Version: Hemsqui 0.21 released!
Finally, after months of dribbling around with Hemingway and Squible, I am ready to release my own theme, or rather a mod, based on abovementioned themes, and hence the name “Hemsquiâ€.
You can see a live demonstration right on this blog right now. The package you will download though is a little toned down version of what is up on the site right now – the reason being I am using many plug-ins to achieve what I want, and I thought it would be simpler if I kept the alternate features as a separate download.
Some salient features of this theme include:
• It is a hybrid between Squible and Hemingway. I wanted the best of both features on my site; hence Hemsqui was created taking the best of both worlds.
• A 3 block sidebar on the main page. Like Hemingway, there are lots of blocks that can be added and displayed on the main page. Those blocks can be added directly from the admin area.
• I also added a current recommendations block on homepage, which really is nothing but some divs put together. You can go ahead and delete it if you wish. Or if you like it, change the Amazon code to your tastes.
• Implements all the lovely features of Squible – namely, popular tags, asides and categories as tags.
• Like Squible, if you are above registered user, you can add tags to your post directly from the post page itself.
• A lot of free space for non-intrusive ads if you wish. Right now you see that on my blog itself.
This theme supports all plug-ins that Squible and Hemingway support and some more:
• Comment Heat Map plug-in
• RSS Friends Aggregator plug-in
• Delicious Plug-in
• Pandora Music List
Just visit the theme options to find out more about it.
Now for the nitty-gritty parts of this theme:
INSTALLATION
Download the theme by clicking on link below:
After downloading, unzip the contents of the zip file into /blog-directory/wp-content/themes/Hemsqui
Go to your Administration Panel > Themes > Enable Hemsqui theme.
Once you enable Hemsqui, visit the Hemsqui options page to configure the way you want your blocks to show up on the homepage.
That’s about it.
README
There are some issues however with my theme – admittedly. I am not the best PHP guy or the best web designer in the world, hence there will be issues with the theme; if you face any problem, shoot a comment on this post and I will try to reply to it.
The theme directory also includes a file called “template-functions-category.phpâ€. I have found that the popular tags plug-in (from Squible) only works for me if have the above file in the wp-includes directory. I suggest you first try and see if popular tags plug-in works for you – if it does great. If it doesn’t, then take the file above and replace it with the one in /wp-includes/ directory. As a tip, I would rather take a copy of the file and then replace it.
SUPPORT FOR PLUG-INS
I made some templates for using the comment-heat map plug-in, Pandora plug-in and the Popular tags plugin. To use this, you will need the comment-heat-map plug-in. Download it and activate it. Then create a page, and use “funtags†as the template for the page.
I also used a modified version of RSS-Friend-Aggregator plug-in to get RSS feeds out of my Blogroll directly on a page. Download the plug-in and activate it. More instructions on how to use that plug-in to periodically refresh RSS feeds is on the plug-ins home page. Once you have installed the plug-in, create a new page by any name you want – and use the template “link_feeds_by_date.php†(supplied) to get the kind of output you see on my blog. You are of course welcome to use any of your kind as well hehe ïŠ
THINGS TO DO:
There are a lot of things that I need to still do:
Clear up the code.
Clear up the CSS Mess.
Add support for more plug-ins.
Add get rid of some bugs.
LASTLY…
This theme is released under GPL. Its free, its open source and you are free to do anything with it as long as you don’t make money out of it. If you do share it with me ïŠ – I am kidding. I would like it if you would leave a link back to my blog, so that I can see how is using this theme; also if you can make a great mod to this them, please let me know and I would love to use it myself! Also, (if you wish) don’t forget to thank the original creators behind Hemingway and Squible; they really did a neat job.
Cheers.