--- /dev/null
+# Themes
+
+* [Home](help)
+
+To change the look of friendica you have to touch the themes.
+The current default theme is [duepunto zero](https://github.com/friendica/friendica/tree/master/view/theme/duepuntozero) but there are numerous others.
+Have a look at [friendica-themes.com](http://friendica-themes.com) for an overview of the existing themes.
+There are several ways to change a theme.
+You can either directly work on an existing theme.
+But you might loose your changes when the theme is updated by the friendica team.
+In cases where you are almost happy with an existing theme, the easiest way to cover your needs is to create a new theme, inheritating most of the properties of the parent theme and change just minor stuff.
+The beloow for a more detailed description of theme heritage.
+
+Some themes also allow users to select *variants* of the theme.
+Those theme variants most often contain an additional [CSS](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CSS) file to override some styling of the default theme values.
+From the themes in the main repository *duepunto zero* and *vier* are using this methods for variations.
+
+Third you can start your theme from scratch.
+Which is the most complex way to change friendicas look.
+But it leaves you the most freedom.
+So below for a detailed description and the meaning of some special files.
+
+## Styling
+
+If you want to change the styling of a theme, have a look at the themes CSS file.
+In most cases, you can found these in
+
+ /view/theme/<your-theme-name>/style.css
+
+sometimes, there is also a file called style.php in the theme directory.
+This is only needed if the theme allowes the user to change certain things of the theme dynamically.
+Say the font size or set a background image.
+
+If you want to change the structure of the theme, you need to change the templates used by the theme.
+Friendica themes are using [SMARTY3](http://www.smarty.net/) for templating.
+The default template can be found in
+
+ /view/templates
+
+if you want to override any template within your theme create your version of the template in
+
+ /view/theme/<your-theme-name>/templates
+
+any template that exists there will be used instead of the default one.
+The same rule applies to the JavaScript files found in
+
+ /js
+
+they will be overwritten by files in
+
+ /view/theme/<your-theme-name>/js.
+
+## Expand an existing Theme
+
+### A new Variation for duepuntozero
+
+In
+
+ /view/theme/duepuntozero/deriv
+
+you find a couple of CSS files that define color derivations from the duepunto theme.
+These resemble some of the now as unsupported marked themes, that were inherited by the duepunto theme.
+Darkzero and Easter Bunny for example.
+
+The selection of the colorset is done in a combination of a template for a new form in the settings and aome functions in the theme.php file.
+The template (theme_settings.tpl)
+
+ <script src="{{$baseurl}}/view/theme/quattro/jquery.tools.min.js"></script>
+ {{include file="field_select.tpl" field=$colorset}}
+ <div class="settings-submit-wrapper">
+ <input type="submit" value="{{$submit}}" class="settings-submit" name="duepuntozero-settings-submit" />
+ </div>
+
+defines a formular consisting of a [select](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/HTML/Element/select) pull-down which contains all aviable variants and s submit button.
+See the documentation about [SMARTY3 templates](/help/snarty3-templates.md) for a summary of friendica specific blocks other then the select element.
+
+The template alone wont work.
+You make friendica aware of its existance and tell it how to use the template file, by defining a config.php file.
+It needs to define at lest the following functions
+* theme_content
+* theme_post
+
+and may also define functions for the admin interface
+
+* theme_admin
+* theme_admin_post.
+
+theme_content and theme_admin are used to make the form available in the settings, repectively the admin panel.
+The _post functions handle the processing of the send form, in this case they save to selected variand in friendicas database.
+
+To make your own variation all you need to do is to create a new CSS file in the deriv directoy and include it in the array in the config.php:
+
+ $colorset = array(
+ 'default'=>t('default'),
+ 'greenzero'=>t('greenzero'),
+ 'purplezero'=>t('purplezero'),
+ 'easterbunny'=>t('easterbunny'),
+ 'darkzero'=>t('darkzero'),
+ 'comix'=>t('comix'),
+ 'slackr'=>t('slackr'),
+ );
+
+the 1st part of the line is the name of the CSS file (without the .css) the 2nd part is the common name of the variant.
+The selected 1st part will be saved in the database by the theme_post function.
+
+ function theme_post(&$a){
+ // non local users shall not pass
+ if(! local_user())
+ return;
+ // if the one specific submit button was pressed then proceed
+ if (isset($_POST['duepuntozero-settings-submit'])){
+ // and save the selection key into the personal config of the user
+ set_pconfig(local_user(), 'duepuntozero', 'colorset', $_POST['duepuntozero_colorset']);
+ }
+ }
+
+Now that this information is set in the databes, what should friendica do with it?
+For this, have a look at the theme.php file of the theme.
+There you'll find somethink alike
+
+ $colorset = get_pconfig( local_user(), 'duepuntozero','colorset');
+ if (!$colorset)
+ $colorset = get_config('duepuntozero', 'colorset');
+ if ($colorset) {
+ if ($colorset == 'greenzero')
+ $a->page['htmlhead'] .= '<link rel="stylesheet" href="view/theme/duepuntozero/deriv/greenzero.css" type="text/css" media="screen" />'."\n";
+ /* some more variants */
+ }
+
+so you'll just need to add a if selection, fitting your variant keyword and link to the CSS file of it.
+
+Done.
+Now you can use the variant on your system.
+But remember once the theme.php or the config.php you have to readd your variant to them.
+
+*More of less the same procedure works for the vier theme.*
+
+### Inheritation
+
+Say, you like the duepuntozero but you want to have the content of the outer columns left and right exchanged.
+That would be not a color variation as shown above.
+Instead we will create a new theme, duepuntozero_lr, inherit the properties of duepuntozero and make small changes to the underlying php files.
+
+So create a directory called duepunto_lr and create a file called theme.php with your favorite text editor.
+The content of this file should be something like
+
+ <?php
+ /* meta informations for the theme, see below */
+ function duepuntozero_lr_init(&$a) {
+ $a-> theme_info = array(
+ 'extends' => 'duepuntozero'.
+ );
+ set_template_engine($a, 'smarty3');
+ /* and more stuff e.g. the JavaScript function for the header */
+ }
+
+Next take the default.php file found in the /view direcotry and exchange the aside and right_aside elements.
+So the central part of the file now looks like this:
+
+ <body>
+ <?php if(x($page,'nav')) echo $page['nav']; ?>
+ <aside><?php if(x($page,'right_aside')) echo $page['right_aside']; ?></aside>
+ <section><?php if(x($page,'content')) echo $page['content']; ?>
+ <div id="page-footer"></div>
+ </section>
+ <right_aside><?php if(x($page,'aside')) echo $page['aside']; ?></right_aside>
+ <footer><?php if(x($page,'footer')) echo $page['footer']; ?></footer>
+ </body>
+
+Finally we need a style.css file, inheriting the definitions from the parent theme and containing out changes for the new theme.
+
+ @import url('../duepuntozero/style.css');
+
+Done.
+But I agree it is not really useful at this state.
+Nevertheless, to use it, you just neet to activate in the admin panel.
+That done, you can select it in the settings like any other activated theme.
+
+## Creating a Theme from Scratch
+
+Keep patient.
+Basically what you have to do is identifying which template you have to change so it looks more like what you want.
+Adopt the CSS of the theme accordingly.
+And iterate the process until you have the theme the way you want it.
+
+## Special Files
+
+### unsupported
+
+If a file (which might be empty) exists in the theme directory, the theme is marked as *unsupported*.
+An unsupported theme may not be selected by a user in the settings.
+Users who are already using it wont notice anything.
+
+### README(.md)
+
+The contents of this file, with or without the .md which indicates [Markdown](https://daringfireball.net/projects/markdown/) syntax, will be displayed at most repository hosting services and in the theme page within the admin panel of friendica.
+
+This file should contain information you want to let others know about your theme.
+
+### screenshot.[png|jpg]
+
+If you want to have a preview image of your theme displayed in the settings you should take a screenshot and save it with this name.
+Supported formats are PNG and JPEG.
+
+### theme.php
+
+This is the main definition file of the theme.
+In the header of that file, some meta information are stored.
+For example, have a look at the theme.php of the *quattro* theme:
+
+ <?php
+ /**
+ * Name: Quattro
+ * Version: 0.6
+ * Author: Fabio <http://kirgroup.com/profile/fabrixxm>
+ * Maintainer: Fabio <http://kirgroup.com/profile/fabrixxm>
+ * Maintainer: Tobias <https://f.diekershoff.de/profile/tobias>
+ */
+
+You see the definition of the themes name, it's version and the initial author of the theme.
+These three information should be listed.
+If the original author is not anymore working on the theme, but a maintainer has taken over, the maintainer should be listed as well.
+The information from the theme header will be displayed in the admin panelö.
+
+Next crucial part of the theme.php file is a definition of an init function.
+The name of the function is <theme-name>_init.
+So in the case of quattro it is
+
+ function quattro_init(&$a) {
+ $a->theme_info = array();
+ set_template_engine($a, 'smarty3');
+ }
+
+Here we have set the basic theme information, in this case they are empthy.
+But the array needs to be set.
+And we have set the template engine that should be used by friendica for this theme.
+At the moment you should use the *smarty3* engine.
+There once was a friendica specific templating engine as well but that is not used anymore.
+If you like to use another templating engine, please implement it.
+
+When you want to inherit stuff from another theme you have to *announce* this in the theme_info:
+
+ $a->theme_info = array(
+ 'extends' => 'duepuntozero',
+ );
+
+which declares *duepuntozero* as parent of the theme.
+
+If you want to add something to the HTML header of the theme, one way to do so is by adding it to the theme.php file.
+To do so, add something alike
+
+ $a->page['htmlhead'] .= <<< EOT
+ /* stuff you want to add to the header */
+ EOT;
+
+The $a variable holds the friendica application.
+So you can access the properties of this friendica session from the theme.php file as well.
+
+### default.php
+
+This file covers the structure of the underlying HTML layout.
+The default file is in
+
+ /view/default.php
+
+if you want to change it, say adding a 4th column for banners of your favourite FLOSS projects, place a new default.php file in your theme directory.
\ No newline at end of file
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