Category » Themes

Prepended update 10-17-11 v3.5.3 https://github.com/vc27/ParentTheme_VC

Original Post
For the last 3yrs I’ve been working on a single theme framework I call ParentTheme_VC. I completed my last update at version 3.4.3 and am now at the level where I can truly use my theme as a framework. I recently updated this site using my latest version and I’m rather satisfied with the results :)

I’m not close to a public release yet, but honestly there are so many well done frameworks out there I doubt I need to try and compete. There are also a few items that I need to stream line before I would feel comfortable offering this theme to the public.

Here’s are the basics

• Filter include() & include_once();
  I am using filters on my available include functions and using a template files. This allows for conditionals to be ran on all includes making it very easy to target special needs.
• Actions
  There are a number of actions placed through out the framework making it easy to add content from a plugin or the functions file. As well all content from ParentTheme VC is added via Actions so that you can remove anything that is annoying or in the way.
• Library VC
  A library of custom functions for all post items. This utilizes $objects of post content so that you can use the same function for all items such as get_pages() or get_post().
• Video Meta VC
  Uses custom fields api to create shortcodes for video embeds. This takes out the need to embed full scripts. There is an admin section to set height, width & the embed code. It also has two different widgets for “Featured Video” and tabbed video player that reads via post category.
• Post and Page Widgets
  There is a widget for both Post and Page that will allow for the use to insert a list of posts or page with a number of different options including thumbnail, excerpt or full post, post offset and category specific. (there are more)
• Child Page Loop
  I have added a meta box to the page editor to allow for users to display child pages below the parent page content. This allows users to break up long pages of information into smaller child pages and list them out by menu order. This has been very handy when dealing with lots of content on a single page.
• General Options
  • Favicon
  • Head & Footer Script
  • Post options for excerpt & thumbnail
  • Archive Headers
  • 404 & Search page
  • Password Protect
  • There are many more small tweaks available, but these are the major concepts

ToDo before Public

There are a lot of things to do before I can make this an “out of the box” theme. However, most of all the functionalities I’ve built into the theme come from an internal plugins directory so adding things to existing frameworks is a matter of dropping them into the theme folder.

Layout, Design & Networks are a few items that are still done manually due to the major differences from project to project, but I think a general plugin for managing them should be good enough.

I can definitely say this is more of a developers framework. Honestly I feel like I could use a major overhaul from another developers perspective. But for the most part it’s pretty solid.