Pixelpost

Finner · #1 02-17-2008, 10:19 AM

Just uploaded my 2nd template, 'BlackJack', and would love to hear what you think or if anyone has any problems with it.

It's a fairly minimal black based template with the focus on the image. Commenting hasn't been added to this, but I'm sure it wouldn't be hard to add if you wanted it. I can add this to the template if it's really wanted. No addons are required for use, but are easy enough to add should you want to extend it.

You can download it from http://www.pixelpost.org/extend/templates/blackjack/ .. I'd love to get some demos going, but will have to look in to the most efficient way of doing this.. for now, there's just the screenshot (there's a better one in the .zip).

Thanks

**jaywilliams**+ · #2 02-17-2008, 04:19 PM

One efficient way to switch templates on the fly would be to use this hack:

http://www.pixelpost.org/forum/showthread.php?t=6644

**GeoS**+ · #3 02-17-2008, 11:34 PM

And is there any demo site?

**dakwegmo**+ · #4 02-18-2008, 02:05 AM

I really like what you've done here, but I think the template needs a little work still.

To start with there's no demo, so I don't know if what I'm seeing is just something that's happening on my system or if it's a problem with the template universally.

Second, once I download and install the template, per the instructions, the pages are unstyled. This is because the template is called 'BlackJack_byFinner' and the folder created bears the same name, but the style sheet link referenced 'BlackJack' (without _byFinner). Renaming the folder and then changing the template to just BlackJack fixed that issue.

Once I was finally able to see the template, it seemed like the photos were shifted a bit too far to the left. After I checked a few of the images on my dev site, I realized that indeed some of the images are shifted partially off of my screen. I checked in IE and the images aren't cut off but the meta data on the right is, and the photo is shifted all the way to the left of the window.

Lastly, I don't see any way to comment on photos or view the comments. This may have been intentional, but I think it's a good idea for any template to include an option to at least click to open the default comments window.

All in all though, I really like what you've done here. I could really see myself using an adapted version of the template once some of the kinks are ironed out. I especially like your layouts for the about and archive pages, and may go ahead and incorporate some of those ideas into my own site.

Finner · #5 02-18-2008, 07:11 AM

Thanks for all the feedback, I do appreciate it. As this was a template I designed for me to use (and I was up until about a month ago..), it is very much tailored to how I wanted my blog to be, but I do agree, there should be the option of commenting already implemented.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Finner

I'd love to get some demos going, but will have to look in to the most efficient way of doing this.. for now, there's just the screenshot (there's a better one in the .zip).

There is no demo at this stage.. Just haven't had the time to organise another installation or explore my options.. will check out the hack though, looks like a nice method.

Thanks for pointing out the folder structure problem dakwegmo! Rather an oversight on my behalf (trying to package it all nicely, and I go and break it..!)..is just plain old 'BlackJack' now

I'll definitely look into the display problems and commenting as soon as I can.. what screen res are you using, if I may ask..? I did have troubles getting it all to center well when developing it, so looks like it wasn't working as well as I had first thought

**dakwegmo**+ · #6 02-18-2008, 12:28 PM

The commenting isn't a big deal, just something that a lot of people may want out of the box.

I've tested it on three different systems. XP and Vista, IE 7 and FF2. Running screen resolutions of: 1920x1200, 1280x1024, and 1280x800. The behavior is similar to what I described above on all three systems.

fredxeric · #7 02-18-2008, 02:33 PM

would love to see a demo...

**dakwegmo**+ · #8 03-10-2008, 06:57 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fred-eric

would love to see a demo...

I've got it running on my dev site http://www.invisiblegreen.com/dev/ but as you can see, it's not really working yet.

Finner · #9 04-12-2008, 07:41 AM

It's been a while (had some unfortunate family matters to deal with..), but I've finally got a demo going for this template, with commenting added.

I believe there are still some display kinks that still need to be worked out - this is a bit harder for me as it looks as it should on my displays. If anyone would be so kind as to let me know what problems they're having, I'll do my best to fix them.

dakwegmo - I'm very appreciative of your putting up a demo for me, and i'm sorry I didn't thank you sooner! You've mentioned display problems with the images going too far off the left, which I can see in your demo. I'd suggest that the images you're using are too big for the template (at 1280x1024 or less, it looks fine at 1680x1050), but at the same time, my template shouldn't limit the size.
I'll have a fiddle with it, but perhaps I'll also make a note of a suggested maximum image size.

The demo can now be seen at http://oculus.farfromreal.com/blackjack/

Scarabaeus · #10 04-12-2008, 09:58 AM

My Ra template is based upon your great template but I did encouter a large number of problems in different browsers when using larger sized photos (800px landscape & 500px portrait). The photos would stretch out to the left and the menu on the right hand side would sometimes be hidden behind the photos, so much that you couldn't see it. What I did is to rather than float the contents, I put them in columns and fixed the table to absolute.

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