New Template: Dark Matter

[TheMarco]

Thanks for the compliment!

As for your question:

Create an icon (28x28 pixels)

Change CSS:

#title {
background: url(/path/to/your/logo.png) no-repeat 16px 16px;
}

As I said earlier, I recommend putting these customisations in a separate CSS file and include it in a <link> tag after photoblog_compressed.css in the template.

[ranmajen]

I have installed this template, but i don't know why the thunmbnail cannot roll. It keeps rolling the same 5 thumbnails while I have total 11 photos at the moment.

Any idea?

http://gallery.ranmajen.net/index.php?showimage=6

[TheMarco]

Whoah that's seriously odd. Looks like you hit some edge case. Can you try adding some more photos to see if that makes the problem go away?

What are the dates for the pictures? Are they all exactly the same? I see a lot of pics dated 2007 - 12. Do they have the EXACT same time as well? If so, this may be related to the problem. If this is the case, my backend won't be able to sort out which pictures to load next for the caroussel as Pixelpost doesn't provide and way to determine order if the pics have the exact same datetime. Try changing the times slightly for each photo so they're not all the same.

[TheMarco]

I'm close to bringing the theme to 'release' status. The last thing I wanted to do is make the carousel work when Javascript is not available. I've also made the slideout of the commentform look better.

For those who are interested, try out the version running on my site with Javascript switched off in your browser:

http://www.i-marco.nl/photoblog/

The caroussel browser should still work when there's no Javascript.

If I don't find any more critical bugs I will 'freeze' Dark Matter in this state and only post bugfix updates with detailed upgrade instructions in order to prevent people from having to do their customisations over and over again as new releases come out. It will mean the .html templates won't change anymore unless absolutely necessary.

Let me know if you find any issues on my site!

[ranmajen]

Originally Posted by TheMarco

Whoah that's seriously odd. Looks like you hit some edge case. Can you try adding some more photos to see if that makes the problem go away?

What are the dates for the pictures? Are they all exactly the same? I see a lot of pics dated 2007 - 12. Do they have the EXACT same time as well? If so, this may be related to the problem. If this is the case, my backend won't be able to sort out which pictures to load next for the caroussel as Pixelpost doesn't provide and way to determine order if the pics have the exact same datetime. Try changing the times slightly for each photo so they're not all the same.

I am using photo taking time for datetime, here are the details:

2007-06-22 17:00:13
2007-12-14 17:51:01
2007-12-14 23:35:08
2007-12-14 23:37:49
2007-12-14 23:50:52
2007-12-14 23:52:37
2007-12-15 09:02:28
2007-12-15 09:38:30
2007-12-15 09:45:07
2007-12-15 09:45:59
2007-12-15 09:48:15

But if it is the problem relates to datetime, why can it show all the thumbnails with wrong sequence? Now it only can show 5 out of 11.

Very strange.

[ranmajen]

One more information, i upload my photos without following the time sequence, that means the photo id may not in sequence if start showing the photos sorting with datetime (photo taking time).

[TheMarco]

@ranmajen I will try to duplicate your setup soon to see why it's failing. Please do let me know if the problem disappears as you're adding more photos to your blog!

Also,

I decided to hold back on a 'release version' for a bit longer as I'm working on getting better accessibility. I got a whole list of really good feedback from someone who knows an amazing lot about this subject matter and I plan to incorporate his feedback in the final version.

I plan to push out one more new beta release this weekend which has the non-JS carousel and better animation for the comment form.

After this I'll be working on the accessibility aspects for a while.

For those who are customising: I realise new releases are a pain when you want to use the template with personal changes. On the flipside, I think everyone will benefit from higher overall quality in the theme and I want to make it as great as I can. These things unfortunately take time which is why it's called beta for the time being.


Now, in case you don't like all this, there's always the option of picking a version you are personally happy with, customise it to your hearts content and just not upgrade when I come up with a new release.

I WILL specify what has been changed in a new release so you'll be able to figure out whether you can just overwrite the add-on and javascript only for bugfixes.

[ranmajen]

I have added more photos already but still encountered the same problem. So I have switched to the previous template again.

[alberto]

i love the template and appreciate the work you've put into it. it's functional and very elegant.

my only problem is that it clips the bottom 15-20 pixels of any image I upload, regardless of size.

i tweaked at the div's last night a little but im no web designer (yet)...

any ideas what might be causing this? a couple others encountered the same and mentioned it on the download page.

[TheMarco]

I have posted a significant update to the theme. This is one of the largest updates since quite a while.

Highlights:

• Fixes the bug mentioned in various review remarks where the template chops off 20 pixels off each image
• Improved heading structure for better SEO and accessibility
• Thumbnails carousel now works without Javascript!
• Major accessibility enhancements.
• Comment form animates a lot nicer now
• Various tweaks

This is a fairly major update affecting all html files. Improvements are however significant. The entire page is now perfectly keyboard-navigable including opening the JS panels at the appropriate time when tabbing through the links.

Accessibility is an often forgotten aspect of web development. I strive for the best possible experience for disabled users of the internet. For those who are disabled or know a lot about making websites accessible: Please let me know if you find things that can be improved!

I have taken the greatest care I possibly could when it comes to testing this release before posting it. Still it's obviously possible that I screwed something up. If so please let me know!

A small remark to people who post negative remarks in 'reviews' on the download page: I find it a bit discouraging when people post negative remarks in review postings when they are in fact reporting a bug that I will of course fix after it's been discovered. This template is BETA which means bugs occur.

Please let me know if you have any issues with this release.

Finally: I haven't been able to reproduce the problem ranmajen reported. If others are having the same issues please let me know!