ZenLite Black Mandarin has all of its parent’s functionality but with a black and orange skin for those looking for a dark, single column, WordPress theme.

New features include:

• Toggle author display on or off
• Switch between Page or Category links in the horizontal navigation menu
• ZenLite Black Mandarin child theme

All menus are widget-ready and a custom widget-ready page template is also included. Header customisation available via the WordPress Admin interface along with an option to toggle sticky post display on the front page.

Halloween Pumpkins 1.3 is also available on wordpress.org.

ZenLite WordPress Theme

Read the full Interview on Shop Tab’s blog.

If you have customised the WordPress default theme, all of your changes will be over-written the next time you upgrade WordPress. So you need to protect them now by creating your own custom theme.

1. Using FTP (or whatever file management tool you have available), download the wp-content/themes/default folder to your machine.
2. Rename the downloaded folder “mytheme”.
3. Using a plain text editor, open style.css in this new folder and, at the very top of the file change:

   Theme Name: WordPress Default
   Theme URI: http://wordpress.org/

   to

   Theme Name: My Theme

4. Upload the mytheme folder to wp-content/themes on your server.
5. In WordPress, navigate to Appearance / Themes and you should see that the My Theme is now available as a separate theme. Activate it.

Your customisations are now protected against over-writing during an automatic upgrade.

1. Within the WordPress Administration area, navigate to Appearance / Editor.
2. Select single.php and change:

   <div id="content" class="widecolumn" role="main">
   

   to

   <div id="content" class="narrowcolumn">

3. Then change:

   <?php get_footer(); ?>

   to:

   <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
   <?php get_footer(); ?>

Repeat the last 2 steps for archives.php, links.php & image.php

First of all, you need to decide whether you’ll be running a web site or a blog that invites comments and discussion. Whilst most themes will work as well for a blog as they do on a basic, no discussion, site, you don’t want to find out that your comment display options are limited on your busy blog three months down the line.

If you’re not going to use Posts or comments, ignore any comment enhancements or featured post extras. They’ll be a bit pointless if you’ll be only be using Pages.

Layout

Next, decide what kind of layout you want. 1 column? 3 columns? A narrow or wide display? Focus your search on these decisions. using the Tags page on the WordPress Theme Directory might help in that respect.

When you start to view theme, try not to be too swayed by color. It’s usually far harder to change the layout of a theme compared to changing its colors – although themes with lots of graphical elements (patterned backgrounds, rounded boxes etc) also have their own problems.

To Hack Or Not To Hack

If you are comfortable using XHTML, CSS, PHP and WordPress template tags, go for themes that don’t have custom options. They’re often the easiest to hack.

If you’re non-technical and didn’t understand half of the last paragraph, look for themes that are widget-ready and offer custom header and/or sidebar placement options.

Something Old, Something New

Make a note of the last time a theme was updated. One that hasn’t been touched for years is far less likely to work effectively with the latest version of WordPress compared to one that has been updated recently. Take time out to read any comments posted against the theme. They might forewarn you potential problems.

Preview First

Use the Preview option to view themes in action. OK – so you only get to view a demo front page within a window but that page is carefully constructed to try and give you a good idea of how the theme will look on a working site. Scroll right down. Check the various Headings. Examine the list displays. How readable is the text generally? The closer this preview corresponds to what you want on your site, the smaller the risk that you’ll need to undertake any heavy customisation.

In Summary

Time taken choosing your theme — rather than grabbing the first one that takes your fancy — will pay dividends in the long run.

Happy hunting!

Who are you going to turn to?

The WordPress Support Forums.

But your chances of getting an answer will be significantly improved if you follow a few simple points:

• Search the WordPress Codex first. There is plenty of documentation available and it is being constantly updated. Use it!
• Search the WordPress forums. Don’t just post a question without checking to see if it’s been answered before. The forums are extremely busy and no-one is being paid to help, or answer, you. Do some of your own research first.
• Don’t post questions or complaints relating to free wordpress.com blogs. The WordPress Support forums are primarily for self-hosted blogs, so you won’t find much in the way of help there.
• If you can’t find an answer yourself, read the Forum Rules before posting.
• Post your query in the most appropriate forum. Don’t post the same question in multiple forums. That’s just one way to cause severe aggravation and reduce the chances of receiving any responses.
• Give your post an accurate Topic Title. A title of “Help!” isn’t much use.
• If your problems relate to a specific theme or plugin, tag your post with the theme, or plugin, name.
• Remember to indicate what version of WordPress you are using.
• Post a brief summary of your problem — including any troubleshooting steps you’ve already tried. Include the address of your site, if possible — not a link to a theme. There are currently more than 850 themes in the WordPress Themes directory. Funnily enough, most people aren’t intimately familiar with every one of them…
• Don’t include huge chunks of code in your post. For larger blocks of code, use the WordPress pastebin. It makes life easier for everyone.
• Don’t bump topics. Those with a single post are prioritised, so bumping is a one way of ensuring that your topic will be pushed down the queue and your question may not be answered at all.
• Don’t ask people to completely re-design your theme for you. Many of those who help out on the forums are professional web developers. Asking them to work for free simply isn’t on.
• Don’t complain if the answers you receive are technical. Sometimes the only possible solution involves coding of one sort or another.

  If you are running a self-hosted WordPress blog, you will probably need to undertake some coding at one point or another. So you can either roll up your sleeves and dive in. Or you can pay someone else to do it instead.