jakob's web studio - Template Design Guide

List of phpBB2 Template tpl files

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 05:45:03 -0500

This list was originally hosted in the phpbb.com website knowledge base but later removed after the remake of phpbb.com. The article is mirrored here as a reference for the template design guide. Scroll down the page to view the article.

List of phpBB2 Template Variables

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 05:20:29 -0500

A list of phpBB Template Variables, formerly hosted at http://www.phpbb.com/listvars.php but lost after the remake of the phpbb.com website. The list is now hosted here (scroll down to view it). It can also be accessed using the Wayback Machine:

Appendix

Mon, 23 Jul 2007 05:18:05 -0500

The appendix contains resources referred to in the guide that used to be external but have been mirrored here since the original versions have been taken down.

Some .cfg file magic

Sun, 14 May 2006 06:23:18 -0500

A template for phpBB includes to CFG-files. These can be recognized by their file extension: .cfg. There are usually two CFG-files, theme_info.cfg and templateName.cfg (where templateName is the name of the template).

Some final words

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:39:58 -0500

With all that said I’d like to wish you the best of luck. Remember that determination and an iron will are your best friends so don't give up and keep trying. With enough effort anything's possible!

Supporting your template

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:34:02 -0500

So your template is finished, released and everyone seems to love it, is your work over yet?

Well that’s up to you. If you don’t feel like doing anything more then that’s okay, it’s your call but if you want to keep your template popular, and continue to support the community you should support your template. Supporting your template consists of:

Checking, compressing and distributing your template

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:27:46 -0500

Once exporting is complete you are ready to distribute your template so that others may use it.

Keep a clean house

The first step should be to go through your template’s files and images and delete everything that isn’t needed. You may want to keep some stuff so it might be wise to have a working template copy and one you distribute. Remove all unnecessary files from the distribution copy.

Exporting your template

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:25:18 -0500

Once you’re done testing, verifying and checking it’s time to export your style. As I explained earlier, the theme is stored in the database and contains, among other things, the colors for the moderator and administrator user links in the Who’s Online box.

When you're finished, test!

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:21:41 -0500

When you’ve come to the point when you feel that your template is complete, perfect in every regard, or perhaps just good enough, ask a couple of your friends and members of your family to check it out for you, post and test everything they can see. We tend to become blind to our own mistakes so it’s always a good idea to have someone else look it over and give you a second opinion. It will help you fix problems you may have ignored unknowingly.

Part 5 - Exporting and distributing your template

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:19:30 -0500

Once you’re done editing and feel confident everything works as intended and that every problem or bug has been fixed it’s time to consider releasing your template. Releasing your template is something both the phpBB project and the community benefits from and is a great way to support phpBB and give something back to the community.

Multiple themes per style

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:13:30 -0500

You can create multiple themes to be associated with your style. These can introduce minor changes such as different fonts faces, colors or background images. In order for this to work it is important that you use all or some of the CSS code from subSilver's overall_header.tpl file. In case you have removed it from your copy of overall_header.tpl, you can simple copy it from subSilver's overall_header.tpl and paste it in your file. You can then remove or edit it as you like. Each of the variable placeholders here takes data from the theme configuration which is done in Administration Panel -> Styles Admin -> Management. The variable names and the field names are more or less the same so figuring out where what goes is relatively easy.

Marking up your tpl files to keep track of them

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:11:56 -0500

If you find it hard to keep track of what tpl file is used for what forum part or page there’s a simple way to keep track of it. Open every tpl file and add an HTML comment containing its filename at the top and the bottom of it. So if you edit viewtopic_body.tpl you would add the comment  at the top, and  at the end of the file after all the other HTML and template code.

Multiple color poll result bars

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:09:30 -0500

When you make a poll topic in phpBB, the result of the votes will be shown as bars, one for each option. These bars consist of three images, a left cap image, an image that is repeated to create the center of the bar and a right cap. The code for these bars can be found in viewtopic_poll_result.tpl.

The ICQ status image button

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:06:33 -0500

The page for showing topics, viewtopic_body.tpl contains the buttons that are displayed below posts. I call these “post buttons”. There’s a post button for ICQ, and in the default subSilver template there’s also a snippet for JavaScript code that shows a user’s ICQ online status by overlaying it with a green ICQ flower.

Changing moderator and administrator user link colors for the Who's Online list

Sat, 13 May 2006 17:04:42 -0500

A question often asked is about how to change the link colors for moderator and administrator user listed in the Who’s Online box and on the Who’s Online page. It’s relatively easy, you will need to edit the colors for “font color 2” and “font color 3” in Administration Panel -> Styles Admin -> Management.