The themes that seem to be more up to date are the eBusiness, ePhoto, eVid, eGamer, and Coldstone themes. They are the nicest looking, in my opinion. The other themes look just as nice, but I haven’t worked with most of them, and a couple I tried look like they are waiting to be updated to 2.8, or my local test environment is broken, could be either really.

The themes all have a read me on how to install them, and any required plugins, and Photoshop files to work with if you choose to customize anything. The site also has a large forum for everything from questions, to suggestions, and a place to show off any customizations to the themes.

Once you get the theme installed you’ll want to go and take a look at the options for the theme. Currently they are working on making their options piece for the themes easier to use, and nicer looking.

Here you can see the options for the eBusiness theme, they look nice, and are pretty straightforward in what they do.

Most of the theme is controlled through the options, some of what you can put on your homepage, or use for thumbnails is done through the use of custom fields, a common thread amongst themes like these, and the rest is setting the links and some teaser type text. The on thing I can say here is the use of IDs for things on the homepage, specifically with eBusiness theme, and a couple others. I don’t use the querystring param setup for my permalinks, it hurts SEO (yes even on a tiny site I think about SEO). I use permalinks formatted with the month/day/year/title, or something along those lines. I don’t like having to dig to find the ID of something to have it on the homepage. I guess either Wordpress could make these IDs more readily available, which may already be possible but I am not seeing it. It would be better if the theme could pick the ID, or maybe have something to browse the content you already have in the site, and it can pull the ID itself.

Once those items are setup, the last thing left to do really is replace the stock logo with your own. This was one other point I was kind of disappointed in. Throughout the theme you can set the URL for an image for the “About Me” section, or for many other items like ads. However with the logo, the only thing I can find is to change the name of the file in the header file, or to name your custom logo the same as the stock one. It would have been nice to have an option for this in the theme. Again, this is a tiny thing, and anyone who knows Wordpress should be able to manage this on their own.

All in all, these themes are fantastic, you get a lot for a tiny price tag really. I highly suggest taking a look at the site, see if there is something you like for your own site, and take the plunge. The forums are active with the admins, so help is always easily found, and they are beautiful themes, with the most important part, the right price.

I had spent a lot of time looking at other “premium” themes, and theme clubs. What I found was a lot of generic layouts, or worse the same layout repeated with slightly different colors or fonts. Most of these themes alone, cost more than the price of the many options you get with Elegant Themes. Hop on over and take a look, and check my other site where I’ll be using on of their themes soon. Now I just have to make up my mind.

First was a blog called ThemeGrrl, as the name and title suggests it is for more feminine themes, but since this was my girlfriend’s crafting site, that’s a good thing. She seems to have a lot of posts for different styles of themes, and is pretty well put together. She uses the same host as the new one I used for my girlfriend, and has posted about them a few times as well. 

Next was SimplyWP, the site is not too bad, they have some nice themes to look at, although I wish they would put a preview pic in the blog post itself. I’m a huge fan of free themes, it’s a great way for people with the skills to put together a small portfolio, even better if they get used. There is also really no need to pay for a lot for theme for your personal blog. I sometimes wonder how much business the “Premium” themes vendors get, if anyone of you is reading this, please feel free to give me a clue. I myself am completely incapable of designing anything, I just don’t have the creativity I guess, and I envy those who can. 

As always setting up the new site was a breeze, especially since most hosts have auto installers for Wordpress. I really like that I can crank out something simple and useable so fast, which still has the potential to become a decent site either with additional plugins, or by adding in another app to the host. If anyone needs some help with Wordpress I might be able to help, just ask away. If I don’t know the answer, I will gladly make up one that sounds good, just kidding.

Apparently I am a dummy, and this book seems to be what I am looking for. It asnwers a lot of my questions about the hows and the whys, as well the all important wheres in Ruby on Rails. The book is great, written in an older version of RoR, but then again they all are. The differences between the older version the book uses and the current 2.1 version are minimal, thats a HUGE plus in my book. It minimizes the amount of time I spend trying to find the new methods, and keeps everything understandable. I recommend this book a lot if you’re trying to learn RoR.

So the theme is done, mostly, and it will be great when I am ready to implement it. That theme however is not going to be applied to this Wordpress version of the site, it will be used for the RoR version I am beginning work on (again). I have a much better idea of what I need to do, and what I want to do. As with any project I’ll start with the needs, and add in the wants when I am done. I am a firm believer in get the thing working, preferably well, before adding any new functionality. Some may differ on that sort of view, but I find the cause for that is something not based on a product’s, in this case site’s, best interests.

On a sidenote, I am trying to find some freelance sidework. As the bubble of our economy continues to collapse, I think more and more people will be looking for cheaper smaller projects to be completed to save time and cost. I would like to work on my portfolio, or lack of one currently. Please take a look at the resume, linked on my about page, and contact me if there is a fit.