Presenting The Tao of You
Because I’m of the strong opinion that creation’s ultimate desire is to be shared, I’m letting the theme I currently use into the public flow. I stripped out some of the personal bits holding this place together, laid down a bunch of generic code, and wrapped this theme into a zip file. It’s now a free creature living under a GPL License. Suppose a couple folks might want to use it, and if not then no harm done.
Again, the standard caveats apply; I am a bumbler when it comes to putting these things together. My code kung-fu is not strong. It is a bit of a mess under the hood, and I am sure I’ll need to fix a swarm of bugs. Nonetheless, and perhaps contrary to certain standards, here it is.
The Tao of You sports the following attributes:
- Valid XHTML & CSS
- Big, fat footer
- Features Jessica Doyle’s Art
- Right footer sidebar area is Widget Enabled
- hatom enabled
- Support for In-line Asides
- Nice footer spot to lay down a natural language hcard
- Rotating picture in the footer
- Supports a bunch of plugins
- Site Map & Search page templates
- Clean as a new set of sheets, looking, maybe not internally
Important Note #1:
The Tao of You is a hacked up version of Small Potato’s Basic Concept theme, or that is the theme from which this one sprang. I strongly recommend you check out Small Potato’s site. Not only does he offer a bunch of great themes, but he posts frequent blog reviews that can help one get a better grasp on building and maintaining a weblog.
Important Note #2
You will need to edit files in order for this theme to suit your needs. As for myself, I enjoy doing this, but not everyone does, nor does everyone feel comfortable doing so. Therefore, I want to be very clear that you will have to wade into these theme files, and change a bunch of things to make it your own. It might be a nice theme to play around with in this respect, or to learn from, not that you can learn anything from my code, but you can learn by ripping it apart. I included a PDF and text file that walks you through what files need to be changed.
Tao of You Credits
One could make the argument that everything is derivative. In the case of this theme, it would not exist without the following people and their resources:
Jessica Doyle
I’m quite fond of Jessica’s art. You can see some of it on her Flickr page. She’s also a lovely person to boot.
Christian Montoya
Who wrote a wonderful comments.php and offered it to everyone as a download. I use his template all the time.
Chris Pearson
Who wrote a very sweet Site Map template and offered it to everyone as a download.
Neil Lee
The Bottom Bar Author info was inspired by his damn cool weblog.
Automatic Labs Random Image Rotator
Which is apparently off-line at this point, or the links I once had no longer go where they once did, and a quick Google search didn’t turn up anything convenient. In any event, the image rotator is included in the download so you get the fruits of their labor.
In Conclusion
I’m sure I’m forgetting to credit someone, but those are the people that come to mind. So, without further ado, grab the Tao of You and get to creating something fine. Oh, as for a demo you’re currently looking at it, but seeing as how I probably won’t be using this theme forever, you can check a out-of-the-box demo at this link. There are slight differences to the one I’m sporting.
DOWNLOAD: Tao of You Theme (1254)
Love the new design, Amos. And I like the way you are using pieces coded by others (e.g., comments.php). I’m thinking about designing some home pages that stand alone, instead of entire themes, and this idea just reinforces that. Thanks!
May 14th 2007 - 10:39pmI love you Griffin.
May 15th 2007 - 6:21am@Robert: Thanks for the compliment. As you can see I’m a bit of a scavenger. Live off the kindness of strangers, but if someone makes it, it’s useful, and it fits I say incorporate it… I love the idea about coding stand alone home pages. Home.php’s can be a tad arcane, or I haven’t really made use of them. So having someone code, and zip one up would be great. Plus I think you make aesthetically pleasing designs so I’d be curious to see what you conjure up. Be a great resource for others…
@Jessica: You’re a sweetheart and a talent.
May 15th 2007 - 9:25amI was given your link by another cat loving friend; I proceeded to drool all over your wonderful website without even reading the related post. This is just what I’ve been looking for in a wordpress theme. I know, I know, I get so excited over things my dogs just don’t understand - but you are SHARING!!! lol Thanks!
May 17th 2007 - 10:01pmThank you Suzanne, for the nice words, and for taking a moment of your time to share them. It’s like I said in the post, I really feel creation’s desire is to be shared. If I create something, writing, a theme, a feeling, it’s pretty insistent that it be released. Not so much concerned with outcome, just with freedom. And I can’t blame my little creations. Who wants to be bottled up?
You mention dogs. Love dogs. What kind do you have? How old?
May 18th 2007 - 6:22amOh my, dogs - my official designation in the family is Keeper of the Hounds. We have the adopted child, Holly, 8 /12 yr old Rottweiler (rescued after being abused & left to starve); Little Bit, the unplanned child a 5 1/2 yr long haired miniature dachshund minx (nee Mad Maggie) and Tank, the planned child, a 5 1/2 year old Rottweiler. When they are good they are good and when they are bad, they do it with flair (and I hear Suze, *your* dogs. . . .” )!
A link to my husbands photography site with the three waiting for him to to remember them. http://www.dlpgraphics.ca/gallery/photo.php?photo=3870
May 20th 2007 - 1:43pmYou have a little family of dogs there Suzanne. Very nice. I’ve always like Rottweilers, but it seems many people have preconceived notions about them, that their mean and such. Do you find this to be the case? For example, our German Shepard is the sweetest guy in the world, very friendly and extroverted, but lots of folks are scared of him because of his looks, because he’s a big German Shepard. It is what it is, but wondering if you notice that with the Rotties… Thanks for the link. I’m gonna go check them out.
May 22nd 2007 - 8:08amIt is sad that both breeds have been used to intimidate people and so vilified in the media. Like German Shepherds, Rottweilers come from a herding background. This can lead to a very protective attitude concerning their *pack*. But raise them right & teach them the manners all dogs should be taught, they are a joy to live with. All of ours have loved people (exuberant extroverts is the term that comes to mind!). I tell strangers their only danger is being well kissed and royally slimmed. Sadly, some never make the jump past “!”!ROTTWEILER!”!” to meet the big friendly clown. Of course, it doesn’t help when Tank barks his big deep, “Get over here and PET ME!” bark . . . or starts loudly rumbling his content for a good ear rub. I wish more people could see how gentle they are with children, the cats, and other small residents of the house.
Hmm… as usual, all that to say, yes, it is something we face every time the dogs are in the public eye, especially when we travel. As a result, I tend to speak out loudly for this beautiful breed given even an inch of someone else’s comment space!
May 27th 2007 - 12:56amThey sound much like Kotter. Very social, and extroverted. It’s in the nature of their herding genes, as you mentioned. I find it sad when they’re not socialized with love and respect. Brings out the worst in them, but cared for they can make such great family friends. I’ve always felt you can tell a lot about a person by the way they choose to interact with their dogs. Dogs tend to heighten a person’s personality, or that’s how I always saw it… Thanks for dropping back in Suzanne.
May 29th 2007 - 7:46am