History: Theme-related Software Concept and Design

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Preview of version: 43 (current)

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Overview

Tiki uses the Smarty template engine, so pages generally have a PHP file (.php) and a Smarty template (.tpl) associated with them. These produce the XHTML for the page, which is then given visual styles with CSS. The CSS is provided by a combination of some feature-specific stylesheets, default layout and design stylesheets, and theme stylesheets.

Concept (Tiki14)

There are several features that determine which theme is displayed for a given screen. See also About the changes for Tiki14 see a bit more info here:

Site theme

Site theme setting can be made at the Look and Feel settings panel. Themes can have options.

Overrides:
- none

Overridden by:
- user theme
- group theme
- theme control
- perspective

User theme

If preference change_theme is enabled than users are allowed to change theme.

Overrides:
- site theme
- perspective

Overridden by:
- group theme
- admin theme
- theme control

Limited by:
- available themes

Available themes

In the Look&Feel settings page it is possible to limit the list of the themes and theme options users can pick from when changing theme is allowed (preference name: available_themes).

Group theme

Define a theme for a group (tiki-admingroups.php)

Overrides:
- site theme
- user theme
- perspective

Overridden by:
- admin theme
- theme control

Admin theme

Themes and theme options for the settings control panels (tiki-admin.php?page=XXX).

Overrides:
- site theme
- user theme
- group theme

Overridden by:
- perspective setting

Not affected by:
- theme control

Theme Control

Allows to have a specific theme for objects, categories and sections, see

Overrides:
- site theme
- user theme
- group theme
- perspective

Overridden by:
- none

No effect for:
- admin theme

Perspective

Perspectives are to override a preference, see

Overrides:
- site theme
- admin theme

Overridden by:
- user theme

Edit CSS

It is possible to try, view and edit css files from a built in CSS editor. Using the "Try" functionality the selected theme/option is applied
and shown for all screens in Tiki for the duration of your login session.
Overrides:
- everything

Overridden by:
- none

How Tiki decides which theme to display

0) If a CSS try theme session is active than that theme will be used, so in this case none of the below points apply

1) Check for user's theme preference

2) If there is a group theme defined, override user's theme

3) If Theme Control feature is enabled, then override the above like this:
- If a theme is assigned to the individual object that theme is used
- If not then if a theme is assigned to the object's category that theme is used: but if the object is assigned to multiple categories and this causes a conflict in the theme choice then they are all skipped and the next logical choice in this hierarchy is chosen
- If not then a theme for the section is used

4) If an admin page (Settings control panel) is displayed, check if there is any admin theme set to override. When in a perspective, check if there is a perspective specific setting and override if available.

5) If none of the above applies, use the site theme. When in a perspective, see if there is a perspective specific setting and override if available.

Theme related CSS files

Basics

1) Tiki always loads themes/base_files/css/tiki_base.css, no matter which theme is selected. This file contains rules specific to Tiki that Bootstrap doesn't have awareness of.

2) The css file of a theme (or theme option) must always have to be named like the name of the theme's or option's folder name, for example for fivealive-lite theme it is called fivealive-lite.css. This isn't necessary if the theme is selected by specifying the Custom theme URL, but if it's selected as a theme in the "themes" directory, then it needs to follow that naming scheme.

Create a new theme or theme option

Tip

More information about how to structure a new theme:

New theme

If you want to create a new theme for Tiki, you have place a css file under the css folder in the theme's directory (eg: for a new theme called "mytheme": themes/mytheme/css/mytheme.css).

Please note

The themes/base_files/tiki_base.css has rules for Tiki-specific things (similar to the old layout.css and design.css). It doesn't have anything related to Bootstrap, though, such as the grid, form classes, and so on. These have to be provided by the theme stylesheet.

It isn't necessary to use Less to make the theme stylesheet, as long as the end product is essentially a bootstrap.css equivalent. That is, the theme stylesheet needs to contain the grid layout classes, rules for responsive behavior, and so on in addition to the color and typography rules, etc. for the theme.

Anyway, this is what we might think of as the "standard" way, with the fewest separate CSS files.

More information about how to structure a new theme:

New theme option

If you want to create a simple new option called "myoption" (eg: for the "mytheme" theme), than proceed like this:

step1) create a new subfolder under the "themes/mytheme/options" folder called "myoption/css" (so path is: "themes/mytheme/options/myoption/css/")
step2) place in the new folder a css file that contains the changed or additional css for your new option (eg: "themes/mytheme/options/myoption/css/myoption.css") - this is loaded in addition to the theme.css file in the main css folder eg themes/mytheme/css/mytheme.css
step3) optionally place in the new folder a custom.css file that contains your specific local customizations for that one Tiki instance (eg: "themes/mytheme/options/myoption/css/custom.css") - this too is loaded in addition to any custom.css file that is placed in the main css folder eg themes/mytheme/css/custom.css

For more complex options you can also have the same folder structure as for a normal theme (fonts, icons, images, templates, etc).

Tip

If you just want a few simple changes to the default Bootstrap theme, than create a new option under "themes/default/options/"

This way the new theme doesn't have to have the bootstrap rules. The new theme can just override or add to the bootstrap rules, essentially being a Bootstrap theme option.

Customizaton of themes and options

If you want to slightly modify (change some colors, backgrounds, etc) a theme or a theme option shipped with Tiki then it may be easier for you, if you don't edit the theme files directly, but create a custom.css file in the same directory of the theme or theme option and store your customizations there.

If you have a main theme with theme options, you can have a custom.css for the main theme and another custom.css for the theme option, both will be loaded (first the main theme's custom.css, then the theme option's custom.css)

To create a highly customized theme however it may be better, from an onward change management point of view, to add your own option to an existing theme. This then lets you use all the css from the main theme as a 'base' for your customised theme and this will be automatically maintained/updated for subsequent Tiki version changes. All you have to do then is to develop your option css and change this from time to time as may be necessary due to Tiki version upgrades and you can use your own naming convention for the option and its subsequent versions for your change management process.

Loading css files

For a main theme Tiki gets first the theme's main css file (eg: from themes/mytheme/css/mytheme.css), then a custom.css file containing local customizations if found in the theme's css folder (eg: /themes/mytheme/css/custom.css)
If a theme option is enabled, then Tiki gets first the main theme's css file (eg: from "themes/mytheme/css/mytheme.css") then it gets the theme option's css file ("themes/mytheme/options/myoption/css/myoption.css"), and then it loads the main theme's custom.css (eg: from "themes/mytheme/css/custom.css") and finally the theme option's custom.css file containing local customizations if found in the option's folder (eg: "themes/mytheme/options/myoption/css/custom.css")

Theme related smarty template files

Basics

Tiki uses smarty templates
Tiki ships all basic template files in the "templates/" folder.

Tip for Tiki14 upgraders

The goal of moving customization stuff to the "themes/" folder was to have self-contained themes, which means that you can store all your site customizations (css, templates, images, etc) in this folder. This move should make your life easier. However, you should be aware, that if you are upgrading from a preTiki14 version then you have to move your custom templates from the legacy "templates/styles/mytheme/" folder to the new "themes/mytheme/templates" folder or the themes/mytheme/options/myoption/templates.

(please note that "mytheme" and "myoption" are not actual folder names, they are just examples)

Customization of templates

If you don't like how, for example, a blog post (templates/tiki-view_blog_post.tpl) looks, you can have your own, redesigned template.
You have a number of ways of implementing this however as follows:
1) If you want to have a custom template available for all your themes, you should put the altered or new template file in the "themes/templates/" folder.
2) If you want to have a custom template for a given theme and all its potential options, put the template file in the "themes/mytheme/templates" folder
3) If you want to have a custom template for just one specific theme option, put the template file in the "themes/mytheme/options/myoption/templates" folder

In this way you can manage a hierarchy of choices so that the same .tpl file can have different content depending upon whether it is available at a specific level in this choice hierarchy.

How Tiki decides which template to display

1) first try to use the theme option's template folder (eg: "themes/mytheme/options/myoption/templates/tiki-view_blog_post.tpl)
2) then try to use the theme's template folder (eg: "themes/mytheme/templates/tiki-view_blog_post.tpl)
3) then try to use "themes/templates" folder (eg: "themes/templates/tiki-view_blog_post.tpl)
4) finally use "templates/" folder ( (eg: "templates/tiki-view_blog_post.tpl))

Some other considerations

Newsletter css

As discussed in the

The customised newsletter.css file should be placed in either the /themes/mytheme/css/ folder or the /themes/mytheme/options/myoption/css/ folder.

custom.js

Custom javascript can be defined using the Customization tab of the main Look & Feel admin screen - but often this is better managed in a separate file called custom.js that is held on the server.

There are number of choices where the file with the custom javascript can be held on the server depending upon whether the script is theme dependent or not:

to use a file independent of any specific theme it should be placed in the root of the /themes folder
to use a file for all options of a specific theme it should be placed in the root of the main folder for the theme eg in /themes/mytheme
finally to use a file for a specific option within a theme it should be placed in the root of the option folder eg in themes/mytheme/options/myoption/

In all instances the file will be automatically loaded after the main set of javascript definitions. # Developer info

The different theme settings are stored as preferences and can be accessed as smarty variables.

Theme selection logic

Theme selection is primarily done at lib/setup/theme.php. If you enable Theme Control, then after lib/setup/theme.php has finished tiki-tc.php kicks in and makes sure that Theme Control settings are applied.

Template selection logic

Template selection is done using lib/init/smarty.php.

Most of this was developed in the tiki14_themes experimental

It was merged back into trunk on 19 jan 2015

Here are the details of the merge back to trunk commit

[+]

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Merged from tiki14_themes
[ENH] Gezza's patch "Tiki14_Theme_patch_2014-12-21"
Part 1: General prefs renaming and restoration of "options" and refactoring of theme functions into themelib.
e.g. site_style -> theme_site, style_option to theme_option_site, style to theme_active, $tikilib->get_style_path to $themelib->get_theme_path etc [from revision 53354]
[ENH] Gezza's patch "Tiki14_Theme_patch_2014-12-21"
Part 2: User theme functionality including fixing the switch_theme module [from revision 53355]
[ENH] Gezza's patch "Tiki14_Theme_patch_2014-12-21"
Part 3: Group theme changes [from revision 53356]
[ENH] Gezza's patch "Tiki14_Theme_patch_2014-12-21"
Part 4: Theme control changes
Refactor ThemeControlLibinto the right place, numerous other pref changes and tc admin fixes [from revision 53357]
[ENH] Gezza's patch "Tiki14_Theme_patch_2014-12-21"
Part 5: Default theme (empty "skeleton" directory structure) [from revision 53358]
[MOD] remove theme control button from the pref list, it is already there in the top [from revision 53363]
[FIX] theme control category filter setting [from revision 53364]
[FIX] fix php notice when pref is not set [from revision 53365]
[FIX] switch theme php notices for cases when there is no user_theme pref [from revision 53366]
[MOD] comments and make sure Custom URL is removed from the available themes [from revision 53367]
[MOD] Themegenerator is broken, this commit just hides remarksbox by checking if the feature is on [from revision 53368]
[FIX] themes: Simplify logic and remove typo in list_themes, add missing var and global in list_base_iconsets [from revision 53381]
[FIX] themes: Simplify logic in get_iconset (although i think the function is actually unused?) [from revision 53382]
[FIX] themes: Remove unused styles prefs code [from revision 53383]
[FIX] various fixes, including: 1) extending available theme pref to be able to control theme options too 2) adjusting theme switch module accordingly 3) theme control was not working properly, now it drops/adds css files as promised 4) simplify default theme handling in lib/setup/theme.php 5) adjusting lib/setup/theme.php to add css files as promised (first theme css, than option css, finally custom css) 6) adjusting user preference screen to handle theme selection TODO: fix that an additional manual page refresh is needed for the new theme to be displayed [from revision 53386]
[FIX] tc_theme_path [from revision 53387]
[KIL] For consistency, redundant theme option CSS file removed (naming convention subject to further discussion). [from revision 53399]
[FIX] custom templates for theme control themes [from revision 53400]
[MOD] in case of theme options load main theme's custom tpl even if there is not custom tpl for the option itself [from revision 53401]
[REF} Theme option file renamed for consistency (naming convention subject to further discussion). [from revision 53404]
[REF] Didiem was revamped as a full bootstrap.css equivalent so it seems more appropriate as a full theme rather than an option. [from revision 53405]
[REF] Remove jqui.css import statement from option files, since both files are now loaded again as before. [from revision 53406]
[MOD] when using theme option, add first the main theme's custom.css, than the theme option's custom.css [from revision 53407]
[FIX] custom modules and smarty includes were not loading for theme options [from revision 53408]
[REF] FIveAlive-lite theme option files made partial, overriding style sheets again rather than full bootstrap.css equivalents. [from revision 53410]
[MOD] newsletter css selection [from revision 53411]
[FIX] restoring loading of custom.js (try to load first from the root dir of site theme/site theme option, or if not found there, than from "/themes" folder) [from revision 53413]
[ENH] themes: Add a demo/test theme option for flatly - sort of works [from revision 53417]
[FIX] send newsletter css file path [from revision 53418]
[FIX] newsletters: Move $tikilib declaration to where it's needed [from revision 53420]
[FIX] themes: Make $themelib->get_theme_path automatically guess where different types of file should be found, can be set as a param for ambiguous ones. Should fix current newsletter.css issues (thanks Geoff) [from revision 53422]
[FIX] show templates after clearing all cache [from revision 53423]
[REF] Remove width and nowrap rules for suckerfish menus (matches behavior of Bootstrap menus) so they conform to container size. Work in progress: dropdown arrow visibility/colors. [from revision 53424]
[REF] Added a few Bootstrap classes to suckerfish menus so they get coloring automatically in (external) Bootstrap themes. Todo: Eliminate some color quirkiness in themes. [from revision 53425]
[REF] Adjust padding and margin of first and last menu list items to cover all of containing ul background on hover, preventing a 5px contrasty margin at top and bottom of menu list. [from revision 53426]
[KIL] remove unnecessary update script [from revision 53429]
[MOD] restoring Edit CSS functionality with some related enhancements [from revision 53430]
[REV] reverting 3 files that were accidentally committed in the previous commit, sorry about that [from revision 53431]
[REF] Adjust padding and margin of first and last menu list items to cover all of containing ul background on hover, preventing a 5px contrasty margin at top and bottom of menu list. [from revision 53432]
[MOD] use "theme" and "theme-option" user pref names as before but instead of overwriting other prefs make them have a distinct, meaningful $pref smarty value [from revision 53441]
[FIX] themes: custom_url theme can be external so file may not exist [from revision 53444]
[REF] prefs: Allow prefs that have their own file to be defined there instead of global (language was the only existing one, theme to some soon) [from revision 53471]
[REF] themes: Converge various theme prefs (theme_active, theme_site and users_prefs_theme) into just theme (also for theme_option)
Part 1: global and general usages [from revision 53472]
[REF] themes: Converge various theme prefs (theme_active, theme_site and users_prefs_theme) into just theme (also for theme_option)
Part 2: User prefs and switch theme (note, user pref theme-option changed to theme_option so $user_overrider_prefs functions properly) [from revision 53473]
[FIX] custom url setting field should appear only if it is selected in the theme dropdown [from revision 53475]
[FIX] thumbnail should always consider site theme/option pref, plus correcting the path now that we are guessing for theme subdirs [from revision 53476]
[FIX] themes: Fall back to the default theme if the selected one is not found (thanks gezza)
Unfortunately the current default, called "default" as set in lib/prefs/theme.php:38 is horrible - TODO, pick a better default theme for Tiki 14 😊 [from revision 53480]
[FIX] themes: Cope with themes that don't have options, and enable user to use no option properly when selected. [from revision 53481]
[FIX] themes: Fix default fallback properly by actually setting $theme_path (thanks again gezza) and fix get_theme_path to not return non-existent paths (and remove unnecessary null params on get_theme_path calls) [from revision 53482]
[FIX] themes: Remove the mysterious jquery_ui_chosen_css pref as if jquery_ui_chosen is enabled it really doesn't work at all well without the css file in any setups i can find. Hopefully this was just a Tiki 13 transitional workaround? (let's try without it for a while) [from revision 53483]
[FIX] themes: Add missing theme control and group tables corrections (removing the .css parts) and retrospectively fix a previous php patch to cope with updates from before Tiki 13 where theme_active would not be found. [from revision 53484]
[FIX] themes: Remove the custom_url "theme" from the switch theme list [from revision 53488]
[FIX] themes: Some users_prefs_theme prefs missed, now anonymous can switch theme [from revision 53493]
[FIX] themes: site_theme not theme_site now [from revision 53494]
[SVN] Missing Id keyword [from revision 53500]
[FIX] themes: Better handling for user theme options when anonymous [from revision 53501]
[REF] iconsets: Move the iconsets code into a new IconsetLib library and reduce the number of global vars etc [from revision 53506]
[REF] themes: Rename tiki.css and tiki.less files to the theme or option name .css
As discussed on  https://dev.tiki.org/Tiki14#Less_and_CSS_naming_convention
Probably some further tidying up to do... [from revision 53507]
[REF] themes: Use the new getIconsetForTheme() function in theme control and remove now unused previous get_iconset() fn [from revision 53508]
[FIX] make switch theme consider available_themes pref [from revision 53520]
[MOD] use Edit CSS as title as before [from revision 53530]
[MOD] adjust iconset usage for the installer to eliminate php notices [from revision 53531]

Merge #2 from tiki14_themes

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Merged from tiki14_themes
[MOD] iconsets: Change the theme specific iconset naming convention to match css and other files, so now should be:
    themes/your-theme/icons/your_theme.php and themes/your-theme/options/your-option/icons/your_option.php
Note: hyphens need to be replaced with underscores [from revision 53595]
[FIX] restore possibility to override an icon img with another img just by having the same name. Also change the default icon set icon class to btn-link [from revision 53616]
[FIX] typo [from revision 53617]
[MOD] basic things to get themegenerator somewhat functional again [from revision 53618]
[MOD] themegenlib at new dir [from revision 53619]
[MOD] Some visual and loading changes for brosho CSS assistant. This plugin kindof works, altough its source has not been modified since 2010. (https://github.com/mustardamus/brosho-plugin) Maybe for Tiki15 look for something more up-to-date [from revision 53620]
[MOD] remove and modify tips [from revision 53621]
[FIX] themegen: A few more fixes for the theme generator dialog [from revision 53628]
[REF] icons: Further refactoring of iconsets, so that all the icons available in the chosen set can be used in templates - glyphicons defaults to come soon [from revision 53629]
[REF] icons: Example theme and option icons as demos, possibly should be removed or replaced with better (useful) examples [from revision 53630]
[FIX] icons: Add glyphicons defaults [from revision 53631]
[KIL] Remove redundant layout_section feature.
Hasn't been connected to anything for a long time and should be done with module visibility, perspectives and/or theme control these days. [from revision 53632]

Upgrade to Tiki14

The structure of themes changed singificantly for Tiki14, so please note the below points:
- your old css files will probably need to be reviewed modified as many selectors have been adjusted to bootstrap
- an upgrade patch is provided that modifies your database. The change is focusing on removing ".css" from the end of the theme values in as shown below:

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UPDATE `tiki_preferences` SET `name` = 'theme' WHERE `name` = 'theme_active';
UPDATE `tiki_preferences` SET `name` = 'theme_option', `value` = REPLACE(`value`, '.css', '') WHERE `name` = 'style_option';
UPDATE `tiki_user_preferences` SET `value` = REPLACE(`value`, '.css', '') WHERE `prefName` = 'theme';
UPDATE `tiki_user_preferences` SET `prefName` = 'theme_option', `value` = REPLACE(`value`, '.css', '') WHERE `prefName` = 'theme-option';
UPDATE `tiki_theme_control_categs` SET `theme` = REPLACE(`theme`, '.css', '');
UPDATE `tiki_theme_control_objects` SET `theme` = REPLACE(`theme`, '.css', '');
UPDATE `tiki_theme_control_sections` SET `theme` = REPLACE(`theme`, '.css', '');
UPDATE `users_groups` SET `groupTheme` = REPLACE(`groupTheme`, '.css', '');

History

Information	Version
Wed 24 of Sep, 2025 06:26 UTC System Administrator automatic conversion	43
Wed 08 of Jul, 2015 06:42 UTC Gary Cunningham-Lee Minor editing.	42
Sun 25 of Jan, 2015 15:31 UTC Jonny Bradley	41
Sun 25 of Jan, 2015 13:12 UTC gezza	40
Sun 25 of Jan, 2015 13:10 UTC gezza update and unify examples	39
Mon 19 of Jan, 2015 16:30 UTC Jonny Bradley	38
Thu 15 of Jan, 2015 18:57 UTC gezza some updates	37
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 21:42 UTC Geoff Brickell	36
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:38 UTC Geoff Brickell	35
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:28 UTC Geoff Brickell	34
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:27 UTC Geoff Brickell	33
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:27 UTC Geoff Brickell	32
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:25 UTC Geoff Brickell	31
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:19 UTC Geoff Brickell Remarks Box Plugin modified by editor.	30
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:12 UTC Geoff Brickell	29
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:10 UTC Geoff Brickell	28
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 18:03 UTC Geoff Brickell	27
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 17:57 UTC Geoff Brickell	26
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 17:56 UTC Geoff Brickell	25
Mon 05 of Jan, 2015 11:29 UTC gezza updates	24
Sat 03 of Jan, 2015 09:53 UTC gezza some updates	23
Sun 21 of Dec, 2014 18:14 UTC gezza some description	22
Wed 17 of Dec, 2014 20:30 UTC gezza	21
Tue 16 of Dec, 2014 20:40 UTC gezza	20
Tue 16 of Dec, 2014 20:39 UTC gezza	19
Tue 16 of Dec, 2014 20:36 UTC gezza	18
Tue 16 of Dec, 2014 20:35 UTC gezza developer notes	17
Tue 16 of Dec, 2014 20:18 UTC gezza	16
Tue 16 of Dec, 2014 20:16 UTC gezza theme templates	15
Mon 08 of Dec, 2014 16:13 UTC gezza	14
Mon 08 of Dec, 2014 16:11 UTC gezza	13
Mon 08 of Dec, 2014 16:01 UTC gezza	12
Mon 08 of Dec, 2014 16:00 UTC gezza updates	11
Mon 08 of Dec, 2014 13:36 UTC Torsten Fabricius Added a Remarksbox with the note, that the mentioned features are not YET working in pre-14 due to changed concept and that we are working on it.	10
Sun 07 of Dec, 2014 11:51 UTC gezza	9
Sun 07 of Dec, 2014 11:48 UTC gezza	8
Sun 07 of Dec, 2014 11:39 UTC gezza	7
Sun 07 of Dec, 2014 11:38 UTC gezza	6
Tue 25 of Nov, 2014 11:54 UTC gezza	5
Tue 25 of Nov, 2014 11:52 UTC gezza	4
Tue 25 of Nov, 2014 11:10 UTC gezza	3
Tue 25 of Nov, 2014 11:05 UTC gezza	2
Sun 10 of Apr, 2011 10:46 UTC Gary Cunningham-Lee Content shoveled from "Content & Design" which was causing a loop.	1

Navigation and related functionality and content

Related content

Preview of version: 43 (current)

Overview

Concept (Tiki14)

User theme

Group theme

Admin theme

Theme Control

How Tiki decides which theme to display

Theme related CSS files

Basics

Create a new theme or theme option

Customizaton of themes and options

Loading css files

Theme related smarty template files

Basics

Customization of templates

How Tiki decides which template to display

Some other considerations

Newsletter css

Theme selection logic

Template selection logic

Most of this was developed in the tiki14_themes experimental

Here are the details of the merge back to trunk commit

Upgrade to Tiki14

History