Joomla 1.6 templates

[Ron Severdia]

As you already know, the new admin template for Joomla 1.6 is
BlueStork. This isn't a totally new template, but a refreshed look and
refined UI based on the new elements in 1.6. There have been a lot of
great ideas coming from within the community and many of them have
already been implemented in the latest SVN.

In the final stretch leading up to the beta release, we're planning
how the front-end templates will work and which templates will be
included. The following are the planned template options:

1) A nice looking default template with some "bells and whistles" but
not "blinged out."

2) A simple, bare-bones "simple" template for beginners to learn how
the basics of templating works.

3) The default Milkyway template from Joomla 1.5, but including
template overrides so it will work in Joomla 1.6. The template itself
would remain identical to the 1.5 version, but the overrides would
demonstrate how to upgrade a 1.5 template, or (with some tweaking)
could be dropped in as overrides in your own template.

The templates Beez and JA_Purity will be dropped from Joomla 1.6, but
the developers of those templates will probably update them for 1.6
and continue to make them available.

Please feel free to submit your feedback and ideas on these plans and
options.

[Marco Giorgetti]

On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 12:58 AM, Ron Severdia<ron.se...@joomla.org> wrote:
> 1) A nice looking default template with some "bells and whistles" but
> not "blinged out."

What do you mean exactly?

--
Marco Giorgetti
http://www.marcogiorgetti.com

[Chris Davenport]

2009/7/28 Ron Severdia <ron.se...@joomla.org>

1) A nice looking default template with some "bells and whistles" but
not "blinged out."

Definitely.  The "core" templates are used as prototypes by many, many people and the focus should be on clarity of coding and simple design techniques that can be easily customised (and documented).
 

2) A simple, bare-bones "simple" template for beginners to learn how
the basics of templating works.

I'd like to tie this in with the official template documentation that I will be starting to work on in the not too distant future.  Unfortunately, the timescales may not match: I won't be able to give much input before the Beta is scheduled for release.
 

3) The default Milkyway template from Joomla 1.5, but including
template overrides so it will work in Joomla 1.6. The template itself
would remain identical to the 1.5 version, but the overrides would
demonstrate how to upgrade a 1.5 template, or (with some tweaking)
could be dropped in as overrides in your own template.

Yes.

The templates Beez and JA_Purity will be dropped from Joomla 1.6, but
the developers of those templates will probably update them for 1.6
and continue to make them available.

Your suggestion is for three templates: 1 is really legacy (Milky Way), 1 is for learning and not realistically usable, leaving only 1 actual serious template.  I'd actually like to see one or two additional templates added to the latter category.  I think we should have at least two templates that can serve as the foundation for real, live sites.  Large numbers of users will just take one of the core templates and do some minimal customisation, rather than creating a new template from scratch.  So I think that if we can offer a choice of good, solid core templates in different styles, to use as starting points, then we may find favour with a larger audience.  Might I suggest one template aimed at each of the top three market segments that Joomla is currently deployed into?  They don't need to differ hugely "under the hood" and should be largely "bling-free" and aimed at easy customisation.

Chris.

[elin]

The new Beez that Angie shared with us about a month ago is really
spectacular looking and a great example of moving to the next level of
accessibility (all accessible javascript etc, usable in the backend
because of how the parameters are set up). I think in terms of
examples, looking for accessibility is always a key issue for people,
which is why so many people worked off of the old Beez. So I'd vote
for putting that in.

A skeleton template would be really helpful (no images, no javascript,
a list of all classes) not just for beginners but for everyone who
makes templates.

Elin

On Jul 29, 4:36 am, Chris Davenport <chris.davenp...@joomla.org>
wrote:
> 2009/7/28 Ron Severdia <ron.sever...@joomla.org>

[Marco Giorgetti]

On Wed, Jul 29, 2009 at 3:09 PM, elin<elin....@gmail.com> wrote:
> A skeleton template would be really helpful (no images, no javascript,
> a list of all classes) not just for beginners but for everyone who
> makes templates.

+1

[Ron Severdia]

Cool...thanks for weighing in. After a chat with Steve Fisher, we both
agree that it makes the best for Joomla strategy-wise to have
templates that fill the following needs:

1) The "nice looking" template described above. This is the "small
business" template that would require a minimal amount of
customization to get where most businesses want it.

2) The "simple" template for the personal site, blogger, or other
simple, elegant needs.

3) The "barebones learning" template (described in my previous post as
the "simple" one) for beginner users to see how to set up their first
template.

4) The Milkyway template with the layout overrides included to
primarily get people with 1.5 templates up and running.


On Jul 29, 1:36 am, Chris Davenport <chris.davenp...@joomla.org>
wrote:

> Your suggestion is for three templates: 1 is really legacy (Milky Way), 1 is
> for learning and not realistically usable, leaving only 1 actual serious
> template.

Now it's 4. :) But the kinds of ideas we were discussing for the
"barebones" template would make it a nice template for use, so don't
be surprised if those minimalist lovers out there use it for their
sites. My personal site is very minimalist and the template has only
30 lines or so of code. So I don't want to discount that template as a
"throwaway" of any kind.

On Jul 29, 6:09 am, elin <elin.war...@gmail.com> wrote:
> The new Beez that Angie shared with us about a month ago is really
> spectacular looking and a great example of moving to the next level of
> accessibility (all accessible javascript etc, usable in the backend
> because of how the parameters are set up). I think in terms of
> examples, looking for accessibility is always a key issue for people,
> which is why so many people worked off of the old Beez. So I'd vote
> for putting that in.

I don't accessibility alone is a reason for including Beez (or any
template for that matter), especially since we're aiming at core
accessibility and across all templates anyway. I haven't seen any
revisions to Beez outside of the version in 1.5, but I don't think it
fits into any of the above categories.

Some template names are being tossed around as well, but if anyone has
any brilliant ideas, throw them out here. :)

[Andrea Tarr at Tarr Consulting]

Angie had done some revisions to Beez. They were in the 1.6 Trunk that was
replaced in early June.

Andy

Andrea Tarr
www.tarrconsulting.com

[Angie Radtke]

Hi,

I started to work on beez already.
At the moment I'm still waiting until the output of com_content is
finished.
I think it's make no sence to start before.
I'm not informed how the actually state of it is.
If somebody has some news about that, please inform me.

Summertimes is not the best time for me to work , because my kids are at
home.
I have to do my daily work and care about them. Their holidays are
finished at the 18th of August .

Bye Angie














ausdrucks | STARK
Büro für Kommunikation Angie Radtke
www.der-auftritt.de
Witterschlicker Allee 52 53125 Bonn
0228/6420467 Mail:a.ra...@derauftritt.de
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Barrierefreies Webdesign
von Angie Radtke und Dr. Michael Charlier
ISBN: 3-8273-2379-7

[Ron Severdia]

On Jul 29, 11:12 pm, "Angie Radtke" <a.rad...@derauftritt.de> wrote:
> At the moment I'm still waiting until  the output of com_content is
> finished.
> I think it's make no sence to start before.
> I'm not informed how the actually state of it is.
> If somebody has some news about  that, please inform me.

Andrea posted revised wireframes here about a week ago:

http://groups.google.com/group/joomla-dev-cms/files

She has assimilated all the community feedback and these will be the
"final" in moving forward.

[Angie Radtke]

Hi Ron ,

these files I know, but what is with the code?

Bye Angie

ausdrucks | STARK
Büro für Kommunikation Angie Radtke
www.der-auftritt.de
Witterschlicker Allee 52 53125 Bonn
0228/6420467 Mail:a.ra...@derauftritt.de
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Barrierefreies Webdesign
von Angie Radtke und Dr. Michael Charlier
ISBN: 3-8273-2379-7

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ron Severdia" <ron.se...@joomla.org>
To: "Joomla! CMS Development" <joomla-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 30, 2009 4:38 PM
Subject: Re: Joomla 1.6 templates

[Ron Severdia]

On Jul 30, 8:17 am, "Angie Radtke" <a.rad...@derauftritt.de> wrote:
> these files I know, but what is with the code?

Those files demonstrate the core output. Isn't that what you're
looking for?

[Angie Radtke]

ausdrucks | STARK
Büro für Kommunikation Angie Radtke
www.der-auftritt.de
Witterschlicker Allee 52 53125 Bonn
0228/6420467 Mail:a.ra...@derauftritt.de
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Barrierefreies Webdesign
von Angie Radtke und Dr. Michael Charlier
ISBN: 3-8273-2379-7

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ron Severdia" <ron.se...@joomla.org>
To: "Joomla! CMS Development" <joomla-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 30, 2009 5:10 PM
Subject: Re: Joomla 1.6 templates

[Angie Radtke]

Hi Ron,

maybe I'm standing on the line, maybe I passed some information because of
my language prob. .-)


We had this discussions about the Xhtml principles. We got a result in form
of Andreas wireframes. We got some dummy output of com_content in the trunk
or is the code ready and I don't know it yet?

Bye Angie

ausdrucks | STARK
Büro für Kommunikation Angie Radtke
www.der-auftritt.de
Witterschlicker Allee 52 53125 Bonn
0228/6420467 Mail:a.ra...@derauftritt.de
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Barrierefreies Webdesign
von Angie Radtke und Dr. Michael Charlier
ISBN: 3-8273-2379-7

----- Original Message -----
From: "Ron Severdia" <ron.se...@joomla.org>
To: "Joomla! CMS Development" <joomla-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, July 30, 2009 5:10 PM
Subject: Re: Joomla 1.6 templates

[elin]

Ron,

If the nice template you make meets various government standards for
access and also has been tested with people with disabilities
including hand use than more power to you for accomplishing that, good
news indeed.

Elin

On Jul 30, 11:59 am, "Angie Radtke" <a.rad...@derauftritt.de> wrote:
> Hi Ron,
>
> maybe I'm standing on the line, maybe I passed some information because of
> my language prob. .-)
>
>  We had this discussions about the Xhtml principles. We got a result in form
> of Andreas wireframes. We got some dummy output of com_content in the trunk
> or is the code ready and I don't know it yet?
>
> Bye Angie
>
> ausdrucks | STARK
> Büro für Kommunikation Angie Radtkewww.der-auftritt.de
> Witterschlicker Allee 52    53125 Bonn

> 0228/6420467   Mail:a.rad...@derauftritt.de

[Ron Severdia]

On Jul 30, 8:59 am, "Angie Radtke" <a.rad...@derauftritt.de> wrote:
>  We had this discussions about the Xhtml principles. We got a result in form
> of Andreas wireframes. We got some dummy output of com_content in the trunk
> or is the code ready and I don't know it yet?

Andy just posted an update in the XHTML thread. The code is in
progress, but by looking at the wireframes, you could create it
yourself in short order for testing.

On Jul 30, 9:34 am, elin <elin.war...@gmail.com> wrote:
> If the nice template you make meets various government standards for
> access and also has been tested with people with disabilities
> including hand use than more power to you for accomplishing that, good
> news indeed.

The goal is the have all templates meet accessibility and disability
guidelines, not just one.

[Jennifer Marriott]

It is fantastic news Ron that you have all the templates lined up to
meet the standard accessibility guidelines. If you need real world
testers I can see if I can get students in our school district that
use alternate input devices test them. Do you have some real word
testers set up using screen readers? Are we going for 508 or WCAG 1,
2 or 3?

The only issue I see is that you say wireframes are good for testing,
when the wireframes aren't the actual code, and that is pretty
important, because we all know code can change very quickly, so has
there been some update to com content that I haven't seen yet? It is
kind of impossible to get tests done that actually show real results
on something that doesn't exist.

Jenny

[Ron Severdia]

On Jul 30, 4:26 pm, Jennifer Marriott <marpomultime...@gmail.com>
wrote:

 If you need real world
> testers I can see if I can get students in our school district that
> use alternate input devices test them.  

That'd be great. The more testing, the merrier.

Do you have some real word
> testers set up using screen readers?  Are we going for 508 or WCAG 1,
> 2 or 3?

The WCAG is a mess and I think it's smarter to go Section 508. It
pretty much covers most of WCAG and it's compliant with US Government
standards, which is applicable for almost all international standards.

> The only issue I see is that you say wireframes are good for testing,
> when the wireframes aren't the actual code, and that is pretty
> important, because we all know code can change very quickly, so has
> there been some update to com content that I haven't seen yet?  It is
> kind of impossible to get tests done that actually show real results
> on something that doesn't exist.

Yes, the wireframes aren't code. But anybody could create a mockup for
testing in a matter of 15-20 minutes based on the structure outlined
in those documents. Though com_content isn't there yet, there's no
reason why anyone couldn't set up a dummy template to work out the
design, CSS, and 95% of the issues before even getting it into the CMS
(I believe Andrea and Steve may have already embarked upon this).
Either Andrew or the Production Workgroup will be giving an update
shortly on the timing of the real layout outputs in action (dunno the
status myself).

[Angie Radtke]

>The WCAG is a mess and I think it's smarter to go Section 508. It
>pretty much covers most of WCAG and it's compliant with US Government
>standards, which is applicable for almost all international standards.

Hi Ron,

I prefer WCAG 2 . Of course there are some techniques left, but after
talking with shaddy of WCAG working group I 'm sure I will be go in the
right direction in future.
Joomla is an international Project and we should work on internatianal
guidelines.
In Germany the we need WCAG2 to reach the goverment standards.

If you want to set up all templates with accessibility standards it's a
great goal.
But are you sure you can really reach your goal?

Did you take a look at my new beez template at all?
Maybe we can work together on it.
If nobody wants my beez code , I keep it.

At the moment I 'm a littel bit offended .-) and displeased .
I don't understand the way the project is going to. Open source
development isn't that easy . So many people with various motivations.
Most of must be honest to itself and ask what did I want?
Did I want to move the project foreward to a really great solution or need
I the project to satisfy myself.
To satisfy themself is an allowed motivation but everybody has to take care
that the project isn't lost in that.

On monday I talked with somebody who is involved since years and he told me
I should care about the culture differences.
We germans are normally cautious ( I don't know if it is the right word).
He advise me to be louder. But that's not my personality.

I 'm not sure what I should do , I can loose the project, but I'm fighting
for accessibilty since mambo times and my heart is on it.
So my wish would be to band competence to a great solution.

Bye Angie

[elin]

@Angie,

Tons of people will want the new Beez, it's an incredibly good looking
template as well as doing so much so well. I love how you can move the
navigation and the accessible JS plus how generally quick it is, just
the kinds of things we want to encourage. So even if it's not in the
core for whatever reason, we should find a way to make it widely
available. Even just on your site it will be a really hot download.
Thanks for again leading the way in showing how far Joomla can be
pushed for justice and functionality.
Beez One was incredibly transformative in shaping how people build
templates and Beez Two will be also.

Elin

[elin]

@Angie,

Tons of people will want the new Beez, it's an incredibly good looking
template as well as doing so much so well. I love how you can move the
navigation and the accessible JS plus how generally quick it is, just
the kinds of things we want to encourage. So even if it's not in the
core for whatever reason, we should find a way to make it widely
available. Even just on your site it will be a really hot download.
Thanks for again leading the way in showing how far Joomla can be
pushed for justice and functionality.
Beez One was incredibly transformative in shaping how people build
templates and Beez Two will be also.

Elin

[Idea Market]

@Angie,

Is it possible to see the new Beez template? I'm usually heads down in
work (both my own and stuff for Joomla!) so I haven't really had an
opportunity to take a look.

Being from Canada, 508 is great, but still a USA thing. If you look
around the world WCAG is a bit more common even if it seems to be a
bit of a mess.

[Angie Radtke]

1.5 -> http://test1.run-digital.com/

1.6 -> http://test2.run-digital.com/

bye Angie

ausdrucks | STARK
Büro für Kommunikation Angie Radtke
www.der-auftritt.de
Witterschlicker Allee 52 53125 Bonn
0228/6420467 Mail:a.ra...@derauftritt.de
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Barrierefreies Webdesign
von Angie Radtke und Dr. Michael Charlier
ISBN: 3-8273-2379-7

----- Original Message -----
From: "Idea Market" <st...@ideamarket.ca>
To: "Joomla! CMS Development" <joomla-...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, July 31, 2009 4:53 PM
Subject: Re: Joomla 1.6 templates


>

[Andrea Tarr]

I agree with Steve that WCAG would be more appropriate. Joomla is
international and it would be better to go for a general guideline
rather than only supporting one specific country.

I saw an early version of the new beez template and it looked great
and even incorporated the WAI-ARIA landmark roles.

The "wireframes" that are available are just diagrams of the proposed
structure, not actual code.

Andy

[ot2sen]

Hi Ron,

 

Those four suggested templates, business/personal/skeletonish/milkyway demo15->16, and all meeting standards really sounds great. Think users will welcome new visuals and thereby get inspired to rethink their own standard modified designs. New is good.

 

The WCAG is a mess and I think it's smarter to go Section 508. It
pretty much covers most of WCAG and it's compliant with US Government
standards, which is applicable for almost all international standards.

Wouldnt it then make sense to just add a little on top of the chosen 508 criterias to fully meet the requirements set by WCAG that many international designers/devs will have to fulfil.

Recently read the 'Mapping Section 508 to WCAG' and from that perspective it looks like both can be met:

http://www.tomjewett.com/accessibility/508-WCAG2.html

 

Looking forward to see the new templates in 1.6!

 

Ole

[Ron Severdia]

On Jul 30, 11:51 pm, "Angie Radtke" <a.rad...@derauftritt.de> wrote:
> I prefer WCAG 2 .  Of course there are some techniques left, but after
> talking with shaddy of WCAG working group I 'm sure  I will be go in the
> right direction in future.

I don't believe this, especially considering their track record. But
there are specific areas where the 508 (even being an older spec) is
better than WCAG. If the consensus is WCAG, I'm open to it, but only
with the condition that the results are better than the WCAG--using
the 508 where the WCAG lacks. Make sense? So the results will meet
both standards, but essentially create a third standard that's better
than each alone.

> Did you take a look at my new beez template  at all?

No, I hadn't. But now that you've posted a live link, I have.

> Maybe we can work together on it.
> If nobody wants my beez code ,  I keep it.

The Beez template itself doesn't fit in the categories previously
outlined. That doesn't mean some or most of the code couldn't be used
in one of the other templates described.

> At the moment I 'm a littel bit offended .-) and  displeased .
> I don't understand the way  the project is going to.  Open source
> development isn't that easy . So many people with  various motivations.
> Most of must be honest to itself and ask what did I want?
> Did I  want to move the project foreward to a really great solution or need
> I the project to satisfy myself.
> To satisfy themself is an allowed motivation but everybody has to take care
> that the project isn't lost in that.

I'm not sure I understand why you're displeased. Because your Beez
template won't be included? There are plenty of things that I want
included and won't be. It's not a personal issue. It's strictly what's
in the best interest of the software and the project.

I'm not interested in people's "various motivations" because those
motivations should be focused on producing the best product possible,
even it means not getting what they want.

> On monday I talked with somebody who is involved since years and he told me
> I should care about the culture differences.
> We germans are normally cautious ( I don't know if it is the right word).
> He advise me to be louder. But that's not my personality.

I don't understand why this is classified as a cultural difference. As
elin stated, Beez has led the way for accessibility in Joomla 1.5. No
doubt about it. But with the idea that all templates will adhere to
(and exceed) these standards, what is the compelling selling point for
Beez in 1.6? How does it fit into the template strategy previously
described?

[Angie Radtke]

>I'm not sure I understand why you're displeased. Because your Beez
template won't be included?

Sorry Ron ,

but you haven't understand what I mean . I think this is maybe the culture
difference.
I haven't a profil neurosis. I don't need my template in the code.
I want to move the project foreward, nothing else.

Angie

[Ron Severdia]

On Jul 31, 9:39 am, "Angie Radtke" <a.rad...@derauftritt.de> wrote:
> >I'm not sure I understand why you're displeased. Because your Beez
>
> template won't be included?
>
> Sorry Ron ,
>
> but you haven't understand what I mean . I think this is maybe the culture
> difference.

Possibly, but you didn't explain the cultural difference. I'd like to
understand this and how it pertains to the template process so we can
all be respectful of one another and nobody feels offended (like you
mentioned). If you don't feel this is the forum for it, feel free to
contact me on Skype. If it's just a language barrier, try to explain
it in a different way and maybe I'll understand better. Since I lived
in Vienna for a few years, my German is pretty good too (albeit
Viennese).

[Angie Radtke]

>If you don't feel this is the forum for it, feel free to
contact me on Skype.

Can't see you in skype. .-)

my skypename: anradtke