Valuable Wasted space in themes…

  • I’ve downloaded too many themes.

    What I find interesting is the standard practice of putting the blog content messages into such small areas on the sites and leaving so much blank space unused.

    Theme builders provide variable width theme with lots of space, you have a sidebar then as you scroll content the sidebar disappears quickly. The blog content still remains where it was, and the sidebar column extends the full length of the page. You have this big worthless space for the sidebar column extending the full page length. – waste of space!

    Why don’t theme builders use some flash or XHTMl/DHTML horizontal drop down menus that tier/subcategory. Why not have a row of columns across the top of the page with the blog contents below?

    I could use some recommendations or links to some themes that utilize space and navigate well. It would be nice to have some color and a few nice graphics.

    Two columns of blog contents on a varible width theme would seem to be a better choice, than one column of blog content and wasted space.

    It maybe that Blogger don’t revere horizontal drop down menus for aesthetic reasons. In such cases, a block horizonal area across the top of the screen, below the header might be a go place for navigation. This way a couple to three columns of blog content could be placed below.

    Blog content doesn’t just have to be words, so the pages can still be interesting with graphic enhancements,videos,etc.

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  • Moderator Samuel Wood (Otto)

    (@otto42)

    www.ads-software.com Admin

    Why not roll your own? Themes are actually very easy to create if you can create a decent layout to start with. Make your page using fake content, then when you have it the way you want it, replace the fake content with the relevant template tags and such. Simple, really.

    Thread Starter domineaux

    (@domineaux)

    Otto42

    You’re right of course. The best way to satisfy yourself is do it yourself.

    Those little projects always turn into monster projects, and how many times do you wish you’d just gone with the flow and used what was finished by someone else.

    That’s kind of my take on building themes. Some of my efforts at theme building were adequate, some were lousy and most were never finished.

    The purpose of my post was not to rag on theme builders. My gosh no, I’m just looking for some hints, links to find some themes that take better advantage of the page space, with enough graphics to keep users interested.

    Also, if some theme builders read the post they might get some ideas and get those creative juices flowing.

    THanks for your response

    Well, I guess one of the reasons there are no flash menus in WP themes is that they lack accessability – and I am glad about that. As for DHTML or CSS drop downs: While there are some very good examples out there to show that you can make them in a easy-to-use, accessible and cross-browser-compatible way, it is not too easy to cast the – by theory endless wide and deep – WP (category) navigation into such a markup. IOW: A dropdown menu with 4 top-level categories and a maximum depth of 2 – short: (4/2) – is easy, one that works for (4/2), (2/8), (15/1) and (25/7), is still fast, is usable in all major browsers, JS on or off, THAT is hard to build.

    Nevertheless the OP’s general point is well made. There are still some really original layouts/navs which have yet to be done in WP. The problem from the designers point of view is that mould breaking themes are often not very popular. They also commonly require a lot of php hacking in the loop. ??

Viewing 4 replies - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
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