Template Switch

Kapikua’s theme is darn nice, designed by this dude (or dudette from Spain). Got them from WordPress extended theme achieve. I had one modded based on Kapikua’s BBRose theme last week. It was originally dark – 3-columned template but I changed the dark background to white & blue & foolishly added another 4th column on the far right thinking that it looks darn nice in all res.

Kapkikua’s BBRose – unmodded yet.

After positioning the visitor stats, shoutbox & all the link, I go for a test surf. Yes – on a 1280×1024 pixel resolution which I am using now. After 24 hours, I decided to put a disclaimer that my site is best viewed using 1024×768 pixels (yeah right!). Then I came to realise it looks distorted even in 1024×768 what more lower! I panicked & at the same time frustrated cos the finishing was so damn nice viewed in 1280×1024 pixels!

Kapkikua’s BBRose – modded to Wreck Rose.

I was so reckless not to mod & fine tune them based on all resolutions. Well, the reason it won’t display well in other res is because the 4th column was made fluid, i.e. the float properties was set to ‘absolute’ instead of static/relative or inherit so that it can retract or stretch based on one’s resolution. The other 3 column are unfortunately fixed & no fluidity at all while viewing. To have those column modded to make it fluid is time consuming.

So what I did was scrap off the 4th column & transfer all the bits & pieces to column 1, 2 & 3. All fits well except one – that was the shoutbox. This shoutbox is an addon on it own & run its own Ajax API. I am not sure why the hell it doesn’t position well in column to with the rest of Archive, Categories & Blogroll in IE. It displays well in Firefox though. i tried to fiddle with its properties by wrapping it with div’s & assigning property so that it doesn’t affect the others. But my assumptions are wrong cos even assigning it with its own independent properties it still affect the rest which I am not sure why! I even tried to fiddle with its package source code but cannot do much cos the source of those problem is no where to be found.Soon an idea came & I decided to shift the shoutbox to the far left, i.e. to column 1 itself. Walla! It fits so well! the final process is to configure WPG options.

WPG options comes with two flavor of settings – one with built in settings that fiddle around with the embedding CSS properties &the other method is to clone its template foot & header files into a wpg2 prefixed file. It involves abit of copy & paste as we need to retain its functions. Soon, based on manual, we need to include some function code into the cloned files. Upon activation, it was assumed it would work, but mine doesn’t cos it generated a one-line error that makes me sick & fedup.

I try Googling around but no solutions can be found. Therefore, I deleted the cloned files & return back to the old style WordPress. It works at the end using method one, by adding a positioning element & fiddle around with its top & left margins. And the end result is here;

Completed Wreck Rose II – 3-column with 4th column scrapped to fulfil res’es.

I learnt my lesson – “Fine tune your template, needs & res will possibly making it a success.! huhu..scary!