Rapid Development Toolset for Wordpress Theming
May 25th, 07 | 17 remarksOne of the things I love to do is play around with Wordpress themes - pulling them apart, piecing them back together, and learning something new almost every time. I’ve tried designing a few of my own by starting with various open source themes as a foundation, but I usually end up disappointed because, depending on the original author, the CSS is often convoluted. Finally I decided to rip apart the simplest theme available (the default) to use as a starting point for creating a few base templates which I can then use for rapid development any time. The thought of setting up a standardized template system, and throwing out at least some redundant setup tasks is very appealing, don’t you think? I should’ve done this long ago - and if you design Wordpress themes you may be way ahead of me on this one - but if not, you’re welcome to download any of the base themes I created. Screenshot of a fluid-width, left nav, 2 column base layout 
Screenshot of a fixed-width, right nav, 2 column base layout 
Each was stripped of any extraneous CSS hooks within the HTML. Some of the major components were also slightly reworked for quick recognition of elements, and easy styling every time. Very minimal CSS styling was applied (no graphics) so you’ll always have a clean slate to start with. Get your themes off the ground a bit faster and minimize time spent on repetitive tasks by downloading the following rapid development toolset. All four have templates for the most commonly used pages of a blog (such as archive and search) included.
Baseline FixedLeft
Baseline FixedRight
Baseline LiquidLeft
Baseline LiquidRight
Baseline Template Kit (all four in one shot)
[...] admire, and starting with a stripped down version of the Wordpress default theme (a.k.a. one of my base themes), I’ve incorporated organizational ideas from Daily Blog Tips, a bit of functionality from [...]
Jun 5, 07 | 1:41 pmGood work,thank you,Charity.
Jul 13, 07 | 11:07 pmYou are charity girl indeed.
Oh if I only had a dollar for every time I heard that! Haha just kiddin.’ :)
Aug 2, 07 | 4:29 pm[...] my baseline theme, and referencing Brian’s Vertigo when I got stuck, the code should now be easily modded by [...]
Sep 4, 07 | 3:48 pmGreat stuff. Been looking for just this type of thing for learning more about Wordpress themes. Cheers.
Oct 8, 07 | 12:42 pmThanks, Charity. With over 50 blogs to develop in quick time, these templates will no doubt become a valuable asset to me. :)
Nov 14, 07 | 4:20 amOh my oh my - guess what I have just learned ! ( tell you later ;) )
Dec 1, 07 | 9:12 pm[...] got the idea for this theme from Charity Ondriezek and her Rapid Development Toolset For WordPress Theming and this theme is actually based on the BaseFR theme from that package. I made the theme so it [...]
Jan 31, 08 | 2:49 pm[...] most generic, baseline theme I could find to bend to my will. After a lot of looking I decided on one of these themes provided by Charity at Design Adaptations. It’s well developed, very well commented and absolutely gets out of the way of anyone who is [...]
Apr 14, 08 | 8:12 pmHey there, this is great. I’m using your Baseline FixedRight as the foundation for a theme I’m working on. Happened to find a “bug” in your stylesheet:
should be:
Any plans to update for WP 2.5?
Apr 17, 08 | 8:45 pmJustin - I am going to be updating all the free themes (including the baselines) very soon. I know they need some attention but I have a couple other things I want to roll out first. I’m hoping to get to them by the end of April though!
Apr 18, 08 | 7:47 am[...] work today to sit in on an interview for a new English teacher but plan to have a good look at the Rapid Development Toolset for Wordpress Theming when I get a [...]
May 30, 08 | 2:32 pmCharity, sounds good. If you create a new post, it’d be great if you could link to it from here, as I refer back to this post occasionally.
Jun 24, 08 | 1:32 pmOh, and shameless promotion, the site I used your baseline design for is live now, it’s called White Noise Lounge a photoaudioblog of collected ambient sounds. Gotta say that working from your baseline made it really easy to go from idea in my head to finished product in short order. Thanks again.
Jun 24, 08 | 1:35 pmThank you — this is exactly what I was looking for!
Jul 18, 08 | 2:33 am[...] run to work today to sit in on an interview for a new English teacher but plan to have a look at the Rapid Development Toolset for Wordpress Theming when I get a [...]
Aug 3, 08 | 9:19 amoh great learning process for me. i totally agree with ehab i just learn new thing here and these zip files are great help for me. thanks for putting them in file.
Aug 17, 08 | 11:56 pm