@kaa Love your site design. Is that hosted on micro.blog? If so, did you just CSS an existing theme into submission or is there a way to use a completely custom theme that I’m missing?
@Mtt thanks! So it is a totally hosted Micro.blog site. i used Primrose and then honestly beat the CSS (and some HTML and JS) into submission. The thing is I imagine that most users dont have the knowledge, time or patience to do this sort of thing. I know that there is a better way, but alas that is something that has been a struggle for most blogging platforms. Years ago blogger did a thing where they introduced several themes by top name deaigners, which was nice. I should write some of this down in something longer form I think.
@Mtt I can’t remember what @kaa said before, if it was just CSS or a complete, from-scratch theme, but it is impressive and looks nothing like any other Micro.blog site :-)
You can start with an empty base and build what you want using the Blank theme; I think Manton talked more about it once, too—maybe it’s in the video linked from that help page, or maybe somewhere else…?
@kaa I’m one of the lucky few who taught myself to do what you’re saying. Honestly, it all started with MySpace forever ago. I saw there’s a new blank theme in micro.blog, so I was thinking you figured out some undocumented way to go ninja on it. I’m gonna have a go at it in the next couple weeks. I can’t let you have the most unique one. Ha.
@smokey For some reason, I can’t get the blank theme to work properly. It seems to just build out based on the default theme for me. In fairness, I only tried it a couple times and I tend to be impatient.
@smokey Also just realized it’s contingent on GitHub access. Probably explains why it wasn’t working as I was expecting.
@Mtt To be honest, I don’t know really know the details and the documentation becomes more and more confusing to me as I reread it ;-)
But I think you might be right: if you start with Blank and don’t provide the URL of another existing theme from GitHub when creating the custom theme, then it will pull the rest of the files from the Default theme:
When picking a template to use, Micro.blog first looks in your custom theme, then one of the built-in designs, and then the Blank design.
So maybe your next step is to provide your custom theme with “empty” files for those templates, and then start customizing from there?
Or maybe your next step is to ignore me and email help ;-) It seems to me like the documentation could be clearer, at least :-)
@Mtt Awesome! Can't wait to see what you come up with.
I understand now. So I believe I copied the primrose theme into my repository and started editing it there. Once it was 90% done I imported that into Micro.blog.
@smokey I have tried to start with the blank theme and it’s not working properly for me. I posted a video in slack for @manton to look at. I select blank and the start a new template and also link to blank git repo (or not) and the site doesn’t change to blank stays stuck on previous chosen theme and the editing files for me includes Marfa theme stuff even if that wasn’t the last theme selected
@Mtt I’ve the same issue. I’ve posted a video on slack for @manton to see what’s happening. Select blank. Theme on blog doesn’t change from previous selection. Try to create new custom theme using github link or not and I am editing a theme based on Marfa even if that wasnt the theme selected. This is on my test blog so maybe it’s due to using Marfa on main blog are you using a test site as well?
@adamprocter @Mtt No need to add the "blank" templates. They are always added if not overridden by the theme. You are seeing the Marfa templates because it also shows templates from your default blog's theme. But they aren't used unless you click and edit them... I can see how that is confusing.
@manton ok thanks - so why when I select blank the site doesn’t change to blank ? But stays on the last theme I selected ?
@adamprocter Hmm, that might be a bug because if there is no new index.html file to replace the existing one, the old site might be left in a weird state. I'll fix that. Also, I've changed this behavior: it now shows templates from the most recent site you were viewing the settings for.
@manton awesome stuff. My plan is to slowly build up some new style and templates on my test site and migrate that to the live site in theory. Including RSS photos template :)
@adamprocter As a followup, I just ended up customizing Marfa to my heart’s content. Ya know, until next week when I feel the need to change everything.
@kaa I went your route. Manipulated Marfa to get what I (mostly) wanted. Would love to easily have full width images on mobile (without JavaScript), but they’re wrapped in paragraph tags by default. Maybe one day.
@smokey Just following up...but I ended up just customizing Marfa as much as I wanted. Few things remain on the todo list, but mostly done.
@Mtt i think you need to update list.photolist.html maybe? Also love the green underpants - I think all websites should have that
@kaa Thanks. I especially like the underpants on iOS. The jumpback scrolling, colored title bar, etc really pop.
I think that particular photos layout is only utilized when posting a photo album via Sunlit, but maybe I’m mistaken.
@kaa I also went the route of automatic dark mode (via browser/system settings), but I like your toggle switch too.