The site's not in the air, that's why your system tries to connect via the dialup,.,.

Quote:Thanks, I'll try again later then

Alan

Thanks for the link. While it does look very custom to a particular site, it does look like it could be a good starting point for what I am trying to attempt. Thanks again...

I thought this post on August 30 at Eric Meyer's site might prove interesting, in light of this thread, both for it's discussion on approaches to accomplishing this kind of design with 3 columns as well as its practicality.

http://www.meyerweb.com/eric/thoughts/2004/09/03/sliding-faux-columns/

**Shrinks back into den after having raised some thoughts, even links, on css vs. tables.**

Hi,

Quote:
Try this posting: Studio C's new Theme

Best Wishes,

Alan

hello, daddio!

i'm new to xoops, too. you probably have resolved your query by now but i want to thank you for asking the same question i am now asking.

what i got from reading this thread and visiting the suggested sites is the courage to check out XOOPS documentation. {lol at myself for hestitating!}

i found an excellent article, too -- anatomy of the default theme:
http://docs.xoops.org/modules/xdocman/index.php?doc=xn-103&lang=en

i'm still reading but wanted to post here before i begin my journey and forget to come back here. apparently, XOOPS has three default themes (all of them with css control). these themes seem to be based on three columns and so that may guide our searches through the references in these posts.

i have a favorite i have used in the past for tableless three column css: www.glish.com/css/ ! especially, see the blogger template, which i love! i have been using it athttp://telepoetics.dyndns.org/a1/ (eventually to be www.telepoetics.com) for a while and am now looking to do something similar yet more powerful with xoops.

www.glish.com is eric costello's site. he has a lot of useful links, especially for tableless three column css, all cross-browser, too.

well, ta for now. i'm going on to read more of the documentation. all my best to you and your project! and thanks everyone of this community for all you do!

~merilene

i am working on a tableless theme right now, but my templates are a combo of tables and divs; so far.

hi, tjnemez ~

i have visited your wonderful sites and savored your posts here. thanks a lot. i really love the concept and easy navigation of www.mindhealth.ca; it's really cool. & your graphic on www.dcdezines.ca is what lead me to read your posts. keep all that good energy coming! i really love your web design ability to maintain playful designs for *serious* sites.

as i promised in an earlier post to this forum, i have been reading the XOOPS documentation. to humbly offer my tableless css column tweaks (assumptions, right now) based on the XOOPS documentation file named: anatomy of the default template
[http://docs.xoops.org/modules/xdocman/manual.php?lang=en&doc=xn-103&file=index.html], i begin here. see if you have any feedback for me, okay, on all this?

from what i have read and understood, and the documentation paragraphs are quite clear and sweetly brief, theoretically all i need to do to adapt the tables in the default theme to pure tableless column css is to change the html <td> tags to css divs with similar names and define them in the xoops.css, making sure there are no conflicts. if my theory is correct, all i need do from there is two things: (1) be sure that all references in my XOOPS default theme folder (which is where i will put my trials and work from distribution install files _after_ copying/renaming the distribution default folder in themes default1 just in case i screw up) and (2) be sure the references to my <td> tag changes work everywhere else throughout the XOOPS distribution.

from what i've read:
The XOOPS default theme contains 6 HTML files: theme.html, theme_blockleft.html, theme_blockcenter_c.html, theme_blockcenter_l.html, theme_blockcenter_r.html and theme_blockright.html.

the documentation also notes where xoops.css is stored.

so i'll look through these for references to the tags i need to change first and then for what other in the XOOPS distribution files reference the <td> tags.

am i on the right track here? i hope so. i have only read the documentation once, but i'm going back now for a re-read.

~
merilene

@Daddio:
The 2cnt theme is tableless, but it is a specialized theme with no right column.

As soon as things calm down a bit, I'll be releasing a three column variation with a tableless template set. As usual, there will be an absence of graphics, but the way I plan to code the 3 column theme will make it extremely easy to add gradient block header backgrounds, or whatever you wish.

If you cannot wait for other designers to release what you're looking for, there are an abundance of sites where you can pickup the skills you need to code CSS. It's really not that hard.

My three favorite CSS sites:
W3C CSS Homepage
W3Schools CSS Tutorial
Glish.com

Of course, a little Googling will reveal a treasure chest of other CSS resources.

@PeazRitr:
Converting the default theme is not quite as simple as replacing the <td> tags, changing some references, and verifying the path is correct. I was under this assumption as well and it ended in a mess.

For one, the way the default theme nests tables doesn't work quite the same with divs. I found it better to set my left and right columns positioning absolutely and allow my center column to be fluid.

The 2cnt theme mentioned above started life as a three column layout with a fluid center column. It worked pretty well, but there were problems with the theme breaking with certain modules at 800x600dpi. The resulting 2 column layout is the temporary solution.

Unless someone knows of a way of preventing the overlap effect that third-party modules have on a 3 column CSS theme, you'll probably have to do quite a bit of hacking on module templates. [note: the overflow property of CSS creates nasty scroll bars if you use a 3 column theme at 800x600dpi.] If someone has found a solution to this problem... Please share the wealth! This one has been giving me a headache for a while.

Best Regards,

JMorris

dear JMorris~

which of the XOOPS default templates is yours based on? how did you tweak?