If you have not had the chance to read up on these updates you can view them in the latest news list or in the Feature Requests, Ideas and Next Version forum.
While working on all the behind the scenes core Simple:Press setup and plugin features the Simple:Press themes have not been forgotten.
The themes have been updated to take advantage of all of the new core and plugin features included in 5.1. Changes have been made in all theme files and their corresponding overlay files.
After you update to version 5.1 you will be notified in your WordPress updates page that there are new theme updates and you can then update your theme to to match the latest version.
If you are using a custom theme you can continue using it with version 5.1 but we do recommend you download the latest themes and manually compare the changes with your theme . There may be some new features that you may want to include.
Here are some of the changes and additions.
- Additional forum page title graphic replacement CSS. I you are using a Graphic image to replace your forum title text it will be easier for you to style it’s layout.
- CSS for links in vtip. If the vtip, popup graphic you see when hovering over a topic or a button has a link in it you will be able to style it differently than the rest of the text.
- Visual feedback when clicking and adding a smiley icon to a post. You will now see the smiley appear to ‘jump’ when clicked and added to a post for added confirmation.
- Enhanced background look in Quicklinks drop down. When hovering over the drop down list in the Quicklinks (New updated topics or Select forum) the highlighted text now matches your button color.
- Updated Theme selection layout and images to match WordPress 3.4 Admin changes. Now easier to preview and select different themes.
- New post delete button. There is a new button on each post that lets you delete a post easily without opening up the forum toolset box. This function was added to all the themes and uses a new icon image named sp_DeletePost.png which is included.
- Added focus background to forms. This gives all form entries a consistent professional look when both moused over or when entering text.
- Text color fix for html links in popup bubble preview of topics.
- Added entry and icon to forum toolset which allows you to reverse sort a forum or topic quickly. This required a new entry and icon named “sp_ToolsSort.png” which is added to all themes.
- New icons (sp_GroupClose.png and sp_GroupOpen.png) along an entry that gives you the ability to slide open or close a forum listing.
- Minor changes and fixes on various overlays to make them more consistent throughout the forum and overlay choices.
One of the bigger changes to the themes is the addition of new CSS container section entries to allow easier bulk styling of sections and also gives you more styling options for different pages. Every main section of the forum now is, for lack of a better word, wrapped inside a DIV entry. Those of you who do not use a custom theme will not see any difference in the layout. Those of you who do can add these new additions into your theme when and where needed to help you style your theme easier.
A hint for those running a custom themes but have very little changes in it.
You may want to consider downloading the new theme you based yours upon and make changes to it instead of trying to add everything into yours. You can then replace your custom theme with the new one similarly how you did when you created yours originally. You may find that easier than adding everything from the new themes into yours.
For some more detail and technical information on the theme and template changes then please visit our codex page summarising the changes.
If you have any questions on the new theme features or before updating your themes you can always ask us for advice in the support forum. We will be glad to help in any way.