Efficient: theme: Pre Sales questions

Hi Brian,

I really like the look of Efficient with one exception: both sidebars are on the right side. I much prefer one left and one right. Is there a reason why you put them both right? Market research? Eyeball tracking? Other??? Can they be changed to left and right?

Is color change easy (if Color module is turned on upon Drupal 5.7 install)?

Many thanks!

Lew

Hello,

@ doomed:

Question #1: Those areas within the theme are coded into the front-page.tpl file using the "primary links" menu, so whatever you add to the primary links menu within the administration area gets placed there.

Search button could be changed to fit your needs for other languages. You just have to change the CSS and image a little.

Question #2: Well, the look and feel of the theme would be compromised by showing other blocks up the header region but the login area to the right is really meant to just "hold" the login block.

If you were an OK designer and could manipulate CSS a little, I'm sure anyone could create avatars, a small ad region, or anything else and assign it to that block though. It really comes down to how familiar you are with CSS and perhaps a little PHP if something needs to be changed with the .tpl file(s).

Question #3: Anything can be placed here that's created in the blocks administration section.

Suggestion #1: Although good suggestions, we don't use Panels or Views modules in the theme, or in-node pagination, etc. If we catered to adding all types of modules for very specific purposes, then the installation and configuration of the themes would be much harder. We are trying to keep it simple and allow people a solid foundation to build from at a reasonable cost.

Since Drupal has over 5,000 modules to date, it's really up to the end user to be familiar with all of the other module's HTML output and the handling of those module's overall integration and design, but we could not afford to build our themes with so many variables in mind.

Last question/suggestion: Sure, a pre-sale forum could be added. Why didn't I think of that ;-)

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@ lbrown:

A little of my comments from above apply to this answer. If you know CSS and tweaking .tpl files, then yes you can do this. We put them both on the right for SEO purposes since it's easier for a search engine robot to spider the unique content closer to the top of the source code with no repetition of menus on the left column.

I may have our designers look at supplying an option to do this, but it would still require manipulating or changing several .tpl files and main CSS file. But here again, if we start making all types of request changes based on one or two people's likes or dislikes, then it may not be advantageous.

I'll see what my designers say concerning the difficulty of doing this.

Thanks!