For those that know this site and see differences from a prior visit: Yes I have changed theme(s). From now on I am using just one theme: the thesis theme.
I am still working on getting everything in place and displayed in a way I like. But I got hooked to the theme after I got several recommendations by fellow bloggers. I just plunged ahead and installed it. The main reason for change is that I did some reading about SEO (search Engine Opimization) and installed some dedicated plugins.
I like thesis’ flexibility, professionalism and the care for SEO. I also hope it loads faster than my Misty theme did. As it is so flexible, I don’t see any need anymore to use the theme switcher. The disadvantage of a theme switcher with several themes running is that every nut and bolt you change, has to be changed on every theme separately. With three and sometimes four themes running aside, that kept me from focusing on producing content. In addition this theme is so flexible that with few alterations I can completely change the look and feel of the blog, without even losing it’s main features.
In an update of this post I will flesh out some thoughts and findings.
Update 1 May 8, 2009:
Thusfar I have paid attention to:
- Getting a favicon.ico. Now you will see my little avatar next to the URL. Why? because I saw that many browsers that hit the site want one and get a 404 message. I discovered a nifty WordPress Plugin 404 Notifier from Alex King that logs 404 hits and put them in an RSS reader for you to check them out. Higly recommended!
- Added avatar, background image (needs a bit of tweaking as yet), background color, played around with sizes, borders and so on to get the look and feel I’m so used to. Two columns lay out. And still a lot of scrolling. I won’t place back the header image as you get more space to read the last post.
- Placed back the various widgets. This is done via snippets of code you can insert via text widgets. Ideally you bring all tweaks in one of two seperate files that you can carry along. But then you need a lot of special Php knowledge and that is a bit steep a learning curve yet.
- Next steps will be either a 3 column lay out, or special pages for Archives and for Links, that will result in less scrolling.
- As a keen photographer I will have more space for bigger photos.
Still my question remains: What are your first impressions?
