How to implement generic sidebar boxes in themes for the marketplace?
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I am building some sites and using free themes (downloaded fromhttp://freescctemplates.org ), and I'd like to build them in a general way so that they can be put up on the marketplace when I'm done. A big problem I'm running into, however, is that many themes have a set number of sidebar boxes with heading names. For example, see these two:
http://www.freecsstemplates.org/preview/thefences/...
http://www.freecsstemplates.org/preview/milestone/...
Note the two sidebar boxes on the right in both themes (one titled "Aliquam Tempus" and the other titled "Pellenteque Ornare"). If I'm building a site for a client, it is very easy to handle this situation because I know what they want in their sidebars so I just include the appropriate title in the page template itself. But if I'm trying to make this a more generalizable theme suitable for the marketplace, what's the recommended approach? Here are some of the ways I can think of:
* Hard-code the latin titles in the template, and require people who download the theme from the marketplace to alter the html template themselves.
* Make each sidebar box an area, and require content managers to put an <h1> tag at the beginning of their first content block.
* Create a separate area for the box header and the box content -- and somehow put in a default block in that header area that contains the latin title so it's obvious to content managers that they can click on it to edit it (probably in the defaults for the page type).
All of these approaches have their pros and cons of course -- I am very curious to hear how others have handled this in the past, or if there's a recommended way to do this by the C5 developers.
Thanks!
-Jordan Lev
http://www.freecsstemplates.org/preview/thefences/...
http://www.freecsstemplates.org/preview/milestone/...
Note the two sidebar boxes on the right in both themes (one titled "Aliquam Tempus" and the other titled "Pellenteque Ornare"). If I'm building a site for a client, it is very easy to handle this situation because I know what they want in their sidebars so I just include the appropriate title in the page template itself. But if I'm trying to make this a more generalizable theme suitable for the marketplace, what's the recommended approach? Here are some of the ways I can think of:
* Hard-code the latin titles in the template, and require people who download the theme from the marketplace to alter the html template themselves.
* Make each sidebar box an area, and require content managers to put an <h1> tag at the beginning of their first content block.
* Create a separate area for the box header and the box content -- and somehow put in a default block in that header area that contains the latin title so it's obvious to content managers that they can click on it to edit it (probably in the defaults for the page type).
All of these approaches have their pros and cons of course -- I am very curious to hear how others have handled this in the past, or if there's a recommended way to do this by the C5 developers.
Thanks!
-Jordan Lev
I might also just define the whole side as one block area, and make the "box" part of a custom template you could apply to HTML blocks and some other common ones like form or survey. That way they can stick images in there without the border..