CSS help: a suggestion.

  • Resolved aga1

    (@aga1)


    12 years, 7 months ago

    Hi,

    I’m a bit of a CSS newbie. What little I’ve learned, I’ve learned through trial-and-error, and reading the support forums.

    One thing I’ve noticed is that many people ask the same question: how do I change this? Where do I find this? etc.

    A major issue for me, and it seems many others, is simply trying to FIND what line of the CSS to change to achieve what I want.

    It occurred to me that if the style.css for the default theme was better commented, many people’s problems would be instantly solved, and the work of the mods would be halved overnight.

    All it takes is a decent explanatory comment above every line/section of the default CSS, such as:

    /*This controls the page color: replace the default color with another value of your choice*/
    /*This controls the width of the blah-blah-blah*/
    /*”section.featured-post” refers to the xxxx xxxxx*/

    … etc etc… What this would mean is that all the answers are RIGHT THERE in the very file people are trying to edit (or copy into a child theme), saving bags of time going to the forums and searching/posting, and bugging the mods with the same old questions. It also teaches people what things are called, the correct syntax etc, as they go along.

Viewing 3 replies - 16 through 18 (of 18 total)

  • Did YOU come up with the TwentyEleven theme?

    As it so happens, I have contributed to it in a minor way and hope to contribute more to future default themes.

    The default theme ITSELF could “teach the basic things”, which would SAVE you guys from having to!

    A stylesheet by itself (even a heavily commented one) cannot teach anything. At best, it can only act as an example to a fully documented teaching resource or article. People who are learning need proper explanations – not a couple of comments here & there. If that were the case, the whole of https://www.w3schools.com/css/ could be condensed into one big stylesheet example. As it stands, the commentary on https://www.w3schools.com/css/ is still pretty sparse – which is why additional resources such as https://www.css-discuss.org/ are needed.

    You describe yourself as a CSS newbie. yes? Well, I’m not. I’ve been working with CSS for over 13 years. And I’ve also spent time teaching it. And I can assure you that a commented stylesheet ain’t going to cut it as a teaching aid by itself.

    Dude, I’m done with this post, with your attitude, your going to get A LOT of help on here for sure. If someone else wants to keep going back and forth with you then that is their time to waste. To answer your question about “they’d have to do a lot less work, and waste a lot less time on repetitive newbie” We just ignore stupid questions that have been asked over and over and over again. Just today, some a**hole demanded that someone do the changes for them and called everyone a mother f***er for not doing the changes for him. Guess how many people helped ZERO!! And his post is lost in oblivion on page whatever.

    So simply put as volunteer helpers, we help the ones who are courtious, and respectful and just simply ignore a**holes and the same dumb questions. That is how volunteer helpers manage our time.

    Moderator Ipstenu (Mika Epstein)

    (@ipstenu)

    ?????? Advisor and Activist

    Pleae don’t make personal attacks.

    I know it’s really easy to get fired up over things that we feel passionate over, but remember we’re a community and we should work together ??

    Aga1 – We do see your point. Esmi (and I) don’t feel it matches the goal of the default themes.

    TwentyEleven (and it’s replacment TwentyTwelve) is an example theme not of CSS but of WordPress. It’s not meant to be a CSS primer any more than the Hello World! post is an HTML one. This is just a basic, get you started.

    We shy away from teaching CSS and HTML here, and often limit PHP only to as it relates to WP, simply out of constraintes. Most folks on the forums aren’t paid to support WP, but are volunteers who want to help.

    Andrew Nevins – I’d argue back that if people searched more, they’d find the answer, but at the same time, I’m well aware that if you don’t know the right terms for the question you’re asking, you can’t find the right answer. Part of how we try to help is to teach people the right words. “Google on how to force a DIV to center text.” or “Here’s a doc on how to add background images in CSS.”

    We want to teach, not just answer. We want the person asking to learn how to ask the question next time. ??

    (If that sounds contrary to what I said about the theme, remember I said the theme is an example of WordPress, not CSS/HTML/PHP/SQL. It should teach you how to write a theme, not how to design one ?? )

Viewing 3 replies - 16 through 18 (of 18 total)
  • The topic ‘CSS help: a suggestion.’ is closed to new replies.