Why using Kubrick on 1.3 is a mistake

One of the things I like about Kubrick is that it’s very easy to make it your own (not look like every other site out there) with a distinctive photo in the header and changing up the colors a little bit. The fact of the matter is that people are turning away from WordPress because of the default template. There are basically three types of people: those who are never going to change the default, those who will tweak it as long as they don’t have to learn anything, and those that will change everything. We want to give something as usable and aesthetically pleasing to those first two groups.
Images in the default template? Not a big deal. We’re talking less than 3K of images here. If I sneeze on post.php it’s more than that. It’ll look fine without the images, and great with them. The CSS will be different than the current Kubrick simply because I think it could be done more efficiently. Of course it will be cross-browser and cross-platform.
One thing I am wary of is requiring a graphics program, even if it’s a free one like Gimp. All these programs would be doing though is changing the color around the border and possibly putting curves on a header image. Luckily this is relatively easy to script in PHP. If a Kubrick-derived style is in 1.3 then some sort of online wizard for customizing the graphics will be a high priority project. (Anyone interested in working on this?)
What about other styles? There are a few from the CSS competition that were excellent, Toni and Rubric come to mind, and I think it would be a good idea to highlight these in some official capacity, but I don’t think they’re right for the default. Gemini and Trident are good in some ways and I think the community will still benefit from those resources, but in my opinion they have a few fundamental problems that I won’t get into here.

Thanks for the clarification Matt.
I think Nuclearmoose’s response just about sums up what I feel!

There were half a dozen responses while I was typing mine! That’s what I get for hunting and pecking…
I’m very concerned about what any change in WordPress will have on support, not only because of the people (including myself) here but also because I get dozens of support emails direct to my inbox a day. When things are broken it has an immediate and personal effect on me. Not to mention the countless hours superstars like Podz and others put in here on the forums. I’m very sensitive to this issue and would never do something in a release that would increase the problem. In the past I have done things I personally didn’t care for to make things easier around here. (Remember when the category list on each post was an unordered list?)
I think a more attractive and easier-to-use default, combined with a customization wizard, will satisfy that middle group I mentioned earlier that knows enough to want something better than the default but struggles with implementing it. If we do this right things well get pleasantly boring around here.

[anonymous flame from 164.111.23.46 removed.]

And I think Podz missed my point. My point was that it doesn’t matter what the default template is, be it Gemini, Trident, Vesuvius, Kubrick, Rubric, or Golf even. Iagree that what is ultimatly shipped with WP should be every thing you said, and more, BUT a lot of the agruments I’ve seen so far have been I have to do this or I have to do that. Very little has been said about the new user.
Kubrick is a nice look, it isn’t for me, but for some it’ll work. My biggest concern would be in the graphics dept. Is it going to be simple enough that someone who isn’t graphicaly gifted will be able to use it? Eh, time will tell. Personaly, I’d like to see more than one style get shipped. It would certanly give the new user the opportunity to try a couple of different things, and hopefully see the power of CSS. But, it’s in the hands of others.
People can do one of two things here. They can play Chicken Little (or Nuclear Moose) and cry that the sky is falling. Or you can sit on your hands and wait to see what *does* ship with 1.3, then make you determination as to if it’s for the better or not. So far, things have been rumors and innuendos. Something I noticed Matt said his posts “If a Kubrick-derived style is in 1.3 then…” Which tells me it isn’t a done deal.
But what do I know? I’m just a stupid gnome.
TG

Think of Kubrick like a classic frame or nice table. By itself it may look decent, though certainly not anything that will get you or HGTV. However if you add in a stunning photograph or a beautiful vase and place setting, the objects themselves get out of the way and let the real character shine through. On a blog this would (first and foremost) the writing and the colors and graphic elements people choose to customize the default template with. Anyway that’s how I’m thinking of it. So if anyone asks you can tell them that the next version of WordPress is all about frames and tables.

Wee! Frames and Tables!

Point of note, you don’t have to wait for 1.3 to ship. As the changes go into CVS, look them over, discuss them. Subscribe to the CVS list and the hackers list. Hang out on IRC. It would be best if people looked things over *before* we release instead of waiting for it to fall from the sky in one big, ready-to-ship whole. You’ll just have to be patient for a bit as the first code drops are readied.

Goodsnake: Deleting comments can be necessary when anonymous trolls more interested in bickering over ‘snide remarks’ than the matter at hand happen to pass by.

If you want to see fundamental problems you should look at Matt’s entry Charleen in the style comp.

Actually the anonymous troll was me, I did not realize I was logged out. The comment was valid, I think it rediculous that there is a definate bias on this site and with the things we use. Your Kubrick template which I like, tried to download but could not get the .htaccess to work right so after an hour I gave up. I have 10 installs and dozens of designs and setups I have worked on. I think that if I can’t get it to work in an hour that a new person is out of luck.

Well I agree Michael. I have never commented publicly on any aspect of your design at all. What are these useability issues in Gemini? . And why is Kubrick borked.? And why does it not install properly ? We are entitled to know.

Root, I did not enter anything in the CSS style competition. Charleen was a style I made for my sister and people kept asking to use it so I released it. Alex packaged it for his style switcher.
Goodsnake, no one is “attacking” any existing styles [flame removed]. As I said I think Gemini and Trident are valuable now and will continue to be to the community regardless of the WP default. You should think about if what you say is about the issue or the person, and if it’s relevant at all. Current problems with the .htaccess in Kubrick from Michael’s site don’t have anything to do with its graphics and concepts being integrated into WordPress. Obviously the mod_rewrite system in WP will continue to work just as well as it has for you in the past. If you want to report a bug about actual WordPress code, there’s a place for that.

And what are *fundamental problems* and *useability issues* if they are not direct attacks on my design. ? Here is Charleen Adapted from the default index. Please scroll down for the full effect. The Root template galleries are now closing. Thank you. And Goodnight.

2fargon: I agree re. “design by community”.
What I was trying to do was to see if some kind of consensus would emerge as to what we want from the next template. If so, then that might just be useful for the devs to know. Even if they decide differently in the end.
Re. the dictatorship bit, you don’t need to take me so seriously just because I say “seriously”. Seriously, inserting :-)s into my gratuitously incendiary rhetoric is no fun, it makes it all too obvious. I’m a happy guy right now. I love what the devs are doing (gimme gimme gimme 1.3). I love the template stuff that “Root&co” (sorry can’t remember all the names right now) are doing, especially Root’s blog entries that explain the motivation behind it all (if only he’d linked to those from here earlier). I did an install of Kubrick and am loving that as well, just not as default in a WP distro (at least not as it stands now). And do I really need to point out that our GPL-given Right To Fork makes a WP dictatorhsip impossible anyway?