Themes

Hi Warren (I'm a different Mary without sunglasses) I'm not a themer but I think what Mary meant was that the coding for page themes is the same as the coding for course themes or site themes - so in order to learn how to make a page theme you would first have to learn the basics of Moodle 2.0 themes in general -from the link she gave you.

ROFL...this is hilarious.

Custom pages...ah...now that IS different.

First of all, putting my bad start to this behind us, in relation to the site you have in mind to experiment with this type of theme page, where exactly are you intending the page or pages to be?

In the config.php within BASE theme there are a good number of likely settings for Theme page layouts...

For example:

$THEME->layouts = array(
    // Most backwards compatible layout without the blocks - this is the layout used by default
    'base' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array(),
    ),
    // Standard layout with blocks, this is recommended for most pages with general information
    'standard' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),
    // Main course page
    'course' => array(
        'file' => 'coursepage.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
        'options' => array('langmenu'=>true),
    ),
    'coursecategory' => array(
        'file' => 'coursepage.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),
    // part of course, typical for modules - default page layout if $cm specified in require_login()
    'incourse' => array(
        'file' => 'coursepage.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),
    // The site home page.
    'frontpage' => array(
        'file' => 'frontpage.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),
    // Server administration scripts.
    'admin' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array('side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),
    // My dashboard page
    'mydashboard' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
        'options' => array('langmenu'=>true),
    ),
    // My public page
    'mypublic' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),
    'login' => array(
        'file' => 'loginout.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('langmenu'=>true),
    ),

    // Pages that appear in pop-up windows - no navigation, no blocks, no header.
    'popup' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('nofooter'=>true, 'nonavbar'=>true, 'nocustommenu'=>true, 'nologininfo'=>true),
    ),
    // No blocks and minimal footer - used for legacy frame layouts only!
    'frametop' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('nofooter'=>true),
    ),
    // Embeded pages, like iframe/object embeded in moodleform - it needs as much space as possible
    'embedded' => array(
        'file' => 'embedded.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('nofooter'=>true, 'nonavbar'=>true, 'nocustommenu'=>true),
    ),
    // Used during upgrade and install, and for the 'This site is undergoing maintenance' message.
    // This must not have any blocks, and it is good idea if it does not have links to
    // other places - for example there should not be a home link in the footer...
    'maintenance' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('noblocks'=>true, 'nofooter'=>true, 'nonavbar'=>true, 'nocustommenu'=>true),
    ),
    // Should display the content and basic headers only.
    'print' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('noblocks'=>true, 'nofooter'=>true, 'nonavbar'=>false, 'nocustommenu'=>true),
    ),
    // The pagelayout used when a redirection is occuring.
    'redirect' => array(
        'file' => 'embedded.php',
        'regions' => array(),
        'options' => array('nofooter'=>true, 'nonavbar'=>true, 'nocustommenu'=>true),
    ),
    // The pagelayout used for reports
    'report' => array(
        'file' => 'report.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre','side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-pre',
    ),
);

This is as far as I know the only place you can begin to customise those areas.

You would do this by creating a special layout page for each given layout in this list.

Take My Public page as an example: This is the page you can customise yourself here in Moodle.org. You can add blocks, move stuff about add images make it your own basically.

    // My public page
    'mypublic' => array(
        'file' => 'general.php',
        'regions' => array('side-pre', 'side-post'),
        'defaultregion' => 'side-post',
    ),

In the above you will see it uses general.php as the page layout. If you wanted to "customize"  this page you could make a page based on general.php where you could totally redesign it.

This is what I am doing at present using a Free CSS Template which I found on the web.

The Theme uses Base as a parent but the theme CSS is the original CSS from the template, modified to meet Moodle standards re images etc.

Most of the pages I have in this theme are based on the same index.html I got with the Free template, this includes the Lorum ipsum dummy text and the images and pseudo blog news bulletins...which make it look totally different than the ordinary Moodle site. You can see for yourself HERE.

If this is what you mean...then that is easy enough to so, as you obviously know a lot more tan I first gave you credit for, for which I openly apologies.

HTH

Mary