Drupal Theme Development - Let’s Enjoy Interactive Designs

Jul 14, 2014
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Drupal Theme Development is a leading approach towards interactive web designs that not only increases look & feel, but also adds some additional features & functionality for the enhancement of traffic.

Are you aware of Drupal and its exclusive features? If the answer is No, then get ready to learn a lot about it. In this post, you will come to know a detailed description about Drupal and the various tips involved in the Drupal Theme Development. Let’s start with the basics. Drupal is among one of the most popular CMss (Content Management Systems) followed by WordPress, Magento and Joomla. There are several Drupal versions available till date, but Drupal 7.1 is the latest one that provides customized web solutions and attractive appearance for incredible performance of the websites.

Before starting the process of Drupal Theme Development, you should be aware of some tools and markup languages as follows:

  • PHP
  • CSS
  • HTML
  • JavaScript
  • Content Management System(s)

Steps covered during theme development based on Drupal

Some crucial steps that must be taken into consideration for Drupal Theme Development have been illustrated below:

Making a plan with full preparation

1.    Create the Design: The first emphasis must be laid on creating a design for the website that includes web pages, body, header, footer and the navigation menu. After completion of the design, check it at least once ensuring that it is up to the mark.

2.   Go for Development using HTML & CSS: Create the layout and develop the web pages like Home & Contact Us using the markup languages such as HTML & CSS. Make simple layout and do not use any server or client-side scripting languages as their involvement may interfere the Drupal’s code.

3.   Install the Drupal: To start the Drupal Theme Development process, the primary requirement is to download the Drupal. After completion of the download, the next step is to transfer all the essential files to a server, which will be used for theme development. For this purpose, you may either use your own testing server or an online server, but the former one is highly recommended. All the downloaded files should be placed in the Root Folder.

4.   Understand the Drupal’s structure and convert the pages: After successful completion of the above three mentioned steps, the next one is to understand the web page structure of Drupal and convert all your static pages (HTML) into dynamic. Regions & Blocks are important parts of Drupal. The former one is dynamic where Blocks refer to the things contained in the Regions.

Creation of the Theme Files

1.   Setting the theme folder: A .info file must be created in this folder that consists of all the essential information about the themes.

2.   Creation of the template files: Create standard template pages like html, node, block and custom.

3.   Add Process & Functions: Add process & functions in order to modify the variables to be used by templates.

Installation of the Themes

  1. Install the theme and add appropriate nodes.
  2. For enhanced functionality and security, additional modules should be installed.
  3. Add unique content to the website.

Drupal Theme Development boosts the appearance of the website to a great extent and necessary changes can be made to the different sections like web pages and content. A wide range of ready themes are available and you can opt the one that fits the best for your site.

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