Fruit Basket
Fruit Basket Tutorial

Fruit Basket

Below is a list of tutorials that will instruct you on how to install and use the FruitBasket template from JoomlaPraise. This tutorial covers how to change pre configured Template Themes for the FruitBasket template.

Overview

FruitBasket is the March template from JoomlaPraise. The template is like most JoomlaPraise templates and focuses on design more than web tricks. This template features PraiseSlides, the JoomlaPraise module that utilizes Mootools function to display content as a Newsflash module would but presents it in a more attractive fashion. You have the option to choose from any section or category of content items.


Installation 1.0

To install the FruitBasket template go to http://yourdomainname.com/administrator

Joomla Domain Name

Once your here enter your username and password and login to the back end of your site.

Joomla Login

After logging in you should see the control panel.

Joomla Control Panel

Once your here use the top menu and navigate to Installers>Templates Site

Joomla Template Sites

Next, browse for the jp_fruitbasket_1.0.zip file you downloaded from JoomlaPraise and click Upload File & Install.

Joomla Install

You will be taken to the Template Manager of the back end and will now see that jp_fruitbasket_1.0 is a template option.

Joomla Template Thumbnail

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Parameters 1.0.x

To change the template parameters for Joomla! 1.0.x install simply use the top menu and navigate to Site>Template Manager>Site Templates

Template Manager

Next you will see the list of templates you have to choose from.

Joomla Template Thumbnail

Click the radio button to the left of the template named jp_fruitbasket_1.0 and click the Edit HTML found in the top of the back end.

Joomla Edit HTML

Next you will see a list of 8 variables that you can change.

Joomla Parameters

  • $default_style has the option of theme1, theme2, theme3, theme4, theme5, or theme6.
  • $custom_width gives you the ability to change the templates width to your desired amount.
  • $showBanner allows you to show/hide the top area of the template.
  • $heading_color allows you to change the heading tags of your site.
    Examples would be h1, h2, h3, component headings and content headings.
  • $font_color allows you to change the font color of the site.
  • $link_color allows you to change the link color of the site.
  • $linkhover_color allows you to change the link hover color of the site.
  • $background_color allows you to change the background color.

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Customizing Themes 1.0.x

To change the template theme for Joomla! 1.0.x install simply use the top menu and navigate to Site>Template Manager>Site Templates

Template Manager

Next you will see the list of templates you have to choose from.

Joomla Template Thumbnail

Click the radio button to the left of the template named jp_fruitbasket_1.0 and click the Edit HTML found in the top of the back end.

Joomla Edit HTML

Next you will see a list of 8 variables that you can change. In the $default_style variable change "theme1" to "theme2".

Change JoomlaPraise template theme

Refresh your site from the frontend and you will see that the template is now the "Pineapple" theme.

Pineapple Theme of FruitBasket

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Customizing Width 1.0.x

To change the template width for Joomla! 1.0.x install simply use the top menu and navigate to Site>Template Manager>Site Templates

Template Manager

Next you will see the list of templates you have to choose from.

Joomla Template Thumbnail

Click the radio button to the left of the template named jp_fruitbasket_1.0 and click the Edit HTML found in the top of the back end.

Joomla Edit HTML

Next you will see a list of 8 variables that you can change. In the $custom_width variable change "" to "90%".

Change JoomlaPraise template theme

Refresh your site from the frontend and you will see that the template now has 90% width.

Pineapple Theme of FruitBasket

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Show/Hide the Top Banner 1.0.x

To show/hide the top banner area for Joomla! 1.0.x install simply use the top menu and navigate to Site>Template Manager>Site Templates

Template Manager

Next you will see the list of templates you have to choose from.

Joomla Template Thumbnail

Click the radio button to the left of the template named jp_fruitbasket_1.0 and click the Edit HTML found in the top of the back end.

Joomla Edit HTML

Next you will see a list of 8 variables that you can change. In the $showBanner variable change "yes" to "no".

Change JoomlaPraise template theme

Refresh your site from the frontend and you will see that the template hides the top banner area. You can also accomplish this by not publishing modules in the "user4" module position.

Pineapple Theme of FruitBasket

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Custom Colors 1.0.x

To customize colors for Joomla! 1.0.x install simply use the top menu and navigate to Site>Template Manager>Site Templates

Template Manager

Next you will see the list of templates you have to choose from.

Joomla Template Thumbnail

Click the radio button to the left of the template named jp_fruitbasket_1.0 and click the Edit HTML found in the top of the back end.

Joomla Edit HTML

Next you will see a list of 8 variables that you can change. In the $heading_color, $font_color, $link_color, $linkhover_color, and $background_color variables enter hexadecimal values. Remember that their is no need to type the pound(#) sign.

Change JoomlaPraise template theme

Refresh your site from the frontend and you will see that the template colors have changed for the headings, links, font, and background.

Pineapple Theme of FruitBasket

For more information on changing graphics for the template click here.

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Sample Client Usage

In this portion of the tutorial we will explain how to customize the entire template using a fictitious company.

Our fictitious company has supplied us with a logo and a style guide to help us in the creation of their new website.

Delivery Styleguide

First thing we want to do is edit the colors of the website. We'll start by changing the custom color variables in the backend of the template.

In your index.php file you want to edit the html and change the colors to match the style guide that has been supplied.

Change JoomlaPraise template theme

I've changed the custom color variables to match more closely to the style guide provided.

Change JoomlaPraise template theme

The resulting changes should look like this. The background, font, heading, and link colors have all changed.

Custom Colors

Next we need to modify the graphics to solidify the site.

Our first step is to change the background image for both the header and the footer.

Open up the "header_source-bg.png" and "footer_source-bg.png" files provided in the template downloads area. You will need Adobe Fireworks to change these files.

Edit these accordingly and you should have resulting files "header-bg.gif" and "footer-bg.gif".

Header

Header

Overwrite the files on your Joomla website and refresh the page. Were almost done!

Header Footer

Next, open the source file named "fruitBasket_source.png". You will have a file with slices already named for exporting.

Sliced

Change the file accordingly and export your new images. Once you overwrite on your Joomla site you will be one step closer to finishing.

Changed Graphics

Finally we need to change some css. Navigate to the css file in templates/jp_fruitbasket_1.0/css/theme1.css we are using theme 1 but make sure you edit which theme you specify in the index.php file.

For our example we edited the css file from this.....

#header-border{
background:url(../images/theme1/header-border.png) repeat-y 50% 0px #041E39;
border-bottom:5px solid #EAEAEA;
}
#header-inner{
background:url(../images/theme1/header-bg.gif) no-repeat 50% 0px #05274C;
}
#header h3{
color:#99CC00;
}
#footer-border{
background:url(../images/theme1/footer-border.png) repeat-y 50% 0px #041E39;
border-top:5px solid #839CB8;
}
#footer-inner{
background:url(../images/theme1/footer-bg.gif) no-repeat 50% 100% #05274C;
color:#FFFFFF;
border-bottom:1px solid #53708E;
}
#footer h3{
color:#99CC00;
}
#topnavigation a{
color:#FFFFFF;
border-top:1px solid #53708E;
}
#topnavigation a:hover, #topnavigation #active_menu-nav{
color:#53708E;
border-top:1px solid #99CC00;
}

To this...

#header-inner{
background:url(../images/theme1/header-bg.gif) no-repeat 50% 0px #352714;
}
#header h3{
color:#FFFFFF;
}
#header a{
color:#FFFFFF;
}
#header-border{
background:url(../images/theme1/header-border.png) repeat-y 50% 0px #FFBD36;
border-bottom:5px solid #EAEAEA;
}
#footer-inner{
background:url(../images/theme1/footer-bg.gif) no-repeat 50% 100% #352714;
color:#FFFFFF;
border-bottom:1px solid #FFD532;
}
#footer h3{
color:#FFFFFF;
}
#footer-border{
background: url('/../images/theme1/footer-border.png') repeat-y 50% 0px #FFBD36;
border-top:5px solid #CCCCCC;
}
#topnavigation a{
color:#FFFFFF;
border-top:1px solid #FFCC33;
}
#topnavigation a:hover, #topnavigation #active_menu-nav{
color:#53708E;
border-top:1px solid #000000;
}

Of course their are several other ways of changing the css to your own specifications. So do what suits your needs.

Final

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