Minimalism
Art students would probably chastise me for even applying this label at all, much less applying it in what it most certainly not accurately following the “minimalism” movement. But for me it fits, and since in this case I’m the artist, isn’t that all that matters? I see your snobbery and raise you two aloofs!
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So there’s this trend (again) towards simplification of both design and function that is popular among certain circles. And many of you have wished to have a different starting point when designing forums for your clients. Many months ago I create the “Developer’s” theme which we began packaging with the Discussion Forum module. It is essentially a grey, background image free version of the default theme. Which is nice, and it has helped many people more quickly brand their forum installation. What I wanted to do this time, however, is not just give you a stripped down version of what you’ve already seen, but something actually different. And not just CSS changes, but modified markup, and dropping some things altogether that are fun in some communities but information and option overload in others. I readily acknowledge that this theme will not appeal to everyone. Here’s a rundown, from the included readme.txt file:
The Minimalist theme emphasizes extreme simplification. Not so extreme that it feels incomplete or broken, but that it makes use of the fewest and barest essentials.
* No signatures.
* No photos.
* No formatting buttons
* No font choosers.
* No spellchecking
* Simplified visuals.
* Easy to read monochrome styling.
* Streamlined forms.
* Works best with 40x40px avatars (or smaller - or none!)
* Few graphical elements
* Text links instead of icons or buttons
* No background images
* Straightforward CSS served from a file
* Reduced markup and tables.
Because of the simplified design, the Minimalist theme also has a marginally lighter PHP overhead, with reduced file access and a slightly reduced memory footprint (an average of 200kb per page).
This theme is not meant to appeal to every person or to be a toolbox with every tool in it. It has a clear target audience, and you probably know already whether or not it appeals to you.
Enjoy!
