What Is a Theme?
A theme within a website is the structure in which your theme appears and provides a different setup depending on whether you have a blog website, an ecommerce website, a magazine website, or even a corporate business website. Each type of website would require their own features and customization abilities – Some are set up and ready to start your website while other themes require personal customization to tailor the theme to your needs. These themes may be free, or they may come at a price depending on your individual needs. Free themes may be found on the WordPress Themes Directory such as on WordPress.org. Places to purchase themes may be on websites such as ThemeIsle.com, ElegantThemes.com, and ThemeFrost.net. There are many free themes, but themes may be encoded with malicious code that may harm, steal, and alter your computer or network, so it is important to use the same tips to look for safe plugins as mentioned in my previous post “What I Learned about Utilizing Plugins for Websites.” In my post I talk about several ways to look out for safe plugins which can be applied to choosing a theme such as considering the about of positive reviews and the rate of the theme, considering whether the theme is from a reputable well known and respected source, checking whether the theme is commonly downloaded by the community, and how often the theme version has been updated by the developer. The way to find safe plugins is the same way to find safe themes.
Theme Files
What type of files will you find in a WordPress theme? WordPress themes typically contain two types of files and they are the style.css and an index.php file. These may have multiple CSS and php files that describe the structure, details, functions, and attributes of the theme. These files are the building blocks used to create the theme like a cooking recipe.
Choosing My Theme
In deciding to choose which theme that I will use for The Goofy Gremlin, I have decided to use a Decision Matrix Analysis chart which provides a comparison between three themes that I desired: Astra, Kadence, and Ocean WP. I used criteria such as the cost, speed, customization, blog related, ecommerce related, easy to use, and the amount of support the theme had. These criteria are important for the future of my website because a slow, non-customizable, high-cost theme with no ability to use it for a blog or an ecommerce website with little support from the developer is not something that will be beneficial. So, the cost, speed, customization abilities, blog and ecommerce abilities, easy use, and support are things that I need for my website to function well. Out of all three themes, the Astra was the best theme to use for my website as it is fast, customizable, used popularly by many big businesses, Is versatile for several types of websites including a blog and ecommerce, and it has a big support for its use. Astra is free but has better added specs when purchasing the premium. Right now, my business is small. If I ever need to expand my business Astra also has the capabilities of providing the increased specs that I will need to add to my website with the premium version of the theme. My theme was not installed manually but installed automatically on the WordPress website. The installation was fast and easy. Now I can freely update the theme of my website to fit the meme-brand culture that The Goofy Gremlin reflects.
Thank You!
If you have read this far and enjoyed reading my post about my website theme, thank you! If like this post, share it, and comment down below a theme that you prefer to use for your website. Also, do not forget to share a meme today that has made you laugh and bring you joy. Make sure to share that meme with a friend, family member, a co-worker, or even a stranger to give their life more Meme-ingfulness! If you have not found you Inner Gremlin, you just might find it on The Goofy Gremlin website!
References
Król, K. (2019). WordPress 5 Complete (7th ed., pp. 1–417). Packt Publishing Ltd. (Original work published 2006)