Installing a WordPress theme is incredibly straightforward. WordPress themes out there for download from numerous places on the Internet are generally packaged in.zip files (i.e. theme-name.zip). Installing a WordPress theme involves practically nothing extra than unzipping the.zip file into the suitable directory of your WordPress installation, and activating the theme from your WordPress administration console.
Structure of a WordPress Theme
In order for you to set up your new WordPress theme appropriately, you need to fully grasp the fundamentals of how the WordPress technique interacts with themes. A WordPress theme desires three essential files in order to operate correctly with the WordPress administration:
o An index.php file: This file is the controller of a WordPress blog. Most WordPress themes also have other PHP files that represent different sections of a WordPress web page, but index.php is the only truly essential PHP file.
o A style.css file: This file controls the appear and layout of the WordPress-based internet site working with style definitions. It also contains the details that is employed in the Handle Themes section of WordPress to display the theme name, version, author, and description
o A “screenshot” image: This image is made use of to produce preview of the corresponding theme in the Handle Themes section of the WordPress administration. It can be any of the popular net graphics files (png, jpg, gif), but it requires to be named screenshot. For instance, screenshot.png, screenshot.jpg, or screenshot.gif.
If you have gotten your theme from a designer who knows what he’s carrying out, you do not genuinely have to have to worry about generating certain the theme is set up appropriately. If you are not positive, you could just want to double-verify that you have got the basic files required to install your theme.
WordPress Directory Structure
The WordPress directory structure contains 3 folders in the root directory:
o wp-admin
o wp-content material
o wp-contains
Beneath the wp-content material folder there is a folder called themes. Inside this folder is exactly where you want to deposit the folder that contains your theme. Here’s an example. Say minimalist WordPress themes am installing a theme for a recipe weblog. The theme is named Recipe, and its folder structure looks like this:
recipe-weblog/
index.php
style.css
screenshot.png
This theme would commonly be packaged in a.zip file. To use the theme, I would have to have to unpackage the file, then upload it (likely employing FTP) into my WordPress themes folder. If I have WordPress installed on my web server below a directory called weblog, my directory structure would look like this:
/WordPress/wp-content material/themes/recipe-blog/
index.php
style.css
screenshot.png
Activating a WordPress Theme
Immediately after I upload the theme to the correct directory, I can now go to my WordPress administration to activate it. Right after logging in to the WordPress admin section, I go to Appearances->Themes. I can see that my new theme is installed correctly and ready to be activated, since I can see it in beneath Offered Themes on the Handle Themes page.