Hello
I'm trying to develop a custom theme for MyBB. So far I'm only able to customize the theme (both the template and anything else) through Theme Manager in Admin CP.
Is there any way to customize it outside Admin CP?
I mean, something like in Wordpress, where you could access it via cPanel. Then you would see the template files (PHP files) bundled in one folder, and you could edit it directly with your own text editor (Notepad++ for example) or with cPanel code editor.
I think it has more flexibilities/liberation than having to rely on Admin CP.
Is it possible?
It's not possible really, no. You can edit the templates within the database via phpmyadmin but you'd be better off just copying it into notepad++, editing it, then pasting it back into the ACP.
...via phpMyAdmin? :o Is the theme files stored in database rather than stored in PHP files? I'm really new in MyBB theming, though I have experience in theming Wordpress and legacy version of IPB (which are similar).
Is there any plugins/modifications available to let us theme not through admin CP?
Yes, templates and stylesheets are stored in the database unfortunately (though stylesheets are cached to proper .css files). There aren't any plugins that I know of, no
Whoa. Just out of curiosity... wouldn't it affect site performance or memory usage? Since every template files must be fetched from the database...
It may do slightly, though it's taken that 1 mysql query is faster than reading multiple files from the filesystem. MyBB uses a single query to grab all the templates at once.
I see... I heard of that too, though AFAIK it requires good server to handle it speedily (CMIIW though, I'm not a programmer). This might go off-topic but I promise this will be the last: does MyBB offer caching for theme/template? So it wouldn't take much queries to process it.
(2012-03-09, 10:41 AM)Deathlock Wrote: [ -> ]I see... I heard of that too, though AFAIK it requires good server to handle it speedily (CMIIW though, I'm not a programmer). This might go off-topic but I promise this will be the last: does MyBB offer caching for theme/template? So it wouldn't take much queries to process it.
Templates are cached at startup; it's only a single query.
Okay, thanks a lot for the confirmation.
On topic: it is unfortunate that we cannot edit theme/template files without using Admin CP. Seeing one complete file rather than separated by functions is giving more power/more flexibility to theme editor, I think. I wish myBB v2.0 would have this feature.
MyBB 2.0 will handle things a lot differently as Twig's going to be used for templating and the whole software will follow the MVC approach.