[HowTo] Design and Tweak your Frontpage

[HowTo] Design and Tweak your Frontpage

v1.0.0 [build for vBulletin 2.2.6 Final] last update:12/06/02

_____ Introduction:

• Each vBulletin forum installed on a web server is either a part of a web site or maybe the web site itself. Either way, the section that is probably the most requested by the end-user is the frontpage which holds the introduction to the forum, the categories with its boards and maybe some other boxes like the private messages, who is currently online and the birthdays. It speaks for itself, that at least this page should give a good impression to the end-user who is browsing your web site. And might consider to continue to browse it and maybe even register.
  
  It has been six months now since I have purchased a license for vBulletin. And since my forum has been online I had a lot of questions and awnsers to them on how to improve my site. Some that did not had a direct awnser and were sometimes somewhat hard to figure out, got sorted out and put together as a little how to so I could share the knowledge with other members who had the same questions and were looking for the same awnsers. Several of those threads turned out pretty nice and with some we found some issues and even though we were able to 'fix' them, the threads did look a bit messy. It was hard to figure out sometimes what to do where, etc. So that is why I have put together this thread, with some design tips and some tweaks in an easy (and better ordered) overview.
  
  Please understand that I am not a guru in anything, and that I am trying my best to get things to work for everybody. However, I will not and can not support older versions of these hacks, older versions of vBulletin, and/or integration with other code-hacks / template modifications. All template modifications in this thread are based on a clean installation of vBulletin 2.2.6 final. Some of the provided code are also very good examples on how you could continue to apply them to other pages of your board; so read and learn > 'How can I do this on that other page?'-questions means that you didn't read and learned.
  
  Said that, let's explain what you can expect.

_____ Index:[list=1][*] Breaking up the categories from eachother[*] Adding background images to the categories[*] Adding onMouseOver-highlighting effect to the boards[*] Adding your own (blinking and clickable) private messages images[/list=1]

[jgm]

Hi there Cindyd,

The one in Caps is the one I have removed too, I also tried the one before it just for good measure

Attached is the screen shot of what I am seeing when I load the page right now. I double checked it on my Mac and still only that current user bar is the only thing detached.

[cindyd]

I don't know what to tell you, it worked on my system and my templates also. Silly question, but did you clear your cache after you took out that one </table>?

[jgm]

Originally Posted by cindyd

I don't know what to tell you, it worked on my system and my templates also. Silly question, but did you clear your cache after you took out that one </table>?

Yeah I did clear it That is why I went to my mac to try it too.

It is strange, it worked for me in the past? and it seems to work for other people using 2.3.0

[jgm]

Well I tried again from scratch with a fresh install and it seemed to work fine. Hmm.. odd?

[jgm]

One last note. I found what was the cause of the problem.

It was External link hack 1.1

When you edit the index.php it really breaks something, you do the following and then all your nicley spaced forums suddenly crunch back together.

Now you have to upload this file and download the index.php.

##### Find #####

eval("\$forumbits .= \"".gettemplate("forumhome_forumbit_level$depth$te mpext")."\";");

##### Replace it with #####

if ($forum['link']) {
eval("\$forumbits .= \"".gettemplate("forumdisplay_linkbit_level$depth" )."\";");
} else {
eval("\$forumbits .= \"".gettemplate("forumdisplay_forumbit_level$depth $tempext")."\";");
}

[jhead]

Originally Posted by xiphoid

(1) Breaking up the categories from eachother

(description)
This template modification will put a white space between the categories so they appear as they are no longer attached to eachother, giving the effect as if each category is in its own block; giving a much better overview of your topics.

I installed the " Breaking up the categories from each other " mod... now when I click on a forum or even a category from the front page, the Category header bar (or forum title bar) is missing on all subsequent pages. What do I need to do to fix it?

Any ideas?

Seen screenshot

[Lady Ginasue]

Thank you for these codes on making the space between categories. I have 11 fourms that I needed separated and this will help a lot.

[imported_Matt Whelan]

I did the spaces between categories hack.

I like it a lot but I do not like how it puts that line across the top of my forums and the space from the top forum section("First Generation") to the "Welcome to our newest member" part is too large of a gap.

How do I change this?

www.acura-legend.com/vbulletin


Thanks!

[Floris]

Those are just some extra <br> tags that you have.
Find them and remove them - they are near <!-- end text --> and <!-- main --> i think. iirc

[imported_Matt Whelan]

Originally Posted by xiphoid

Those are just some extra <br> tags that you have.
Find them and remove them - they are near <!-- end text --> and <!-- main --> i think. iirc

Ok, I found out how to edit the appropriate <br> tags, but I still do not know how to remove that horizontal line, underscore, call it what you will. Any ideas? Thanks!