Bauhouse Design

Building a Symphony Theme: Part 2

As we discovered in Part 1 of this series, a valid XSLT template and stylesheet must be available to transform XML data into HTML Output. (Note that I will be using the latest update, Symphony 1.5.06, for this tutorial.) At this point, though, we have no data to transform. Next, we need to create an XML Data Source. But, before we get there, let’s discover what is possible in Symphony even without a Data Source. The power of Symphony comes in the ability to build HTML pages by assembling pieces of reusable HTML code and XSLT templates into modular page structures through Masters, Pages and Utilities.

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Updating Symphony

This weekend, the Symphony Team has released an update to the official Symphony 1.5 Public Release (version 1.5.05) that was released on September 21, 2006. Symphony 1.5.06 provides several user requested improvements and bug fixes. Much credit must be given to the Symphony development team for their responsiveness and their fast-paced development.

The 1.5.06 update provides many additional possibilities for the development of a Symphony theme, so you may enjoy a short intermission in our series on “Building a Symphony Theme”:/journal/building-a-symphony-theme-part-1/ as we update the application. It should take merely a moment to update.

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Building a Symphony Theme: Part 1

This is part one in a series of articles on Creating a Theme for Symphony. Building a site in Symphony will require some knowledge about XML, XPath and XSLT, as well as HTML and CSS. All of these technologies are standards developed by the World Wide Web Consortium as the basic building blocks that make the web work. Many of us have come around to the idea of developing standards compliant sites using XHTML and CSS. XML is a standard means of storing and retrieving data and media. However, XPath and XSLT are neglected siblings that could use some attention, and Symphony can help us out in this area. They are, in fact, the heart and soul of Symphony.

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Creating a Theme for Symphony

I have decided to build a theme for Symphony using the Pink for October WordPress theme. I will be describing the process step by step to help others who are wondering about the lack of documentation for developing sites using Symphony. I have found the best way to learn is by playing with the application to see what it can do. Learning about XML, XSLT and XPath are part of the process. Symphony provides a wonderful tool for learning the ins and outs of XSLT templating. So, here goes…

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Pink for October

Yes, October is running out. But while it is still October, and seeing as I haven’t made any entries for the month of October, there is still time to act. I wanted to find a theme that would be worthy of inclusion in the list of themes available for Symphony, as theme development seems to be a little slow.

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