Distributing a theme #

Part 6, chapter 8. A theme is the most visible extension there is, and the easiest to reuse. Before you publish one, you have to be sure you may give away everything in it: code is only part of a theme. This chapter covers what is different about publishing a theme; the general release procedure is Part 7.

Everything in a theme has a license #

The last two rows are where themes go wrong. Demo photos bought for one site may not be passed on. A theme shipped with a customer's logo gives that logo to everyone. Replace them with free images (with their credit) or simple placeholders.

Note that a template copied from the kernel is GPL even if the rest of your theme is under another license, so the simplest choice for a theme is GPL-2.0-or-later for all of it.

Credits in the theme #

• A LICENSE file for the theme.
• Each library's, font's and icon set's license file next to it (sevenx_themes_simple keeps its third-party CSS under stylesheets/libs/).
• An Includes entry in ezinfo.php for each bundled library or font, so the about page lists it (Attribution and copyright notices).
• A "Credits" section in the README naming images and their authors where their license asks for it.

Content classes: packages #

A theme's templates expect content classes (article, blog_post, event). A site that installs the theme may not have them. Ship them as packages: export each class as an .ezpkg file into the theme's packages/ folder, as sevenx_themes_simple does, and say in the README how to import them (Packages and the package creator). Never ship a database dump.

Settings the site must make #

The site still has to choose your design (Themes and siteaccesses). Write the exact lines in the README. If you ship settings/siteaccess/<name>/ in the theme, say which siteaccess names it expects.

composer.json #

A theme is installed like any extension (Modernizing composer.json):

{
    "name": "your-account/mytheme",
    "description": "My theme: a clean, responsive theme for Exponential 6 sites, with dark mode.",
    "type": "ezpublish-legacy-extension",
    "license": "GPL-2.0-or-later",
    "keywords": ["exponential", "theme", "design"],
    "require": {
        "php": "^8.0",
        "se7enxweb/ezpublish-legacy-installer": "*"
    },
    "extra": {
        "ezpublish-legacy-extension-name": "mytheme"
    }
}

The README of a theme #

A theme's README should show the theme. Include:

1. a screenshot of the front page and of one content page, in light and dark mode;
2. what it needs (content classes, other extensions such as ezjscore);
3. installation: Composer, activation, the siteaccess settings, importing the packages;
4. what can be customized by settings, and how to build a variant on top of it (Themes and siteaccesses, "A theme on top of a theme");
5. credits and licenses.

Before the first release #

• To do: Every image, font, icon and library is licensed for redistribution, with its license file.
• To do: No real company logo, no customer content, no photos of real people without their permission.
• To do: No node IDs or host names of your own site in templates or settings.
• To do: No editor backup files or unused minified copies.
• To do: Works in light and dark mode, and at phone width.
• To do: Works under a Content Security Policy with 'self' (Theme assets, the packer and CSP).
• To do: ezinfo.php, extension.xml and composer.json carry the version and license.
• To do: The README has screenshots and installation steps.

Then release it as Part 7 describes, and tell people where they look for themes (Growing the community through code).

Related pages #

• Previous: Dark mode and design tokens in themes
• Next: Where the designers' help continues
• Licenses and how they combine
• Packages
• Free documentation: this page is free to copy, translate and improve under the GNU FDL 1.3.