GUADEC is the main event of the GNOME community, celebrated once a year. We have recently adopted Drupal as the platform of the GUADEC's website (http://beta.guadec.org) and we have decided to launch a contest to choose a GUADEC logo and Drupal theme: Artists Wanted.
The works need to be submitted before 31/jan/06 and the winner gets 2 GUADEC vip passes, 2 return tickets to Vilanova (Catalonia, Spain) and one week accommodation for both participants. The event is the last week of June and Vilanova is in the Mediterranean coast, 45km south of Barcelona. We are studying the possibility to use Drupal for gnome.org too, so your theme could end up being adopted/adapted in the main site as well.
We hope this contest will humbly contribute to the increase and diversity of Drupal themes available. All the works are submitted publicly and the winner is decided by a jury in which the community is also represented (more).
Comments
Drupal Theme Competition
It is possible that submissions to this contest will also qualify for the upcoming (still not officially announced) Drupal Theme Competition. There should be plenty of motivation for people to go out and start theming!
Question: is GNOME using Drupal 4.6.*?
- Robert Douglass
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My Drupal book: Building Online Communities with Drupal, phpBB and WordPress
That would be great
This combination of challenges would be great, count with us!
http://beta.guadec.org/ is using the latest stable release of Drupal (4.6) and the aim is to move to 4.7 as soon as this version and the migration path are stable.
http://gnomedotorg.ourproject.org/ (not an official project yet since the Drupal adoption for the main site is till being discussed) is a CivicSpace 0.8.2 - which stands for a 4.6 as well AFAIK. If this site is going to production we will use the last stable CivicSpace release as well.
If the Drupal option is finally agreed, the idea is to integrate these sites and others in a multisite, hopefully powered by Drupal 4.7. http://gnomedesktop.org is another Drupal installation that would be integrated, and we would offer to the GNOME projects (GIMP, Dia, Evolution, Abiword...) the possiblity to run their site with Drupal as well.
Our Drupal bet has a wide scope, this is why we think the mother theme needs to be a good piece of work. We have no doubt the Drupal community has talent for this and more, this is why we came with the idea of the contest.
Specify PHPTemplate
You should be clear and specify that you want a PHPTemplate theme. CivicSpace them is PHPTemplate and 4.7 uses PHPTemplate as its standard engine. The theme competition will also be based on PHPTemplate. It'd suck to get a really great XTemplate (or pure theme) from your hard working volunteers and then have to port it.
- Robert Douglass
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My Drupal book: Building Online Communities with Drupal, phpBB and WordPress
Is 4.6 or 4.7 relevant?
Assuming that PHPTemplate is the engine required, is it relevant to require as well the theme to be for 4.7 and/or 4.6? Will a PHPTemplate theme work wth both?
In case of doubt we would follow the same version requirement you set for your theme competition, to assure the compatibility of submissions in the GUADEC contest and the Drupal competition.
Theme competition => 4.7
One of the goals of the theme competition will be to highlight some of 4.7's new capabilites (block regions, themed forms etc).
- Robert Douglass
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My Drupal book: Building Online Communities with Drupal, phpBB and WordPress
Alright, we will require it
Alright, we will require it as well. We will need to prepare a 4.7 in order to test the submitted themes, I guess we will need to upgrade our test site at http://guadectest.ourproject.org
Thanks for the quick reply. ;)
Good news
I think that there are very few compatibility problems between 4.6 PHPTemplate themes and 4.7, so thankfully this isn't a showstopper one way or another.
- Robert Douglass
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My Drupal book: Building Online Communities with Drupal, phpBB and WordPress
Can we confirm this?
Can we confirm this? We haven't mentioned anything in http://beta.guadec.org/contest in order to avoid unconfirmed rumours.
On the other hand, we have been adding some recommendations about the web themes based on the feedback we got here and there: What you deliver, how and when.
Hard to tell from the threading....
...what exactly you want confirmed?
The theme competition will have specific rules as to what qualifies, but anything done for GNOME should be a close fit, and in the worst case only require some extra tweaking to qualify. Any theme that has been submitted since the release of 4.7b1 can qualify, so even though the theme competition hasn't been officially announced, there is no danger in getting the themes in now. Did I confirm the right thing?
- Robert Douglass
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My Drupal book: Building Online Communities with Drupal, phpBB and WordPress
Mmmm yes :) Thanks, I
Mmmm yes :)
Thanks, I have edited http://beta.guadec.org/contest adding a coment on the Drupal theme competition at the top. That's all we needed.
release
you might also want to state if you want to release your theme to the public ("All the materials are delivered in open formats with free license.")
Mind you: If you can upgrade your theme on yourself for every new Drupal release or can get it done without the help of the Drupal community, I advise you NOT to release the theme for branding purposes (just like the Bluebeach theme on drupal.org itself)
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groets
bertb
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groets
bert boerland
Theme competition will require it
Just as a note, the Drupal theme competition will require that the themes submitted be released under the GPL and made available on Drupal.org. This is a minor consideration for GNOME, however.
- Robert Douglass
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My Drupal book: Building Online Communities with Drupal, phpBB and WordPress
PHPTempate and GNU/GPL
http://beta.guadec.org/?q=node/26
PHPTemplate engine specified - we also want a fast winning theme.
GNU/GPL license specified. GNOME is part of the GNU project and we produce free software publicly available. It makes sense the theme we use has the same conditions. People rebrand our stuff - and we like it.
Accessibility
Please also consider giving points for accessibility as well as eye candy. Most other CMS don't conform to accessibility standards, but this is one of Drupal's many strengths. You could make it a requirement that themes need to pass Section 508 compliance.
See here for more info:
http://www.contentquality.com
Cortext Communications
Drupal Themes & Modules
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Drupal Specialists: Consulting, Development & Training
Robert Castelo, CTO
Code Positive
London, United Kingdom
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Any specs?
I am just wondering if there are any certain needs for the theme...
Does it need to be flexible or fixed, 2 or 3 column, etc?
Or can I just go with whatever?
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Paul Malenke
paul.malenke@gmail.com
AfterDeathGraphics.com
Shop the AfterDeath Graphics Store
Accessibility and additional requirements
About accessibility... we are requiring W3C standards, which is the minimal requirement to get to an accessible site. We fear that putting too strict rules will scare possible participants, or simply relatively busy designers. Instead, working on the tuning of the winning theme once it is elected sounds more feasible.
About additional requirements, we have a preference for a horizontal navigation bar (as stated). About the columns, afaik the theme in itself does not need to deal with this and work efficiently with 2 or 3. But you are right, making our preferences (not requirements) more specific will help designers.
For instance, we don't have a clear preference between fixed/flexible, and in any case this could be also that we could tune working on the winning theme.
We simply don't want to ask too much to the potential participants. We rather collaborate with the winner to improve/tune the winning option.
Extended deadline
We have got no web theme submissions in the Design contest. :( At least one participant was trying to deliver his work but didn't make it on time.
We have extended the deadline to the end of Friday and we are requiring only screenshots and a compromise to convert them to code in the case you win.
More: Preparing a web theme for the contest? Read this.
We got 52 logos, though...