Separate theme from plugin

[ailion]

Is it possible to have a separate theme menu in ACP like WP?

It would be nice if we can preview themes in advance.

[PitaJ]

What do you mean? We have ACP -> Customize -> Themes, where you can see the themes, what do you want to see?

Can you draw a mockup of what you're thinking or describe it in more detail?

[ailion]

1. Themes are plugins in NodeBB so I have to install themes as a plugin. I cannot install themes via ACP -> Customize -> Themes -> Install
2. The preview we have is just a picture uploaded by theme creator.We cannot see the real one until we activate the theme then reboot NodeBB.

My suggestion:

1. Separate theme and plugin pages.
   ACP -> Customize -> Themes -> Install
   ACP -> Customize -> Themes -> Uninstall
   ACP -> Customize -> Themes -> Preview
   ACP -> Customize -> Themes -> Apply Theme

2. Real preview without rebooting or waiting for over 5 seconds/theme.

3. Provide filters(style, color, etc)

[PitaJ]

@ailion what you're asking for is by no means trivial and is impossible with the way themes work. We'd have to run a build cycle to display the theme anyways so you may as well just do it yourself.

[ailion]

fine

Thanks for GPL license

[PitaJ]

@ailion I hope you didn't misunderstand me, by "do it yourself" I was referring to trying out themes.

[Bri]

@ailion said in Separate theme from plugin:

Real preview without rebooting or waiting for over 5 seconds/theme.

Yeah, this is a real problem that I don't think can be solved by wishing it to happen. Not all things are possible with programming, unfortunately; there are real world constraints we have to live with.

AFAIK the current themes require processing since they need to be compiled to CSS that the browser understands, and that requires time. What is sacrificed in time is gained in modularity and composability, which I think is quite a fair tradeoff, unless you plan on changing the CSS constantly (several times a day). This is a scenario I've seen too, but the way to solve it is extremely complex.

But by all means, if you can pull it off, more power to you!