Simplish 2.1.4 is an update to support WordPress 2.7, including the new threaded comments feature.

• Support WordPress 2.7’s threaded comments.¹
• Add compatibility comments template for WordPress ≤ 2.6.5.
• Link to comments goes to heading of comments list (instead of to first comment in list).
• Fix silly feed:// typo in (default) sidebar syndication links (thanks eighty4.se).
• Fix “comments” id and class to not have same name (introduce “commentslist”).
• Use smaller 32×32 gravatar for comment author.

Download Simplish version 2.1.4 here, or see it soon in the WordPress themes directory.

¹ - Threaded comment support has not yet been added to WordPress-mu, the software this blog and the Simplish Demo run atop. Until it is, you can check out Simplish’s rendition of threaded comments at a test site.

Another little gift for the holiday: Here’s a new production edition of Simplish. This is the one you should be using on your real site, you know, where you don’t run pre-release software like Simplish 2.1.4RC, or WordPress 2.7-beta…

Version 2.1.3 is a tiny update that contains just one change: a contributed header background graphic (thanks to both Anonymous and Demetris) that’s 10x smaller than the original, down from ~2.7 Kilobytes to a super-slender 256 Bytes.

In other words, this update is definitely not a big deal. But it does trim the theme’s only image down to a size smaller than… most of your blog posts, and might help (a very little bit) with bandwidth or page load times if you’re using Simplish on a very-busy site.

Download Simplish version 2.1.3 here, or see it soon in the WordPress themes directory.

As mentioned in comments on my original mild objection, I’ve been convinced that threaded discussions, new in the upcoming WordPress version 2.7, are a good value at the price. So today I slapped support for the feature into Simplish. This version of the theme should be considered “beta” quality, just like the new WordPress features on which it’s built. Both are subject to change before final release.

Demo

http://labs.utopian.net/who/josh/wp-svn/?p=1

Code

simplish-2.1.4RC.tgz

The demo shows a “jacob’s ladder” style for the comments/replies layout, where both left and right margins are indented per-thread-level. It’s an (experimental) attempt to ease the “comment chaos” feeling a deeply-threaded discussion can give.

A special thanks to Otto for his comments and his indispensable threaded comments getting-started doc.
More…

This release contains fixes for some minor bugs, and switches to relative (em) font sizing.

• Replace deprecated get_settings() call with bloginfo().
• Improve and simplify hCards for authors, commenters, and the theme footer link, removing mis-used n class (thanks Martin McEvoy @ weborganics.co.uk).
• Further define and improve Windows fall-back fonts in CSS (thanks Demetris @ op111.net).
• Define fonts with relative (em) rather than absolute (px) sizes, allowing resizing in IE6 (thanks op111.net).
• Specify body element background-color (thanks op111.net).
• Use a more humane representation of the date in day archive page h1 element (no leading zero).

Download Simplish version 2.1.2 here, or see it soon in the WordPress themes directory.

We focused on cleaner, more orderly CSS and some code factoring in this release. Visual changes are minor, but post metadata display is tighter, while line heights have been widened ever-so-slightly for easier readability in long text passages.

• Fix spacing below Tag Cloud sidebar widget above certain elements (thanks op111.net).
• Rename hCard generator functions more rationally.
• Uncompress line heights.
• Remove explicit permalink from entry meta display; entry title now serves uniformly.
• Remove the Meta label from entry meta section; unnecessary.
• Add per-comment permalink on comment date.
• Style more basic elements: table and dl styles improved/added (adopted bits of Blueprint CSS).
• Removed remaining uses of visual alignright/alignleft convenience classes in favor of more-semantic class names in the template markup.
• Add entry meta display to image attachment template.
• Improve fall-back fonts in CSS (thanks op111.net).
• Split entry title/byline and meta into include files that produce the main hAtom microformatting.

Download Simplish version 2.1.1 here, or see it soon in the WordPress themes directory.

What began as a couple patches for a minor 2.0.1 bump grew into more extensive 2.1 improvements:

• Trackback URI and Comments: combine display into a single element.
• Don’t display Category in post meta box for Uncategorized posts.
• Fix empty li element by displaying nothing on posts without tags. (Thanks Tim Hamilton.)
• Display dates on posts and comments now honor date format settings in wp-admin -> Settings -> General. (Thanks demetris from op111.net.)
• Remove header_shadow.gif. Alignment changes by a few pixels; the blog title underline is now a CSS border, not an image.
• Fix bug in sp_vallery() gallery shortcode override to handle links and HTML in gallery image captions.
• Fix bug in sp_vallery() that created extra empty gallery div. (See this issue in upstream Sandbox code.)
• Standardize and simplify use of text symbols:
  • [ ] (logged-in user UI elements)
  • | (element separation)
  • - (title element separation)
  • « » (chronological traversal)
• Adopt rel=home in header and footer links to blog’s home page.
• Replace all remaining comments_popup_link() calls with comments_link()/comments_number().
• Don’t show post counts in default sidebar’s Archives and Categories lists.
• A little more prep for gettext internationalization.
• CSS cleanups and simplifications for some double-definitions. (Thanks threesomehour.com.)
• PHP code cleanups.
• (Continued) Re-verification of posts and page templates for hAtom/hCard and XHMTL/CSS validity.

Download 2.1 right here, or see it soon in the WordPress themes directory.

Major overhaul and hCard departures

• Complete hcard/hatom microformatting for posts, authors, even the theme itself.
• Blog.txt/Sandbox-inspired hCard producer functions
• Author’s posts page `extended’ author hCard, with Gravatar
• Improved Archive page (monthly, category, tag, etc) with Archive-level title
• Implemented hAtom hfeed classes around Archives lists as appropriate
• Add single post prev/next post links near footer
• Standardize presentation of prev/next ^(page post), read more, and edit links, respectively, at bottom of content
• Change to simple “Google Style” Subject - Sitename title elements
• Add search term feedback in search results page title and content
• Extensive validation and testing against: WordPress 2.6.1, WordPress 2.7-bleeding, WordPress-µ 2.6 and µ svn HEAD
• Override default gallery shortcode to make output visually identical, but valid XHTML
• New Sitemap template page
• (Minor) code cleanup of Links and Archives page templates
• Sidebar [ol ul] lists styling fixes, and show page hierarchy with indents
• Bare beginnings of gettext internationalization

Get the latest Simplish right here, or see it soon in the WordPress themes directory.

Microformats Macrofix

• Fix hcard/hatom microformatting. Simplish vcard/hatom content now passes through detection/transformation by the Transformr (http://transformr.co.uk)
• Add author url in vcard for each post
• Sidebar ul>li elements now show hierarchy (e.g., sub-pages)

Concentrate on Captions

This is a very-minor release that:

• Styles image captions (generated by WP2.6+) with nicer font and spacing/padding
• Removes unused code in image.php

Bugfix thx 82px

• Removed dangling unused file blogtxt-sampler (my notes - oops)
• Fix typo in image align style causing comments misalignment on posts with image(s)
• Update tags to more clearly describe theme