What Is The frugal WordPress Theme?
NOTE: Many New Features Have Been Added Since This Post!
I just wanted to clarify that there have been a good deal of added features since the publishing of this post. Click HERE to find out more.
When I designed the frugal WordPress theme I was determined to make it as clean and simple as possible. From the look of its pages to the back-end code, I wanted to create the most minimalist WordPress theme that still maintained the truly important, up-to-date features available. I didn’t want to sacrifice solid features for simplicity sake, but I also wanted to ensure that the user of the frugal theme was getting the lightest, cleanest WordPress theme to frame their precious content.
As I started putting the finishing touches on the frugal theme I began to realize the amazing flexibility that came with the simple design. As with many things, less is often more. Just like Twitter is so simple and yet unlimited in its possibilities, so too is the frugal WordPress theme.
Finally a fully customizable theme for the non-coder!
By including a free 29 page handbook to help the user more easily customize their frugal theme, I’ve made it a simple process to change around the look of your frugal theme. Almost like paint-by-numbers and just as simple, I’ve setup a system so you can easily pick the customizations you want to implement and then quickly a easily make the changes yourself. Anything from changing the background color to adjusting the size of your sidebar to adding a custom header to creating a slick looking navigation bar, you can easily make your frugal theme look, feel and function the way that best suits your blogging needs.
It’s all about your content!
When it comes down to it, your blog’s content is MUCH more important that the theme itself. Sure, you don’t want your site to look tacky or amateurish or misrepresent the focus of your blog, but at the end of the day, it’s WHAT your saying that creates the draw for your potential subscribers, not what color the background is when they read it (though that can have an effect). So in designing the frugal WordPress theme I kept in mind the idea of providing the absolute best possible framework to put ALL the focus on the words and images you provide your readers…no more, no less. In it’s stock form, the frugal theme is light and clear and perfect for the next great work you are about to share.
Speed, Speed and more Speed!
Clicking around on a slow blog theme can be a real pain in the you-know-what! There’s nothing more annoying than having to wait around to watch EVERY page load, every time you want to click through to another page. This slow load time can even deter potential subscribers from sticking around. Some causes of this slowness would be:
- Too many, or poorly made plugins.
- A super slow web server.
- Too many/too large images on your site.
I can’t help what server you use, but have touched on the other two issues in the design of the frugal WordPress theme. As for the plugins, by including built-in ad widgets, custom avatars and custom favicons (all mentioned below) you will need to install less plugins to your blog and therefore have less clutter slowing your site down.
Speaking of clutter, I made sure that the frugal theme, in its stock form, uses ZERO images. You’d be surprised at how many images a lot of themes use for things like their navigation bars, backgrounds, headers, footers, etc… I have nothing against using images in your themes and know that they often have their place, but I wanted to make sure that you have the CHOICE to either keep is super clean and simple or fully flashy to showcase your design talent.
Some of the subtle features.
The features I added to the frugal WordPress theme are generally subtle extras that can make ALL the difference.
- A free ebook guide to help you get the most out of your frugal theme and learn to customize it to your hearts content. I start by covering the basics of website design, then move to a more specific WordPress theme focus and then move right into the ‘how-tos’ of customizing your frugal theme. With the simplicity of paint-by-numbers I show you how to take your frugal WordPress theme and mold it into whatever look, feel and function that your content requires to have the greatest chance of getting noticed.
- The ability to easily upload a custom logo. You simply create a logo in a certain specified size (which can be adjusted if so desired), save it as a certain file and upload it to a particular folder in your frugal theme directory and it appears on your header, ready for any adjustments you may want to make to its position.
- Custom avatar. In stock form, WordPress allows for a stock avatar image to sit to the left of the name of the commenter of your blog. The ‘Mystery Man’ is often what you’ll see. What I’ve done is added a function that puts the avatar to the far right of the comment, in a larger size (80×80, but this can be adjusted to your liking) and allows for you to upload your own custom avatar to use in place of the ‘Mystery Man’. This way you can add your logo or whatever you’d prefer, so it will show up whenever a commenter doesn’t have their own avatar.
- Custom Favicon. Just like the avatar and logo, you just create your favicon file (go HERE for assistance creating this file) and upload it to a specified directory in your frugal theme files and BINGO! you have your very own custom favicon image right next to your URL in your browsers address bar.
- Threaded comments. The latest version of WordPress allows for threaded comments (where you can reply to individual comments and not have them appear at the very bottom of the comment list), but this does not work with all themes. I’ve added the code necessary for threaded comments to work as well as made it easy for you to adjust the look and feel of your comment section. (Check the comments of this post for an example.)
- Two 468×60 ad/feature widgets. One is located on the right side of the header, while the other is in between your posts main content and the comments section. All you have to do is add a text widget to these locations and then you can easily showcase a Google ad, an affiliate, a featured item/page on your blog or even showcase requests for subscribers and/or Twitter followers, etc…
- Custom blockquotes. I’ve added a section that not only created a clean look for your blockquotes in your posts, but made it easy for you to adjust to your liking. (Custom blockquotes can really make a difference in the look and feel of your content.
This is an example of the blockquote design that comes stock with the frugal WordPress theme. You can easily adjust it to look and feel any way you’d like. ~ Eric Hamm
- Social buttons. I’ve also included a folder called ‘social’ that represent all the popular social media sites out there. This way you can add ‘fallow me’ type widget that has buttons for your social profiles, and all with buttons that maintain a unified look and feel.
- Simple, easy to locate RSS and Email links for your blogs feed. Many people like to put out monstrous feed icons, screaming to their readers, “SUBSCRIBE!!!!”, but the fact is, if your content is worthwhile and useful to your audience, they won’t need the flashing neon lights to find your feed…they’ll make the necessary effort to find it themselves. And yet you don’t want them to have to make an EFFORT either. So I created a simple piece of text to the right side of the navbar that represents your RSS and Email feeds. It’s clean, simple, easy to find, but out of the way enough to not take up any unnecessary room. The bottom line is, how many big time bloggers have to SCREAM to get subscribers? Most of them have simple subscribe buttons/links that are JUST noticeable enough to allow for easy access, but NO MORE.
- Images WILL center! One of the most frustrating things about some WordPress themes is their inability to properly position the images you add to your posts. This theme has the right code to ensure that when you say ‘Center’, THAT’S what your image does. Move it to the right and there the image moves. This may sound trivial, but if you’ve ever had to deal with a picture that just won’t go where you want, you’ll know that this is very important!
- THIS code validates! One of the issues with some WordPress themes out there is poor coding on the backend. This can cause for unnecessary glitches. One way of figuring out how ‘clean’ or ‘dirty’ a themes code is, is to go to a site like THIS, type in the themes URL and see if it validtes. And the frugal WordPress theme DOES pass this test with flying colors!
Those are some of the extras I’ve included. Nothing fancy and no unnecessary clutter. Just the basic bells and whistles to allow for optimal blogging conditions for your awesome content to come.
So if you’re interested in trying out the frugal WordPress Theme, just click here to download it now.
71 Responses to “What Is The frugal WordPress Theme?”
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This is an example of a custom avatar. As you can see, it sits to the right of the comment, uses your own custom default image and comes in at a size that stands out (in a GOOD way).
This is an example of a comment reply. Instead of having to use the @ symbol to reply to your readers (or them replying to you or another reader) you can just reply directly to the comment of your choice.
And as you can see, these replies don’t have to stop at one.
And of course your own personal avatar/gravatar will show up just like this…
Checking out my avatar too.
Very cool. This theme really does have a very nice feel about it.
Hi Eric! I just wanted to say how impressed I am with this theme (including the fantastic user guide) – lovely and clean theme and the guide is so well laid out and easy to understand). I also love your ‘motivate thyself’ blog. In fact, I am impressed with you and your sites overall (and have promoted you a little via Twitter – and will continue to do so).
Well done Eric!
Best of Success, Megan
Thanks Megan, both for the compliments as well as the help promoting the theme! I really appreciate it!
Eric
I just want to see how much I appreciate this theme! Good Job, Eric!
Thanks!
Eric
Just started WordPress’ing and came across this theme. Fantastic and nicely documented–great tool for learning. And I love the way it looks. Great job!
Thanks Victor! You’ll have to let us know if you use it for a website or blog. Also, be sure to sign up for the Newsletter so you can stay up on the updates as I fix bugs and make upgrades.
Thanks for stopping by and sharing the great compliments!
Eric
Great looking design Eric. I especially like the little happy face in the bottom left corner – nice touch!
Thanks Alex! Yeah, the little smiley face is from my WP-Stats plugin. It kind of gives that warm, welcome feeling, doesn’t it?
Eric
Eric,
Is the only difference between the normal and the lite versions the “all white factor?” Just curious…didn’t know if “lite” meant less features/easier to use.
By the way, great looking theme. I’m currently using Flexibility and I like the looks of this one. Rivals the premium theme, Thesis, I was considering buying.
Neal
Yeah, the only difference is the “all white factor”. Actually, it’s just a few code snippets in the stylesheet that makes the difference.
Thanks! I’m glad you like it.
Eric
G’day mate
your minimalist theme looks very interesting – just want to confirm is it fixed width roughly 980px or can it be made flexible width?
Yeah, it’s fixed width, 980px. The code is super simple so you can do pretty much whatever you want with it. I’ve dove very little with non-fixed width themes/sites, so I couldn’t tell you its capabilities in that arena. Of course it’s free to download so you can play with it and see what it can do. And if you do, be sure to let me know your findings as it may be of interest to others who use it.
Thanks for stopping by and giving it a look!
Eric
Thanks for the great looking theme. I am trying it out on my blog.
Thanks for giving it a shot! I just popped over there and looks good so far. BTW, if you want to have more text in navbar right for the subscribe feature, just increase the ‘width’ of the #navbarright to the desired size. Just be sure to DECREASE the width of your #navbarleft by the same amount. And don’t go too far or you’ll run out of room for your pages to display.
Hope you enjoy the theme and thanks for stopping by!
Eric
Hi Eric,
I really like your frugal theme–I just can’t seem to use it for some reason. I am using my cpanel file manager to upload the zip file, but there is no option to “extract” the file once I have it uploaded. Usually, when I upload a theme zip this way, I have the option to extract it, then it’s available through my wordpress themes page.
Any idea why this is happening?
Thanks,
Chris
Hmm, I’m not quite sure, but have you tried unzipping first and then uploading it? Eric
Tried it and it didn’t work–I’ll look into the problem and see what I can find on wp forums or something. Thanks for getting back to me Eric.
I had someone with a similar issue and they found that for some reason it unzipped just fine under Windows, but not on their Mac. Not sure why, maybe it’s my zip software. Either way, if you don’t get it figured out, let me know and I’ll make sure we get you what you need to try out the theme. Eric
First of all, thank you Eric for making this theme. You are like my “Theme Whisperer” Ha ha. Seriously, this is exactly what I was looking for. I am such a big fan.
And this is just in case this hasn’t been resolved yet (which is highly unlikely but throwing this in for good measure anyway):
I am using a Mac too and I think it’s a zipping issue. For some reason, if my zipped file comes in the *.tar.gz format, it works.
Neal below said something about an error and I was wondering if it’s the same with what I get when I install frugal:
Warning: file(/home/rona1013/public_html/wp-content/themes/frugal_basic_2.2/style.css) [function.file]: failed to open stream: No such file or directory in /home/rona1013/public_html/wp-includes/theme.php on line 180
Warning: implode() [function.implode]: Invalid arguments passed in /home/rona1013/public_html/wp-includes/theme.php on line 180
But he was able to figure it out… and I have no clue on what to do. *grin* please help!
Hey Rona, I’m glad you’re enjoying frugal.
The error message you’re getting usually occurs when the /frugal_basic_2.2/ folder is uploaded into the ../themes/.. directory instead of just the /frugal_basic/ folder inside.
In other words, your directory structure should look like this:
../themes/frugal_basic/..
and not this:
../themes/frugal_basic_2.2/frugal_basic/..
So if you’ve got the above issue, just remove the current frugal files (backup any custom files if you’ve added any) and then freshly upload JUST the /frugal_basic/ directory into the /themes/ folder of your WordPress installation.
Does that make sense? Hope this works for you. Eric
Yes it does make a lot of sense Eric. And I can’t feel anymore embarrassed for not figuring it out myself, heh. It’s just that I didn’t unzip the frugal theme file and I uploaded the unzipped theme through WP so I didn’t see that it has subfolders. Thanks for the quick reply Eric.
Hi Eric:
Your instructions mention: “Two 468×60 ad/feature widgets. One is located on the right side of the header, while the other is in between your posts main content and the comments section. All you have to do is add a text widget to these locations and then you can easily showcase a Google ad, an affiliate, a featured item/page on your blog or even showcase requests for subscribers and/or Twitter followers, etc…”
I am new to WordPress and can’t figure out how to add the text widget under my post and/or before the comments section. I see how to get it on the sidebar, but not anywhere else.
Can you help?
Hey Barbara, you mentioned that you can put ads in your sidebar. Just go to your ‘widgets’ section and select (instead of ‘sidebar’) ’468×60 Post’ widget section. Then just add a text widget and then paste the add code in the text widget. Click save and then refresh your post page to see if it doesn’t show up.
Hope this helps. Eric
Thanks, Eric. I’ll give that a try.
Here’s another question. Can I add a Simple Machines forum to the blog? If I can add the forum, is there a way to have it show up on the navbar next to “home” and “about?”
Get ready for an avalanche of traffic, sales and comments. Why? Problogger just mentioned you (and your lovely theme) on his Twitter stream. Nice!
By the way, very nice theme design. Reminds me abit of Thesis, but with notable differences. Good work!
Missy
Hey Missy, I saw the Tweet. Very cool indeed.
And thanks! I’m glad you like frugal. Eric
This looks really good. Is it possible to change the fonts? And maybe add a third column?
Thanks Benjamin! Changing the fonts is super easy, but not currently available through the theme options. You just overwrite the font in the section of the stylesheet that needs the adjustment. Like in the ‘Content’ area or the ‘Sidebar’ etc…
As for the third column, it’s certainly possible. It would just take some moving around of code. So it’s currently not a stock option, but very doable. Eric
Thanks and you can change the header, hey? Like by adding a picture?
I’m looking for something basic like this but I want a dark header image up top…
Yep. You can go into the Theme Options and select ‘Custom Logo’ or ‘FULL Custom Logo’. The full one spans the entire header. You just replace the corresponding logo image file in the /frugal/images/ directory and it will show up on your header.
I’ll be creating video tutorials very soon. Eric
Sounds excellent. I might have to play around with it and give it a try.
Eric, I LOVE this theme! I was so impressed when I checked it out this morning that I wrote a review of it on my blog. As a web designer, I’m very picky about layouts and cleanliness. frugal is definitely one of the nicest and most “easy on the eyes” themes I’ve seen for WordPress. Keep up the GREAT work!
Hey Keller, I just popped over and read the whole thing. Great job! You really frugal sound as awesome as I think it is!
I’m glad you had a chance to check it out and I hope to see your around. Eric
Does the free Frugal theme still have a lite version?
Thanks,
Neal
Yes it does. I just updated frugal Free and it now has a ‘Lite’ option in the Theme Options. Eric
Eric,
I downloaded the free theme and it’s not showing up in WP. There’s a message that says a stylesheet is missing. Any suggestions?
Nevermind…noobie mistake… =)
No problem. Glad you got it figured out.
Eric
Hi Eric!
I love your theme–perfect for my purposes! I have a quick question though–I would ideally like to get rid of the ‘Home’, ‘About’, and RSS links that were built into the navbar for an even cleaner look. I’m going to include them in my sidebar instead.
Which part of the style.css would I need to snip out in order to do this, or is it not possible? Thanks a lot!
Safura
Hey Safura, I’m glad you’re enjoying frugal!
If you don’t mind, post this question in the frugal Forum and I’ll be sure to properly address it. It’s just easier as I can post code snippets without them coming out all wacky like they do by default in the comments section. Thanks!
Eric
Thanks for the clean design. Clean/Minimalistic design will always be my favorite type of design.
Just found about the new theme. Will be blogging about it.
Thanks for releasing the Lite version.
Mike
Hey Mike, I’m glad you’re enjoying frugal. Can’t wait to see you’re post about it!
Eric
Superb minimalist theme. I love minimalist themes. I thought what I am using now (iNove) is the best among simple themes. But now I feel this one is even better..
Hey Ravi, I’m glad you like it!
Eric
I like frugal theme.
David
Glad to hear it!
Eric
Hi Eric, really enjoying playing around with the theme. im a real estate agent trying make this theme work for my biz site. for some reason, dont see the user guide in my files from the zip file download. where can i find this. also, stupid question but how do i change the text logo? any help thanks
This is a really nice looking theme. It is similar to Thesis but I really prefer this one. And I like some of the features – particularly the ability to center images. I am going to keep this one in my favorites for when I am ready to change my theme…I change themes quite often…probably too often!
Hey Paula, I’m glad you like the look of frugal. It will be hear when you need it.
Eric