Where do we change the default theme path?

Plenty of walkthroughs for changing Blog themes and a nice drop-down interface in the control panel per blog, but where is the setting for the main CS site?  I see that most people just modify the default theme folder, but that's too kludgy for me and I don't want to wind up accidentally overwriting it with an update.

 I've scoured the .config files but couldn't find any theme references to the default folder.  Is it tucked into the database somewhere?

mrmesich,

The "default" theme is just that, the default.  The use of the "default" theme is hard coded into the application.  New user accounts will use the "default" theme by default, due to this coding.  If you can make changes to the SDK and rebuild the application, there is something that you can do that will allow you to have a psuedo-default setting:

1. Click here to read about the changes that are required that will allow you to use the "Anonymous" user account as your default setting.
2. Change the theme of the "Anonymous" user account to the theme that you would like to be the default.  This is account is used by everyone that is not logged into the system.

If you aren't able to do this, then your only option is to play with the Theme folders yourself.

Take it easy,
Bill

There is an option in the Sql Database table for changing the default theme, but the easiest thing to do is rename folders, rename default to something else, then rename the new theme to default

Nick:

There is an option in the Sql Database table for changing the default theme, but the easiest thing to do is rename folders, rename default to something else, then rename the new theme to default

Hi Nick,

Do you know where this code is?  I have looked all over and I do not see any code that would implement this type of behavior.  When a new user account is created, it is normally created without a Theme setting.  Any account that has an empty or null Theme value is hardcoded to use the "default" theme.  There isn't any other code to lookup a system setting.

Also, it is a very bad idea to make any changes to the "default" theme at all.  The "default" theme is a complete theme, while the other themes are partial themes that derive from it.  If the "default" theme is changed, it could and most likely will affect every other theme.

Thanks,
Bill

I don't eva have that problem, since I create a theme with all of the skin's of the defualt.  It's nice tho, to know that if u've missed a skin file, it'll pick it up from the default theme.

To change the default theme, look in the sitesettings table of your CS database, there's an XML field in there which has all of these details 

Hey Nick,

I am familiar with that code.  The problem is that it is just sitting there and is not used by any part of the system, plus the fact that there isn't a way to set it within the UI.  If this setting was able to be set via the UI and the rest of the system was setup to use it, then this would work.  From what I know about the system, there is a lot of coding that would need to be done in order for this to work in a useful manner.  Things like a "Use Default Theme" setting and changing the themes of a group of users would need to be added to the functionality of the system.

Take it easy,
Bill