This site is built using Wordpress and Arthemia Free V2 Theme. There’s a Arthemia 2.0 Premium paid version available,which greatly simplifies the customization of to build professional looking magazine style website like this. I figured that its not difficult to customize any theme if step by step instructions are available.

Being a Software Engineer and having build couple of  Wordpress website already I preferred to take simplest of the themes and do customizations myself. While building this site I have decided to maintain the log of all the steps I gone through  to make this website. I am hoping that this log will be extremely useful for someone who wants build Wordpress website in a quickest amount of time without having to pay for premium themes.. With  the following step by step instructions any one will be able to create a great blogging website with ease.

Before we dwell into customization process its important to list the version of Wordpress,version of Arthemia theme and list of plugins I have used.  If you use the same same components then your are likely to have identical results.

Wordpress Version: 2.8.1

Theme: Arthemia 2.0 Free Version

Plugins:Reveal IDs for WP Admin,Disable WordPress Core Update,WordPress Database Backup,Akismet,WP-Pagenavi,

Step I: Installation

Install worpdpress and upload Arthemia in wp-content/themes folder. Activate the theme from Dashboard,Appearance,Themes menu. Install plugins listed above from Dashboard,Plugins,Add New menu.

Step II :  Headline and Featured Category

From Dashboard, Posts Categories page create two Categories named Headline, Featured. Headline is shown on the Front page top left section and Featured is shown on the top right box. Create a post from Dashboard Posts, Add New menu and attach it to both categories in the post entry page. After this is done you should see your post on both Headline and Featured Sections.

At this time you might notice and empty picture box in Headline section.  Click on the Upload/Insert Image box and upload suitable image file. Note the location of the image file,it will be something like /wp-content/uploads/2009/07/hdmi-connector.jpg . Fill the  picture box create a Custom Field named Image and in the value copy the image file location.

On your sites front page in the Headline and Featured section you will see your newly created post. Make sure that every post your create has an custom field with the name Image.

Step III: Advertisement boxes

Arthemia theme has two advertisement banner boxes on each page. First is located in right side in the header section and second is located on the top of sidebar.

For the banner in the header edit header.php file of the theme. Open the Edit Themes page from Appearance Editor menu. Open the header.php,look for wide.jpg and make changes as shown below.

<!–
<img src=”<?php echo get_option(’home’); ?>/wp-content/themes/arthemia/images/banners/wide.jpg” alt=”" width=”468px” height=”60px”  />
–>
<script type=”text/javascript”><!–
google_ad_client = “pub-5056697348213259″;
/* 468×60, created 7/21/09 */
google_ad_slot = “2292414640″;
google_ad_width = 468;
google_ad_height = 60;
//–>
</script>
<script type=”text/javascript”
src=”http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js“>
</script>

For the banner in side bar, edit sidebar.php. Look for section <div id=”sidebar-ads”> and change  it as shown below

<!–
<img src=”<?php echo get_option(’home’); ?>/wp-content/themes/arthemia/images/banners/square.jpg” alt=”" width=”300px” height=”250px” />
–>
<script type=”text/javascript”><!–
google_ad_client = “pub-5056697348213259″;
/* 300×250, created 7/21/09 */
google_ad_slot = “9549411254″;
google_ad_width = 300;
google_ad_height = 250;
//–>
</script>
<script type=”text/javascript”
src=”http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js“>
</script>

This will fill both the ad boxes, fill the boxes with your own code from any source of your preference.

Step IV: Site Banner

At this point your site banner says Arthemia. You should replace it with your own banner. Easiest way to replace the log is to download the logo.png file. Using windows paint replace arthemia to your own website name. Replace the original logo.png file located  at wp-content/themes/arthemia/images/log.png with your newly edited logo.png file.

Its not a fancy logo but least you got started. Alternatively you can modify the header.php theme file to link a different logo file. Look file section below to edit

<a href=”<?php echo get_option(’home’); ?>/”><img src=”<?php echo get_option(’home’); ?>/wp-content/themes/arthemia/images/logo.png” width=”177px” height=”39px” alt=”" /></a>

Step V: Category Bar

Category bar is located on the front page right below the Headline and Featured sections. You can choose up to 5 important categories that  can be displayed in this section. In oder to include the desired categories you need to know the category ID for each category. You must install Reveal Ids for WP Admin plugin to get the category ID. In the Dashboard,Posts, Categories page category ID for each category will be included in () next to category name.

Edit the index.php file and update following section with your own categories

<?php $display_categories = array(5,6,7,8,11); $i = 1;
foreach ($display_categories as $category) { ?>

Step VI: Sidebar

Arthemia sidebar has four boxes. Top,middle left ,middle right and bottom.  Arthemia comes with default content in these boxes. Its very easy to include something useful in these boxes. In oder to change the content of sidebar boxes, go to Appearance, Widgets page. Just drag and drop widgets from left to right column in appropriate box. You can rename the widgets and customize their behavior in drop down list specific to the widget.

On this site I am using RSS feed from www.connectedhome.infopint.com another site on top sidebar box. I am using TagClouds in the bottom box.

Step VII: Footer

Footer contain three horizontal boxes. If you don’t like the default assignment you customize the boxes from Appearance,Widget page similar to Sidebar.

Step VIII: Front Page list

This section is below the Categories on the front page. By default all the latest posts exuding once from Featured and Headline categories will be listed in this section. To avoid duplication of posts you need to edit index.php file.

Look for <div id=”front-list”> and change the lines as below.

<?php
$page = (get_query_var(’paged’)) ? get_query_var(’paged’) : 1;
query_posts(”cat=-27,-28&paged=$page&posts_per_page=5″); ?>

In my case category 27 and 28 are excluded from the list. Typically you want to remove Headline and Featured posts from the list section to avoid duplication of the same content.

At this time I don’t have a need to extent the top menu system to drop down menus. But the menu customization is easy. I will update the details on the navigation menu customization soon. Subscribe to the feed or social networking links to get an update to this page.

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