Coding Templates for PrestaShop

[LewisSellers]

Hi There,

I'm brand new to PrestaShop and I am currently installing the system on a test domain to get my head around it.

Currently, we are using Cubecart but I've heard a lot of good reviews about PrestaShop and wanted to see if it was easier to develop with.

I do a fair amount of website design and know HTML / CSS (unfortunately, my PHP knowledge is very limited). We generally code to a grid system such as www.960.gs.

My question is, does PrestaShop work best by creating a site in Photoshop, converting it into XHTML using something such as the 960 grid system and then dropping it into prestashop? Or are you best coding in the design straight into PrestaShop using the tags they have?

Any advice on coding templates into PrestaShop would be fantastic. We'd like to develop some themes in the future but getting my head around the basics of how this system works first would be a massive help!!

Kind Regards
Lewis

[mysolarstore]

Coding new themes in Prestashop is not a straightforward task; way more difficult than a regular html/css page.. I am in a similar position to you; I can code a bit of html and css, but finding your way around Prestashop takes a little more time.. Most people recommend starting with the default theme, making a copy and changing bits and pieces to suit. global.css is a good place to start, but in the new Prestashop (1.4...) there are css files for each module, so it'll take a bit of time to work out what classes do what etc.

It would be nice for someone to write some help on creating a theme from scratch, but as it stands, I would copy your default theme and play around with that. Look into the .tpl files for each aspect of the site, experiment, and make a note of everything you change. Don't edit any core files too much, as when you come to upgrade, you'll make life difficult..

Anyway, good luck with your experimenting; as soon as I've created a new theme, I may be able to help further...

[Jonadabe]

Hi there,

Prestashop uses Smarty template engine. Smarty is a template engine for PHP, facilitating the separation of presentation (HTML/CSS) from application logic. This implies that PHP code is application logic, and is separated from the presentation. Thats why PS has .tpl extensions (template extension).

My problem at this time is getting a WYSIWYG editor doing changes accordingly.
How can I use Dreamweaver CS5 and WAMP with it? I can change CSS very good (because the files are linked in CS5), but what about tpl files (I think that it can't be changing it with Notepad++ or other editor for every single file, isn't it?!).

Has anyone a clue to my problem?

Thanks.