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Thematic from Ian Stewart and ThemeShaper.com

Thinking about starting a blog? Already using Wordpress and looking for a blog face lift? After choosing WordPress as your blogging platform, you have the following design options:

Use the default WordPress theme
Find an appealing theme from a third-party provider
Create your own WordPress theme

Most people install a third-party theme or develop their own theme. When the WordPress developers release an update to the core WordPress files, those of us running WordPress scramble to find out how our themes and plug-ins are affected. If you run multiple WordPress sites, this can be a time consuming proposition.

Are You a Coder or a Designer?

If you are a hobbyist, running one web site, yes, you can do both. You’re only working with one site, so wrangling PHP, CSS (Cascading Style Sheets), HTML, PhotoShop and a text editor as a hobby is a low-pressure proposition.

But if you run WordPress sites for a living or own a boutique web design shop, a battle between your “Inner Coder” and your “Inner Designer” will eventually break out.

Your Inner Coder wants to spend more time in the development phase of a WordPress theme, figuring out actions and filters and tinkering with php and HTML while your Inner Designer is dreaming of incredibly creative layouts, PhotoShop, CSS and the style.css file.

There are only 24 hours in one day, so if you’re going to become very good with WordPress for your Clients, you’ll need to make a choice.

This is where a WordPress framework can help.
A WordPress framework is different than a WordPress theme Frameworks, while functional, are minimally designed – you are expected to “skin” one yourself through the style.css and the functions.php files without touching the core framework or WordPress files.

When the WordPress core changes, a framework’s developer(s) (their Inner Coder won the war) wrangle and wrestle the framework’s PHP files. Those of us downstream (our Inner Coder is subservient to our Inner Designer) will not have to worry about core changes affecting our blogs.

There is another benefit to using a framework that Clients will appreciate.

Frameworks offer a standardization that other webmasters can leverage. If a Client comes to me with an existing site, I’ll know in an instant if it is powered by WordPress. If the site is built on a framework, and it’s a framework I’ve used, there is a familiarity with the environment that saves the Client money because familiarity with the framework saves me time.

Which Framework Will I Use?

Before I made a commitment to using a framework, I made a list of possible framework and theme options: K2, Thematic, Thesis or a Woo Theme offering.

I’ve been in love with K2 for awhile. I learned enough about it awhile back to be comfortable theming it. So I really wanted to “go with” K2. But every time I would visit their blog, there was nothing new. [Insert frustrated Val here!]

Let me be clear: I like K2. But the user facing part of K2 just wasn’t warm and fuzzy. I waited and I waited and I waited hoping for a sign that the boys were back in town. But it didn’t happen.

So, I had to make a choice: stick with what I know or move on and learn something else.

I could learn the Thematic WordPress framework, choose a theme from Woo Themes or use Thesis.

All are well-supported. Any of the three can be put into production in my web development shop.

Woo Themes and Thesis are “premium” themes; they are not free but they are insanely reasonable. Woo Themes, per se, are not frameworks, so I kept looking. (I’ve purchased a Woo Themes WordPress theme in the past and was very happy with it; now, though, I was looking for a framework.) I’ve also used Thesis before, prior to it becoming a premium theme. Again, easily worth the small price. Both Theme Shops make it easy for an end-user to get up and running with a good-looking, functional WordPress blog.

But I wanted a framework that would allow me to rapidly prototype and produce WordPress sites.

The Thematic WordPress Framework

Thematic from Ian Stewart is a framework that can be used by blog hobbyists and professional webmasters. Two weeks ago, I downloaded the framework and began poking around. It is a commitment, an investment of time, learning any framework.

But the effort is worth the time when a developer is freed from worrying about core files and can concentrate instead on functionality and design. It’s one thing to have a working knowledge of WordPress and to use someone else’s theme. On a non-commercial site, I can change themes like I change underwear with no investment in how the theme functions or how the theme is organized.

In a production environment, I want a robust framework that is well-documented, well-supported, updated and functional.

When a WordPress update comes along and a third-party theme breaks, well, get a new theme. If I’m going to pour over the theme to find what isn’t working or to create more functionality, I might as well use a framework!

I’ve committed myself, the shop and all future development to Ian Stewart’s Thematic framework.

Now I know Ian Stewart has been hired as a Theme Wrangler for Automattic. That does worry me a bit. Will Ian update Thematic? Perhaps now there will be even more support for the framework? Wouldn’t that be a coup!

In the end, I settled on Thematic because…

Buddymatic, the “definitive WordPress theme for 2010″ is built on Thematic. I wrote about Matt Mullenweg’s launch of the WordPress Foundation and celebrated myself by downloading the Buddymatic framework here on this site.
The Thematic tutorials are well-detailed (but could use a wee bit of organization).
The support in the Thematic forum is stellar. There is an active user base putting forward and answering questions at all levels of ability.
Thematic Forum moderator support is excellent. Very knowledgeable, Chris and Gene are going above and beyond the call of duty for a support forum.

What you are looking at today is my first Thematic child theme. It’s a first pass at theming this framework. While designing this theme, I found design inspiration at:

I haven’t named the child theme yet. It isn’t finished (note the Pages menu and Categories menu – they’re just floating out there in space). I spent the better part of ~~today~~ yesterday using Firebug, PhotoShop and DreamWeaver to mold what you see here now.

It felt good to be designing again. I’ll tackle the navigation menus this weekend.

If you are looking for a WordPress Theme Framework, have a gander at Thematic. Thematic makes sense. It is well-supported. And it’s built to withstand WordPress updates!

If you want a comparison of frameworks, Angie Bowen at ProBlogDesign compared 6 popular WordPress frameworks. She used 5 metrics; this is her analysis of Thematic: