The basic appearance of a Drupal site -- where the columns are, how many columns there are, what special features there are -- is governed by a "theme", and themes can be either free, or licensed at a price. Drupal.Org lists many such themes, and you are welcome to pick one. For the Oregon Republican Party site, we chose a licensed (one-time charge of $75) theme called "StingRay", available at ThemeShark.Com. For Clackamas County, we were advised to start with the public Drupal theme "Zen", on advice from Amye Scavarda, a Portland-area Drupal guru who's come alongside to help us novices look good. We offer it to you below.

After examining Zen, however, it might pose too high a hurdle for most volunteer web masters who are faced with limited time and experience, and yet still want to create an attractive page. So, since your humble editor certainly falls into the limited time and experience category, and so can respect the constraints on others, we are starting the Clackamas County site on Pixture-Reloaded, instead. We offer that, and several others, below. The criterion for selection was manageable modification without too much programming.

As with modules, we have provided a script to automatically load these themes, so you can load them all at once. We recommend strongly that you use the script, and then play with the themes and decide which to use. The attachment may be found at the end of this page.

Now, a Google search for "Drupal themes" will yield a huge number of themes. Look for ones that have "helps" with them, like "reference cards" and such. You will need these, because customizing the theme a bit for your use still takes a little work. Other than that, observe how many different options there are to make your site look the way you want it to, mostly by allowing for different column profiles and layout. Don't worry: it can all be fixed. You can install multiple themes, and then play with them, before settling on one to use permanently.

An important note: don't forget that any theme you select must have a VERSION COMPATIBILE with the Drupal version you installed. As with modules, we will show the download commands for Drupal 6.

Themes are loaded into the folder "~/public_html/sites/all/themes". You must create that folder.

Commands:
cd ~/public_html/sites/all
mkdir themes
cd modules
mkdir uploads

You will probably have to create the files folder, as well:

Commands:
cd ~/public_html/sites
ls -ls

Here is gets a little nerd/tech specific. We have to check permissions. You should see a list of letters and dashes to the far left of the folder entry "default/". It is expected that this list of permissions shows up as "dr-xr-xr-x". Without going into too much detail, this means that "default" is in fact a folder ("directory"), that everyone can read ("r") it, and that everyone can execute ("x") programs in it. Well, we need to be able to write to it, as well, so we will temporarily change the permissions for the folder, create another folder inside it, and then turn off that write permission again. The direct session command for this is "chmod", which essentially allows changing permissions on files and folders in a Linux environment. To learn more about it, type the command "man chmod" in your direct session window, or search the web for the similar documentation.

Commands:
chmod u+w default
cd default
mkdir files
ls -ls

OK, look at the permissions for the folder "files": they should be "drwxr-xr-x". If not, call us for help. Something didn't work. If they are, great: let's turn off that pesky write bit again.

Commands:
cd ..
chmod u-w default
ls -ls

Nerded out yet? Well, now, check the permissions on "default". They should again be "dr-xr-xr-x". Again, if they aren't, call for help.

So, let's install themes the same way we installed modules.

*** *** ***

Theme: Zen (Link)

Commands:
cd ~/public_html/sites/all/themes
wget ftp.drupal.org/files/projects/zen-6.x-1.0.tar.gz
tar -xf zen-6.x-1.0.tar.gz
mv zen-6.x-1.0.tar.gz ./uploads

Navigate -> Administer -> Site building -> Themes. Enable Zen, Zen Classic, and Zen Themer's Starter Kit.

There are tutorial tools for Zen. Bending Zen is one of them.

*** *** ***

Theme: Pixture Reloaded (Link)

Commands:
cd ~/public_html/sites/all/themes
wget ftp.drupal.org/files/projects/pixture_reloaded-6.x-3.2.tar.gz
tar -xf pixture_reloaded-6.x-3.2.tar.gz
mv pixture_reloaded-6.x-3.2.tar.gz ./uploads

Navigate -> Administer -> Site building -> Themes. Enable Pixture Reloaded.

*** *** ***

Theme: Summertime (Link)

Commands:
cd ~/public_html/sites/all/themes
wget ftp.drupal.org/files/projects/summertime-6.x-1.2.tar.gz
tar -xf summertime-6.x-1.2.tar.gz
mv summertime-6.x-1.2.tar.gz ./uploads

Navigate -> Administer -> Site building -> Themes. Enable Summertime.