Custom character template update launched

Posted by Kim on March 7, 2016, 1:05pm

Good news for custom character template artists: The new CSS editing system has finally been launched! This update aims to make creating and sharing custom templates even easier, so that we can all benefit from the tremendous creativity in our community.

What changed?
The interface for custom character template creation was improved.

In addition to being able to designate a template as "just for me" or "for all epic members", you now also have the option of "for specific people I choose"

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Being able to choose who to share your template with will especially make the lives of template commission artists easier.

So, you could create a template on your own account, testing with your own characters, pick all the options for the template, and then share the finished product with only the person who paid for it. You'll retain control of it in case you need to make further edits or updates in future.

This opens up some interesting propositions like small-run templates, wherein you sell the rights to use the template at a reduce rate to five different people, and promise to share the template exclusively with those five.

Or, you could create a special template used only by members of your group or guild! Maybe a template used only by characters that are part of a specific IC family? The possibilities are pretty exciting.
Although you'll still need to be an epic member to use custom templates, any member will now be allowed to create them - and preview public or shared templates.
You will be able to preview your template changes, without actually having to make that template the live template that everyone else sees on your character!
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No more need to create a character named "Template Tester" to avoid making your mains look like work-in-progress disasters. Whatever template you chose for your characters will remain in place, and you'll be the only one who sees your in-progress template when you press the Save & Preview button.

Pressing the Save & Preview button will take you to a special page that only you can see, so that your character can model the in-progress template without prying eyes from anyone else. Accessing your character in the normal way (such as via your dashboard, or from your profile) will cause you, too, to see the live version of your character, without the test template.

For example, I could test a custom template on my character Safiye, but the rest of the world visiting her site would still see her "live" template the default parchment template.

It even works if the character you're testing with already has a custom template as its live template.
The method of handling custom fonts has changing. @font-face and @import commands will no longer work (this is due to security concerns). BUT, this does not mean you won't be able to make use of custom fonts! The method of incorporating fonts is simply changing. You bow have access to 3 drop downs, each allowing you to pick a different font from our library of google fonts. Every effort has been made to ensure that all google fonts currently in use by existing templates have been included in this library, and the library will be periodically expanded.
The default starter CSS for templates is being updated, streamlined, and made easier to work with.
Rather work from scratch? You will have the option to disable the default CSS, or even the default widget CSS, if you prefer to do it all yourself.
Inheritance CSS selectors will be re-enabled! For ages, you've been unable to select via direct inheritance ("li > a") because the > character was completely disallowed. This will not be an issue any longer.
The "IE Only" section of template creation will be going away. Not even Microsoft supports ancient versions of IE anymore, and the RPR doesn't either. There's other ways of giving browser-specific commands, if necessary. Most of you did not use this section, except, perhaps, to simply copy all of your same code into both the main box and the IE box (which doesn't do anything).

I have more questions!
Please check this discussion topic for custom character template creators for more nitty gritty information, and to get your questions answered.

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Comments

Kim

March 14, 2016
11:44am

A few people have reported trouble finding shared templates, and some other people were having the reverse problem of seeing templates that were shared with them several times in a row. I've rewritten the code that handles this to make it more reliable, and also added a new template category: "Shared With You" right under "Your Custom Library" to help you find the ones sent to you without any searching.

Kim

March 9, 2016
8:25am

Your character goes back to the last official template that it was using before you chose a user-created one.

Loki

March 9, 2016
8:08am

If someone changes a custom template you are using to for select people only what does the template you were using default to?

Kim

March 8, 2016
7:31pm

They should show up in your list of available templates. If that's not working for you, please do let me know!

Michonne

March 8, 2016
7:27pm

Hey Kim, just wondering here, how do we access those templates by others that they have given us? Will it just show up in the templates?

Kim

March 8, 2016
10:20am

Bit of an update on this update: the site will now generate thumbnail previews of custom templates, so it's easier for people to choose, and easier for you to find your own templates at a glance.

We've got quite the backlog of templates needing previews generated, so it may be a couple of days before we've got proper previews of everything. But you can already see how much better templates are looking by glancing at the publicly shared custom templates!

Unicorn