My Website Theme

WordPress themes can be found through the official directory or via companies that sell themes on their own websites. The WordPress directory tends to have free themes and they tend to all be much more trustworthy and have a lower risk of security issues. External company websites can provide free and paid themes, and some even offer custom themes built just for you. No matter where the theme is from, it’s important to consider reviews, update and support length, and overall trust of the author/source.

Valid themes must include a style.css file an an index.php file. These two files are required for WordPress to accept the theme. CSS files control the design and layout of a webpage while PHP files control how content is received and displayed on a webpage. Extra files may also be included like an images directory, a screenshot.png file, and various other PHP files. The image directory houses any images the theme uses and the screenshot.png file is often the thumbnail preview that shows what the theme looks like. Other PHP files can provide more information on how to display aspects such as the header and footer of a webpage.

My decision matrix is organized by aesthetics/design, performance/speed, customization, and support/updates. I chose these criteria because they cover the most crucial aspects of a website: how it looks, how if feels/speed of it, how easy it is to customize to my liking, and Theo overall updates and support from the author. These allowed me to keep my decision simple and focus on the foundational elements of a good theme. From this, I landed on Blocksy due to how simple and modern it feels while not being too flashy. It lets the content still be the focus of the website.

Each theme from the Decision Matrix is found below:

Blocksy: https://wordpress.org/themes/blocksy/

SaasLauncher: https://wordpress.org/themes/saaslauncher/

Tourze Lite: https://wordpress.org/themes/tourze-lite/

Blocksy was downloaded via my wp-admin dashboard and was very simple to enable. Once activated, it was ready to go and required no additional setup to get it functioning.