Bear with me, this one is going to hurt. Load up your blog with your favorite WordPress theme on it. Ready? Scroll down.
Yep, scroll your theme down, down past the header and menu, down past the post titles. Scroll down to a page full of text and links and no distractions. This is where The Ultimate WordPress Theme Test will take place. This is where the best themes shine. Because this is where your readers will spend the bulk of their time and this is where your theme does the real work. Columns too wide or narrow? Font too big or small? Typography lame? Remember, content is there to be read. Don’t let your theme get in the way of that.
Ready to fix your theme? Here’s how to get started. Throw the following code (or something similar depending on your markup) into the bottom of your stylesheet.
/* The Ultimate WordPress Theme Test */
#header, #menu, .sidebar, #footer, img {display:none;}
That’s right, I want you to hide everything non-essential, everything pretty, everything distracting, every single little bit of stuff, with display:none. What’s left? Content. Make it readable and you’ve made it beautiful. Make it beautiful and people will read it.
Good luck.
ThemeShaper 
16 responses
That is an awesome idea.
Being a perfectionist makes this simple idea totally something I’m going to try out during my next wp theme, or any site I’ll make.
It’s always the little ideas that make a big difference.
It’s something I almost have to do now. It just doesn’t feel right until I make sure the foundation is good.
This might make a good Greasemonkey script 🙂
-Alister
Cool idea. I’ll have to convince someone smarter than me to make it though.
I agree entirely. I have always thought that the pinnacle of great design is pure content; i.e. remove everything except that which makes it what it is.
Ian, if it’s ok with you can I port it to GM like people want?
Cheers
Jake.
Go for it, Jake. That sounds awesome. Let me know how it goes.
Released here:
http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/23248
It only works on WordPress.com blogs. Removes the header, footer, sidebar and I’m going to try to expand the content box so it don’t look ugly.
(:
OK, I’ll release a link here for it. It will only work for WordPress.com blogs at first, but I will adapt it. Is that OK?
Sounds good. And the more blogs the merrier, I say. Feel free to contact me if you want my opinion on anything.
[…] I am not currently using WordPress, I thought I would try out Ian’s suggestion of hiding everything aside from the content on this post’s […]
Excellent advice! As someone who frequently reads entire articles (not just skimming, but old fashioned reading every word) I really appreciate when designers have taken the time to make their body text readable.
[…] a week ago I came across two great articles on the Themeshaper website, The Ultimate WordPress Theme Test and Hide all your links. If you develop WordPress themes or do any web design I suggest you read […]
I always check all the themes with adding post with all contents like lists,images and content.
Good info
Ahahah, I like hiding sidebar on blogs with stylish plugin. Because it’s often useless for my, but distracting (with borders or background or gradients).