Friendly Themes Options Panel

I’m currently working on the options panel for all the themes which Andy and I will be producing for Friendly Themes. It’s heavily based on the Options Framework from WordPress Theming. I’ve taken their base and added functionality which I see to be key for modern, premium themes.

Sidebar Manager

Does exactly what it says on the tin. I’ve baked in a sidebar manager so that you are able to specify which sidebar appears on each page. You can create unlimited sidebars and have fine-grained control over which widgets are shown for each. No coding necessary, simply click a few buttons and you’re done.

Theme Update Notification

Our plan is to release updates on a regular basis for our themes and as such I thought it would be handy to have a notification when there is an update available. All updates to each theme will be free of charge. Each notification will come with a changelog so you can see exactly what is available in the latest version.

Maintenance

Each theme will have a maintenance mode. If you have large changes to make to your site or just want to put up a quick message before you launch your latest and greatest, then our options panel caters for that. Again, no programming necessary, simply select your message or page and you’re done.

Import/Export

If you buy the extended license for our themes then you might just want to set all of the options on one site and then duplicate them on others. The import/export feature will allow you to do just that – you can even e-mail yourself the options as a backup.

Simple Setup

Even though our themes come with quite a lot of options, sometimes you might want to simply install and go. Alternatively, you might want to set options for your client and then have them only see a basic set of options which they can tweak. So, our options panel allows you to select either an advanced or simple mode. The ‘simple’ mode has the absolute bare minimum of options allowing you to get a site launched in seconds.

Much More To Come

I’m genuinely excited by our options panel. It’s clean, clear, easy to use, modern and useful. It caters for a vast array of options yet keeps things simple. Also, it’s made in such a way that it’s incredibly easy for us to update in the future. If there’s a ‘must-have option’ which all you guys are asking for, we cab get it in there in double quick time.

The Friendly Themes Options Panel will be free with all Friendly Themes. Starting in May 2011, exclusively on Theme Forest.