User:Jack Phoenix/theme

Skins, themes and templates are all distinct concepts in MediaWiki!

The "look and feel" of a website is determined by what we in the MediaWiki community call "a skin". Manual:Skins here on MediaWiki.org has probably more information about that.

Other popular PHP-based projects, like the famous blog software WordPress (which is also used as a Content Management System (CMS), eCommerce platform, etc.) or the forum software phpBB, have different names for the same idea. WordPress calls their skins "themes" whereas phpBB calls their skins "templates".

In MediaWiki templates are something entirely different, see Help:Templates. Support for both skins and templates is implemented in MediaWiki core, although core does not ship with any skins or templates.

Themes in MediaWiki are predefined CSS "bundles", originally implemented by Wikia (nowadays known as FANDOM) and popularized by an open-source extension originally authored by Skizzerz and currently maintained by me: see Extension:Theme. Themes enhance an existing skin, but they are rather useless without skins . Support for themes is not currently in MediaWiki core and is instead provided by Extension:Theme which has to be separately downloaded and installed.

As of November 2022 the Theme extension ships with six themes, three for the MonoBook skin and three for the Vector (classic/"legacy"/not-Desktop Improvements version) skin. Some skins, like the Gamepress skin, have built-in themes, but to make use of them, the Theme extension needs to be installed on the wiki.

Questions, thoughts, feedback?

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