Recently I blogged about the differences of SharePoint 2010 themes and SharePoint 2007 themes regarding the creation and deployment of a theme. After reading the comment from Jan I thought about the update process and after trying it I come to the conclusion that themes have to be used with caution!
Here is the article mentioned:
You have different ways how you can customize a SharePoint 2010 site. If you want to change the color and font of a site then it is recommended (by TechNet) to use themes. But there are differences regarding the type of site template you use… I will demonstrate this using the Blank Site, Team Site and Publishing Portal, 2 themes and SharePoint 2010 beta:
Both themes are saved using the same filename because I want to try to update the theme in the gallery without applying it again to a site.
Blank Site
I created a blank site with a sub site.
Inheritance
If you choose a theme you are not able to
- change the color or the font,
- preview the theme or
- update sub sites.
Updating a theme
A site is not updated if you
- updated the file in the theme gallery without applying the theme again or
- applied the theme to the parent site because it doesn’t updates sub sites.
You have to manually apply a theme to every site. :(
Team Site
The team site has a sub site created with the Team Site template.
Inheritance
Here is a difference to a site created with the blank site template.
If you choose a theme you are not able to
Updating a theme
A site is not updated if you
- updated the file in the theme gallery without applying the theme again or
- applied the theme to the parent site because it doesn’t updates sub sites.
You have to manually apply a theme to every site. :(
Publishing Portal
The Publishing Portal has a sub site created by default if you choose the template.
Inheritance
Using a publishing site template allows you to utilize all the functionality for a theme. Note: Using SharePoint 2010 beta I wasn’t able to update sub sites… it just didn’t work.
Updating a theme
Because of the beta status it might not work although it is offered by the user interface.
Summary
If you apply a theme to a site it is not referenced. It is copied from the file you uploaded to the themes gallery and it is a separate instance which isn’t updated until you apply the theme again. Even if you use the same file name and overwrite the existing file it doesn’t work as you can see in the following to screens: It’s the same file but with different colors.
It’s easier in SharePoint 2010 to create and deploy themes but I still recommend not to use themes because of the update process and how they are stored. Usually a publishing portal is created using a custom site definition and therefore the update sub sites functionality is a little bit lost there.