How does the JReviews Theme Engine work
JReviews uses a php templating system. This means you can mix html with php code, which provides a lot of flexibility to create conditionals and add snippets of php code.
JReviews Themes
JReviews themes are located in this folder:
- /components/com_jreviews/jreviews/views/themes/
- the theme files have the .thtml extension.
In that folder you'll find several themes:
- /components/com_jreviews/jreviews/views/themes/default/
- /components/com_jreviews/jreviews/views/themes/compact/
- /components/com_jreviews/jreviews/views/themes/dark/ - for using with dark joomla templates
You will notice that /compact and /dark theme folders contain less files than the /default theme folder.
The default theme is a "fallback" theme which contains all the necessary files, while /compact and /dark are variations of the default theme and contain only "modified" files and images. If a theme doesn't contain a certain file, JReviews will load that file from the default theme. That makes updating those themes easier.
You can create your own theme the same way, but instead of creating it in /components/com_jreviews/jreviews/views/themes/ folder, you should use the JReviews Code Overrides functionality to place your custom theme outside the /com_jreviews folder.