In order to effectively customize a style, you must first understand the parts that compose the design of that style. Styles, like houses, are built from smaller components that work together to create a frame. That frame, like the walls of the house, provides a structure for displaying the internal contents of a forum. These frames can be very complex creations so let us look at how the basic pieces are put together and stored, before we get into the actual customization of a style.
Styles are composed of three primary style elements, or smaller portions that work together to create the overall visual appearance of the style. These are the template, theme, and image set elements. Each style is self-contained and includes all the style elements needed to operate correctly.
The first and most important part of a style is the template element. The template element is a set of text files containing the entire markup that is used to generate the visual layout...