On average, the basic DotNetNuke skin consists of a Portal.ascx, Admin.ascx, and some other we will refer to as Home.ascx. This means that almost every skin out there has at least 3 user interface files plus any related images and a css file. While we want to provide the ultimately flexibility to designers for creating forum skins, we do not want to require them to make too many UI files otherwise they will not bother creating skins for the forums.
For the forums, I figure we need the following at a minimum (and perhaps maximum):
- GroupView - The initial view when navigating to a forum page (in most cases), shows groups with forums within the groups.
- ThreadView - This view lists all threads within a specific forum. It is also used for search results and "My Posts" (which is thread view).
- PostView - The details view that shows multiple posts within a single thread.
The problem I see with the above approach is that aggregated views and the search results view generally use slightly different items in them. For example, a typical thread view shows the title then "by" user alias. In aggregated or search results view, it shows title then "in" forum name. Outside of this, the items are identical. Do we just create a skin object (token) that is smart enough to handle the difference and name it appropriately?
Any additional thoughts/concerns?