Overview

CalPress is a WordPress publication and teaching theme developed at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. CalPress adds media-centric functionality on top of WordPress, allowing for the rapid development of small media sites and class projects. In addition to workflows to handle basic video, slideshow, audio and geotagging, CalPress incorporates jQuery and the 960 Grid System out of the box, allowing for the quick creation of new designs and interactive packages. The theme also includes templates for common media site layouts, like full page, two and three column packages, article pages with inline content and categories pages in a few sizes and shapes.

Vanilla install

Fresh install

In Wordpress-speak, CalPress is a "parent theme," a theme with little design but lots functionality that can be later styled in a "child theme."

CalPress was initially developed to run Mission Local, Oakland North and Richmond Confidential.

Who is it for?

CalPress is for those who want more than a cookie cutter news theme. CalPress is not a turnkey solution. Out of the box, CalPress does a lot, but visually it does very little. CalPress requires strong knowledge of CSS and intermediate knowledge of PHP and WordPress theme development.

The theme is a framework of functionality, meant as a starter for designers interested in designing a unique experience but without the drudgery of building common functionality. A goal of CalPress is to include much of the functionality media sites need into the actual theme, so the use of many sometimes-incompatible 3rd-party plugins is largely unnecessary.

What does it look like?

Does it work with smart phones and the iPad?

Yes! CalPress addresses mobile delivery in two major ways. The first is built-in auto detection for mobile user agents. On detection, an optional mobile-only stylesheet can be served up. Additionally, if videos are encoded per CalPress's video workflow, non-Flash versions are served up for mobile devices, or any non-Flash browser.

What does CalPress do?

Custom front page selection

One of three example front pages for Mission Local, a CalPress-based theme

Mission Local, a CalPress-based site, has multiple front page templates that site editors may choose from.

One of three example front pages for Mission Local, a CalPress-based theme

An alternate to the "default" layout above.

One of three example front pages for Mission Local, a CalPress-based theme

Not only does CalPress handle multiple layouts, but for supported media (like local videos, YouTube, Vimeo and photos) it dynamically sizes them for different size content holes.

Smarter media

Photos and video on news sites need to be more dynamic than WordPress's ability out of the box. Photos need to be resizable dyanically for placement on articles, sections and promos, not pre-defined to sizes on upload. Video needs to support mutliple formats per asset for different platforms, bandwidths and resolution.

One of three example front pages for Mission Local, a CalPress-based theme
H.264

CalPress' H.264-based video workflow sizes a Flash-based video player for posts viewed in the Web browser.

One of three example front pages for Mission Local, a CalPress-based theme
Smart Video

Video in Posts follows the articles to section pages and front pages, assuming the content hole is big enough to view video. If not, a preview image is shown instead, all dynamically.

One of three example front pages for Mission Local, a CalPress-based theme
iPad

On devices that don't support Flash, CalPress serves up H.264 files automatically.

Dynamic Images

Images on media sites need the ability to be dynamically sized for an array of different uses, like in an article, as a preview on a section page or as a small thumbnail. CalPress image workflow is to upload a single large image and let the theme size it for you as needed.

Soundslides integration

Many sites use Soundslides for basic audio slideshows. Export your Soundslides with our workflow and CalPress will dynamically embed it for you, at whatever size is appropriate for the current page.

Smart embedding of YouTube and Vimeo

On a typical small media site, social media content like YouTube and Vimeo is usually embedded by using the service's provided embed code. This works well most of the time, especially if you know how to customize the code to fit exactly into your art spot. But what happens when you want that same article to show up on the front page, with the video at a smaller size? With CalPress, you simply tell the theme the unique identifier of the video you want to use and the video is embedded and auto-sized according to the size it needs to be on any given page!

Geo-location

CalPress' built-in geo-location allows you to set a location via a Google map for each post or page on your site. The geographic coordinates are included in your (geo) RSS feed, and the information is also available for use in the Loop, allowing you to build special packages or dynamic maps of your content.

Integrated Google Analytics

To use Google Analytics, simply paste in your Google Analytics ID into the appropriate box on the CalPress options page and the theme does the rest, automatically. No extra plugins needed!

Custom body classes in pages and posts

Need to make an invidual page look different? If CalPress' verbose selectors automatically included with the body tag aren't enough, designers and developers can add any number of body classes on an individual page or post for use with JavaScript or CSS right in the admin.

Per-post and per-page custom CSS and JavaScript

Sometimes an article or special package needs special CSS or JavaScript that you don't want to put into your main script files. CalPress lets you point to any JavaScript or CSS you want in an individual page or post through the admin!

Custom related Twitter searches

CalPress gives you the ability, on a per-post basis, to dynamically insert the results of a Twitter keyword search in your article.