# MAKING YOUR OWN TEMPLATE THE EASY WAY #
by Nessahead

Source: http://www.cafelog.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=420


If you know a little HTML, it really isn't that hard to make a custom template.
The easy way to think of it is just go ahead and make your html layout.

Then, you have to put the following at the top in order for b2 to work: 

[code]

<?php /* Don't remove this line, it calls the b2 function files ! */ $blog=1; include ("blog.header.php"); ?> 

[/code]


Then, wherever you want the blog stuff to show up, put this: 

[code] 

   <!-- // b2 loop start --> 
   <?php while($row = mysql_fetch_object($result)) { start_b2(); ?> 


<?php the_date("d.m.y","<h1>","</h1>"); ?> 

<p> 
<?php permalink_anchor(); ?> 

<strong><?php the_title(); ?></strong> (category: <strong><?php the_category() ?></strong>)<br /> 
<?php the_content(); ?><?php link_pages("<br />Pages: ","<br />","number") ?> 
<br /> 
<em>posted by <strong><?php the_author() ?></strong> @ <a href="<?php permalink_link() ?>"><?php the_time() ?></a></em> 
<br /> 
<a href="<?php comments_link() ?>"><?php comments_number("no comments", "1 comment", "% comments") ?></a> 

</p> 

<?php include ("b2comments.php"); ?> 


   <!-- // this is just the end of the motor - don't touch that line either :) --> 
   <?php } ?>  

[/code]

Now, all the stuff like <?php the_author() ?> and whatnot are variables for what b2 will put in there.
If you want the authorname to be bold, just but <b></b> tags around it and so on.
If you want something in a seperate paragraph, just stick it in <p></p> tags.
If something is showing up that you don't want, just delete it. 

If you want more info on what kinds of variables you can use, read the readme.html file.
(It's also on cafelog at http://www.cafelog.com/readme.html and http://sigg3.net/readme.html) 

I think the thing is that people aren't too sure exactly what is necessary to make it work and what
is just there to make it look nice and that's why they're having so many problems with editing the
bundled index.php or b2.php.


Source: http://www.cafelog.com/board/viewtopic.php?t=420