Slimlines is a standalone application. It does not require a separate installation program and does not modify your system registry, so you can move the installation folder at any time without affecting operation.

To Install

Download the application and extract it. It will decompress itself into an installation folder ( /slimlines ).

Downloads

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Downloading the ZIP file (1MB) is both easy and free. No signup required.

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To Uninstall

Simply delete the installation folder. No fuss.

To Upgrade

Reinstall, but be careful. When you extract the distribution file, it will overwrite the default files located in the installation folder. To protect yourself, never edit the default files directly — always make copies of file you edit.

Sample Blog

Slimlines provides a batch file that can be used to build a sample blog. Instructions for doing so follow. The sample blog is meant to demonstate how to build a blog from scratch.

To Build an HTML Blog

Building a blog is quick and easy. In order to demonstrate this, try building the sample blog in HTML first. This will allow you to view it on your computer immediately. To build the sample blog in HTML, just run build-html.bat. This will build the sample blog and copy all of its files to the default output path ( /html ). After the build completes, click on the build.html file to load the sample blog in your default browser. You've just built your first blog. Feel free to poke around.

Now that you've seen how easy it is to build your blog in HTML, you'll no doubt want to make a few changes. I recommend a quick review of the sample configuration files (those with the .xml extension). You might also want to review the configuration options in the Slimlines documentation. I've tried to keep the documentation concise, so that it can be read through quickly. It is entirely up to you how many or few of these options you use. To change your website information such as your site title, edit the build configuration file ( build.xml ). Next you will need to replace the pages in the blog configuration file ( blog.xml ). Once you've reconfigured your blog, rebuild and view it to make sure it is correct.

To Build a Database

Your next step is to deploy your blog on a web server. To do so, you will first need to edit the database configuration file ( db.xml ) to modify the host name and subfolder where your blog will reside, and then run build-db.bat to generate the database and necessary support files. To deploy, simply drag and drop your subfolder into your web server's root file system ( i.e. /public_html ) and your done. For a detailed explaination on how to obtain and setup a web server, and deploy your database, please see

Blogging 101

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Have you ever wanted to create an online blog (for free), but didn't know how to get started. If so, I've got you covered.

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Command Line Options

Slimlines supports several command line options.

A Note on Configuration Files

When reading through the documentation, default values for configuration properties are shown in brackets when they apply. Generally, it is not important the order in which configuration option are specified, nor is it important the order in which the properties are specified within an option (unless otherwise noted). That being said, each property is processed in the order it is loaded, so if you redefine a property, it will overwrite previous definitions (unless otherwise noted). In some cases, such as redefning pages and images, you'll be notified during the build process. In other cases, such as when configuring the header and footer, contents will be appended.

All configuration files use XML tags to define data. XML files are in plain-text, so you can edit them with any text editor. All configuration files must begin and end with the <Options> tag.

<Options>
  
  <!-- all configuration items go here -->
  
</Options>

For those unfamiliar with XML, XML tags are composed of opening and closing tag elements. Text falling between the opening and closing tags may include plain text, HTML, JavaScript and PHP code, or additional XML tags. Since XML uses the left bracket ( < ) to deliniate the start of a tag, a special opening tag delimiter ( <![CDATA[ ) and closing tag delimiter ( ]]> ) must be used to embed HTML within an XML tag. Comments can also be embedded in both XML and HTML using a special tag structure ( <!-- and --> ). A generic example might look like this:

<Tag>

   <Tag>
     Hello World                       <!-- plain text -->
   </Tag>
   
   <Tag> 
     <![CDATA[
       <b>Hello World</b>              <!-- HTML -->
     ]]>
   </Tag>
   
</Tag>

PHP and JavaScript, like XML and HTML, also use the left bracket ( < ) to deliniate the start of a tag, so require the special opening tag delimiter ( <![CDATA[ ) and closing tag delimiter ( ]]> ) to be used. Embedding PHP/JavaScript, unlike XML and HTML, requires special Slimlines opening and closing delimiters ( [[[ and ]]] ) to prevent Slimlines from attempting to cleanup line breaks embedded in the code. A generic example might just look like this:

<Tag>
   
   <Tag>
     <![CDATA[
       [[[
         <?php echo("Helo World"); ?>  <!-- PHP code -->
       ]]]
     ]]>
   </Tag>   
   
</Tag>

By default, all images will be opened using FancyBox.

The remaining documentation discusses additional configuration options that can be used to extend the capabilities of your blog. The Blog includes articles that cover some of these topics in greater detail.

<Setup>

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The <Setup> option is used to configure your blog's metadata including your site title, header, footer and menu.

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