blog

I use zenphoto as the backend to my photos section with a custom theme to hook into my site’s navigation and such. I chose zenphoto for my website a year ago based on it’s main strength: simplicity. It does much less than the competition, but it does what I need it to do—for the most part. It’s a fantastic bare-bones mysql/php photo gallery option.

Since then, though, I (along with many others) have been slightly disappointed by the lack of development in the promising project, without having the time or energy to pitch in myself. Such is life. But now the wait is over: Zenphoto 1.1 is out.

Zenphoto 1.1, I believe, does a good job balancing this tradition of simplicity with some popular new features. Highlights include (there are many) tagging, subalbums, chronological archives, RSS feeds, EXIF support, Google Maps, search, and preliminary video support. Exciting stuff.

As I maintain my own theme, though, some of these new features of course require me to update my theme. Below is my rough guide to editing your theme to take maximum advantage of zenphoto 1.1.

(more…)