I would like to try making a few minor changes to the CSS in either kbin or lemmy both of which I’ve been trying out. I favor a more dense interface and think styles could help visually separate different kinds of content. Maybe to reorganize some stuff if I got more ambitious.

I have some experience with web stuff, css. I can get around in git. But I am not a sysadmin or a programmer. And I have never worked on such a large comprehensive project.

Here are the repos I found:

codeberg Kbin/kbin-core

  • seems to have no contib guidelines
  • issues: 50 open, 4 closed

github LemmyNet/lemmy

  • contrib - same link for both repos but doesn’t really give much useful info

  • Issues: 184 open, 1,594 closed

github LemmyNet/lemmy-ui

  • issues: 197 open, 507 closed

Do I need to run the whole server with back end to fiddle with the CSS? Or can I use the developer tools in my browser to produce an alternative stylesheet?

Maybe it is just way above my skill set to make full PRs in something so complex. Should I post mock ups of how I’d like it to look as an issue?

Or just wait for someone who knows better how to get it done to come along?

  • @EcholotEnglish
    5•1 year ago

    I just created a pull request yesterday for lemmy-ui and to comfortably work on the frontend you would also have to setup the database and the backend („lemmy“) on your development machine.

    Mind you they provide docker containers for the backend so it’s not so hard to get it all running so you can start playing with the UI.

    • @[email protected]English
      2•1 year ago

      I tried to get docker working on M1 MacBook, but without luck. So for this kind of hardware I recommend just setting up backend locally, it’s also pretty straightforward.

      Also if anyone got docker to work on M1 I’d be very much interested in the solution.

    • crankOPEnglish
      1•1 year ago

      Thanks! Just to check is the correct docker instructions here?

      I also found this page Theming Guide, so I guess the way to do it would be to copy an existing theme and work on that?

      • @EcholotEnglish
        3•1 year ago

        Yes that docker-compose will start all the things needed.

        Yeah I would create a copy of an existing or the default theme, of course you can also use the Bootstrap Theme builder linked there but I have never used it myself before so I don’t know how well that’s gonna work.