Quick and Dirty Set-up

1. Rename the site configuration folder from /themes/_site to themes/site to avoid library updates modifying your site's settings.

2. Rename your semantic config file from semantic.config.example to semantic.config

3. Use grunt build to output your project files, you can configure the paths used in grunt.config.

Overview

• definitions/ - contain all UI definitions
• themes/packaged/default are the default UI styling of an element
• themes/packaged are downloaded from the web or a package manager and provide preset overrides
• themes/user are the only files you should modify, these are your site's overrides for LESS and variables

Building CSS

To make development easier, Semantic has a built in grunt config for building your project. Simply modify the grunt.config with the directories you need.

You can also build the source files with any processor for LESS. Just keep in mind to customize site.variables with your asset paths for images and fonts.

For information on installing grunt see their guide

Customizing Semantic

There is only one folder you should ever edit files in themes/site. These are your site's LESS overrides and variable settings.

Using a default theme

Leaving an element as default will use baseline UI stylings.

The inheritance order when using default is:

1. themes/default/elements/button.variables loads the baseline UI variables
2. themes/packaged/default/elements/button.variables loads a blank file
3. themes/sites/elements.button.variables loads your variable overrides

Using a packaged theme

Packaged themes can be downloaded from the internet, and placed inside themes/packaged/

To use a packaged theme change the value inside semantic.config to the theme name.

For example if you change your button theme to 'chubby' the following load order would occur:

1. themes/default/elements/button.variables loads the UI variables
2. themes/packaged/chubby/elements/button.variables loads the "downloadable" theme (this will allow for community packages) In this example, a button theme called chubby
3. themes/sites/elements.button.variables loads your overrides for variables

Adjust your site's configuration

To customize a ui button you can

• Add variable overrides in site/elements/button.variables
• Add user LESS/CSS overrides in /site/elements/button.overrides (this will have all variables accessible)

Semantic now also includes some site-wide configuration by default in site.less it is recommended you include this also.

Advanced grunt usage

grunt reset - Clears your build directory. Use this if you have a source file that is no longer being tracked.

grunt build - This will build all files (not just watched files) in your source directory

Gotchas & Tips

Semantic now requires a box-sizing reset this allows us more flexibility inside the framework to not deal with issues related to calculating padding. This is included in site.less as well as a standard HTML reset.