The idea behind developing skins for this software package is to provide users with many different looks and feels that are easily installable and updateable. This will assist users who are under time constraints for getting their site live as well as users who have little or no HTML knowledge.

The most important thing to remember when developing a skin is to keep everything as generic as possible. Remember, your skin will be installed on many different sites selling many different types of items. Skins should not include any text (for example category names) embedded in the images or HTML.

When developing a skin, base your skin's design on the default skin - ccp51-default. The default skin contains all of the proper files in the media directories with the proper wording embedded in each image. The site layout element also includes all necessary CGIGET and CGIVAR tags to ensure all admin controlled function work properly.

Use the following steps to ensure your skin is developed properly:

1. Create new images for the following directories, ensuring that you create every image and use the same wording on any title, store and button images as the wording provided in the default skin:
   
   ./media-images-site
   ./media-images-title
   ./media-images-store
   ./media-images-button
   
   
2. Update the README file, step 5 under Installation Instructions to include the proper values for your new image sizes.
   
   
3. Create new site layout and body tag elements for use in the directory:
   
   ./data/elements
   
   Ensure that you keep all of the commented tags in your site layout.
   
   
4. Update the README file, step 6 under Installation Instructions to include the proper values for your HTML settings. This is where your skin's font faces, sizes and other information is stored.
   
   
5. Create a screenshot of your skin and save the file as a 400x400 pixel image named 'screenshot.gif' in the root skin directory.
   
   
6. Ensure that you present the correct attributes for your skin in the Skin Information section of the README file so that you get credit for developing it.
   
   
7. Use an archive program like WinZip to create a zip file for your skin - naming the file 'skin_name.zip' where 'skin_name' is the name you gave your skin in the Skin Information section of the README file.
   
   

When you feel your skin is complete, send it to ec@kryptronic.com via email for review. If your skin is approved, it will be listed for download on our Internet site.

Questions regarding skin development should be directed to our online support forum at http://www.clickcartpro.com/forum.