This is mainly a bug fix release. But also, contains some important changes. Here is the list of some of the changes:

• Changes to rendering post date button
• Fixed archive template
• Updated comments file

Full list of changes is available on the changelog page.

Last few weeks I was working on some new features for Starscape Cygnus edition, and I have started compiling the list of features I would like to transfer to Starscape II and also a list of new features. Some of the current Starscape things is still in the rough phase, and I don’t expect to polish all of them, not until Starscape II is in development. This is especially the case with Nova rendering engine that has much more potential then the current version you can see in Cygnus edition.

I will start working on Starscape II in august, and I expect to see first public version in september. There will be a test blog available during development period, and I will upload new version of theme at least once a week.

So, if you are interested to read more on Startscape II features, then read on.
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Finally, new version of theme is ready. Some of the new features still need some work, and this should be done for the next and last edition of current Starscape. I will post new article by the end of the week with announcement of Startscape II theme.

This edition features new rendering engine called Nova. This will make significant change in the way blog looks. It’s very customizable and is not as limited as classic was. Control panel is also changed to reflect adding of new rendering engine.

Beside this, some new modules have been added: new posts navigation, comments and trackback displaying. Typography is updated, and all the errors from the previous version are hopefully fixed. Also, a lot of other things are fixed with this version including the probelms with the classic theme in 1024×768 monitor resolutions. User guide is also updated.

This blog will be updated to new Starscape version in a day or two because I am working on new graphics and I still need some time to finish it. Current version has few background images for a Nova engine, and even more will be included in the next edition Draco that will be ready in the next two weeks.

I hope you like the way the Starscape development is going.

All over the internet you can find tutorials, help, samples on creating wordpress theme. Still, there are some topics that are not covered by many of them. I will try to focus on the solution of practical problems I had while creating Starscape theme.

This first part will cover following problems and solutions:

1. Using theme Wordpress options within CSS or JavaScript file
2. Adding Gravatar support to the theme
3. Separating trackback from comments
4. Creating Post Date button

And as always, Starscape theme contains all this, so you can check it out also.
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Like it or not, MS Internet Explorer is still the most used browser in the world. The reason for this is MS Windows XP/Vista. IE is bundled with every copy of Windows. Now we have two major IE version:

1. Internet Explorer 6 [IE6]
2. Internet Explorer 7 [IE7]

I will show you what optimizations I needed to add to Starscape to make the theme more compliant with IE6/IE7. Maybe you can use some of this optimizations in developing your own themes.

As for the standard compliance, IE7 is much better, and it’s much easier to make optimizations so theme will work in IE7 as it should. One of the most important improvement for design point of view is full PNG transparency support.
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