A complete guide to installing and customizing SWIFT

SWIFT Options

SWIFT Options

Installing SWIFT is not different from installing any other WordPress theme. SWIFT looks great with the default options but spending a few minutes on the options page will give you a unique look to make your blog stand out from crowd. SWIFT is actually a infinite number of themes packed in to one :) .

Here is an example of how you can make your SWIFT unique without any template edits

http://geniushackers.com

Installing SWIFT

Installing and activating SWIFT

Installing and activating SWIFT

  1. Download your copy of SWIFT theme, and unzip the file you have downloaded.
  2. Upload the entire folder on to your server wp-content/themes. The template files should thus be here now: /wp-content/themes/swift-vX.X.X/.
  3. You can also upload your zipped file via CPanel and extract it.
  4. Log into your WP admin panel and click on the Appearance tab –> themes. Now click on the SWIFT theme to activate it (see the first screenshot below).
  5. Change the permissions of swift/cache folder to 777 and swift/custom-styles.css to 666.
  6. Your blog is now powered by the fastest SEO friendly, cross browser compliant, Adsense optimized, server friendly theme.

Note:If you are using WordPress 2.7 or higher, you install the theme directly from the admin dashboard.

137 Comments Post a Comment
  1. Mike Deakin says:

    Thanks for all the help with this..but just wondering now if the image thumbnails can sampled from the top of the image rather than the middle or can the thumbnails be resized to include the whole image, just smaller like a traditional thumbnail?

  2. Sarah says:

    Hi Satish,
    Love the theme! I don’t know my way around CSS very well, and I wonder if you could tell me if it’s possible to make the following modifications:
    - Can I change the content of sidebars depending on the page/post? Sidebar Widgets isn’t compatible with 2.8.6. I’d rather not have DONATE all over every page :)
    - Can I scale the size of images in the sidebar? If you look at my site (www.sarahchauncey.com), the square icons I’ve inserted are tiny (around 20×20), but when published, they’re much bigger. Same with the rectangles.
    Also, how do I increase the font size of 1) the blog tag line and 2) the post text? I know it’s in style.css, but I’m not sure which code refers to those two elements.
    (If I could afford it, I would hire you for a customization, btw… maybe someday I can)
    Cheers, and thanks again for doing a great job!
    Sarah
     

  3. dodypku says:

    this themes very simple and very good, i interested to install on my blog….
    thank’s

  4. Mike Deakin says:

    Can you remove the category navigation altogether? I’d rather have a category list in my sidebar than as menu navigation.

  5. Chris Comberrel says:

    I’m working on setting up my site with your theme with I think is great.
    Question though, when I’m setting up the pages – how can I remove the
    “Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.” on the bottom of pages. I don’t wish to have any comments on these.
    Thanks again for creating such a useful and functional theme.
     

    • Dawn says:

      Go into your theme editor and pull up comments.php
      Find the line that says

      <p><?php _e('Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.'); ?></p>

      and change it to

      <p><?/*php _e('Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.'); */?></p>

      That will remove it from both posts and pages where you have comments closed.  Alternatively, if you’d just prefer it to say something else, versus being gone all together, then just change the words.
       

  6. why page of Plugin Settings Related posts (YARPP) No related posts.
    although the script has included in the plugin settings YAPP.

  7. Mike says:

    Great theme!  Is there a way to set the photo that appears in the slider based on which category the post is in?

  8. Mignon says:

    Hi Satish,
    We have this theme installed on our blog.  I am just wondering how we go about increasing the number of posts from 3 to 10 on the slider though?
    I have been through the Swift Theme Options and couldn’t find anything there specifically for this….
    Thanks in advance!
    Mignon

  9. mary says:

    it may sound like a stupid question, but how do you change the permissions?

  10. Ryan Sanders says:

    This is a great theme!  It’s very customizable and really well thought out.  It’s a great theme for our http://www.settlingcreditdebt.com site.

  11. George says:

    I am using 4.07.  When I clicked on “display exerpts” in the home page options, all my thumbnails disappeared on my home page.  When I disable exerpts, the thumbnails display again.  How can I get to enable excerpts with thumbnails to show on the home page?

  12. Tom says:

    Here is my website. http://www.geomalik.com

    Bellow coding is use for page number.  Like
    « Older Entries                     Newer Entries>>

     
    1 = where i will Replace the this  codeing  for page numbers     <?php if(function_exists(’wp_page_numbers’)) { wp_page_numbers(); } ?>

    This Plugins  downlaod from this url. and u can see how can its work and how can use.        http://www.jenst.se/2008/03/29/wp-page-numbers/

    Here is my 2nd qustion

    2 = In The  slider  Pictures are not showing  only last post picture and text is showing. any 1 guide me how can i will fix it? 
    Thnx

  13. Tom says:

    Nice Theme. i like it. GOOD work

    i have 2 qustion

    1 = where i will Replace the this  codeing  for page numbers     <?php if(function_exists(‘wp_page_numbers’)) { wp_page_numbers(); } ?>

    2 = In The  slider  Pictures are not showing  only last post picture and text is showing. any 1 guide me how can i will fix it? 

    Thnx

  14. [...] option to add images through custom fields, check the following url for info on using custom fields http://swiftthemes.com/2009/09/wordpress-themes/a-complete-guide-to-installing-and-customizing-swift... *Added default favicon. *Increased the font size of sidebar title. *Changed content slider sliding [...]

  15. khizer says:

    on my slider only last post picture and text is showing. and page  any 1 guide me how can i will fix it? 

  16. khizer says:

    pictures are not showing in my main page and also in showsilde. guide me what can i do? how can i will fix it?

  17. khizer says:

    pictures are not showing in my main page. guide me what can i do? how can i will fix it?

  18. fastharry says:

    I have a quick question. I am trying this theme for me new site. On my other site (www.fastharry.com, Atahaupal)), when I paste a post to the front page the hyperlinks work. When I do it on Swift on this site, they come through as solid text, non clickable. And yes, I am enabling them through links…Thanks!

  19. First I must say this Swift Theme is great.
    I’ve been using it about a week now.
    However, I’ve not been able to figure out how
    to change the font style and size. How do you do that?

    Regards,
    Peter

    • Mike says:

      I corrected this using the custom css coding under the “colours” page.
      Here’s my blog youthoutreachunion.com/blog

  20. kbob says:

    This theme is amazing, very tweakable, nice looking and its the only thing that runs well on my awful godaddy hosting. Best WP theme ever… Many thanks!

  21. viral says:

    how i add more post in tht slide show on main page ??

  22. Does anyone have some links to their sites so I can get some ideas of how to implement  this theme?

  23. james says:

    How can I add an external page as one of the menu button to my blog http://2learncad.com/blog ? for example when I go to wordpress Pages, and Add new page. I want that new page that I create to directly open another site with link http://astore.amazon.com/2learncad-20 when someone click on the button.
    Anyone?
    Thanks

  24. mobiles says:

    why my popular post is not work at my home page ?
     
    Thanks

  25. Sagar Rai says:

    Hi Satish,
     
    you are doign a well done job. Recently I used “shift” theme for my new blog http://SagarRai.com
    Everything is fine on my blog but except one thing. I want to increase my “homepage post”.. Right now it shows only 4 post. So i want it to be 6 0r 7. And also the “popular post” i set it to 10 but it shows only 5. Whats the matter here.
     
    Please mail by here or reply to my inbox mail@sagarrai.com
    Your help will be really appreciated friend. Thank you

  26. Shant says:

    Hi there I am using this on my site but for some reason on my article posts the background color changes, please help thanks!

  27. Stein says:

    Thanks, the theme is looking great so far.  One problem I am having is that when I add my logo to the header, the title of the blog disappears.  Is there a way to get it back as my logo is only a picture and doesn’t have the title in it?  Thanks!

  28. Satish, this is best theme ever! thanks ;)
    I have a question, why I can’t see the posts in the home page (under the slider)? http://carloscabrera.net

  29. Geo says:

    Satish,
    One of the best free themes I have ever encountered! – Keep up the fantastic work ! -    Question – the pic in the slider is too big compared with the post – is there a setting somewhere other than the wordpress media settings ? I set the media settings to what you suggested above but the slider pic is still too large – any help is appreciated THANKS AGAIN http://www.cretedirectsolutions.com

    • Satish says:

      These media settings work only if they are set before the thumbnail are created, once they are created these new media settings won’t apply to them.
      Use custom fields.

      Im adding automatic cropping feature in v4.0, that should takecare of issues like this.

      • Geo says:

        Satish,
        Thank you very much !  I deleted the pic and added a similar one back into the post and the slider shows it correctly ! yeeha… keep up the awesome work and thank you for such a quick reply.

  30. Ramesh says:

    How do I ensure that Header has image as well as text. I do not know how to use Alt text as given in the guide. Please could you elaborate?  Thanks a tonne…Regards

  31. diego says:

    My first blog will be with your theme. Congratulations.
    Just a question. I see slider is limited to 184 characters.
    How can increase it??

    Thank you very much.

  32. Mike Wall says:

    How does a person change the content for the tabbed display beside the slider (to the right) on the home page?

    • Satish says:

      Right now you this has to be done manually.
      Edit tabs.php in swift/includes.

      I adding an option to edit this from options pave in version 4.0

  33. marjan says:

    i’ve looked this theme in my friend homepage, this awsome and i follow the link here. i will try it.

  34. Satish says:

    Hello Pete
    In the latest version of version of SWIFT i reduced the slider speed to 6 Seconds form 3.
    If you want to reduce it further
    open js-functions.js in swift/includes folder

    there will be a number either 3000 or 6000, change it to one of your choice. Thats slide duration in mill seconds.

  35. pete says:

    tried the forums but it won’t send me e-mails to log in so I’ll post my question here:

    Is there a simple way to adjust slider speed in the latest swift template ? Love the feature, but my guests cannot read that quick :-)

    • vikasg says:

      Pete someone here had figured how to do that. I guess there was a comment here only on this. Try searching it.

    • pete says:

      OK I spoke too soon. I already saw the option above to edit the js_functions.js file but that looked scary to me :-)
      turns out I can edit it like any other file in notepad. Not so scary after all ..

      works like a charm,

      don’t know if you can change this setting into a variable to set in admin panel but may be a future feature request. (only showing pictures may require different settings than text, quick setting in admin would then be cool).

  36. alaJoAnn says:

    Is there a way to increase the font size in the slider?

    Thanks for help!

  37. VIKAS GUPTA says:

    Wish there was comment reply subscription option by email here!

    It’s a great theme just the same! Thanks a ton! :)

  38. alaJoAnn says:

    I have installed Swift (twice, two different sites), and have the same problem:

    Have selected category for “Featured Category” and set the “Number of Featured Posts.” BUT the selected category does not appear on the home page slider.

    What can be the problem?

    Thanks.

  39. alaJoAnn says:

    Looks like useful theme.

    Can you adjust the jquery slider speed? (I’d want it to be slower.)

    Thanks.

  40. Jenn says:

    Hi Satish,
    I just installed Swift from wordpress and am trying to figure out how to have it show the whole post on the home page instead of just the first sentence or two. Can you clarify for me how to do that?
    This template is beautiful btw!
    Thank you so much,
    Jenn

  41. Monster Buzz says:

    How can we remove about me page from home page? Instead of this if we put vertical slider bar for different post or advert then this is more beneficial in terms of revenue and page views.

  42. Kenji lim says:

    Yeah, I’m using it and it provides most important widgets and options that a blog must have!

  43. Lee says:

    nice theme. but did this theme support gravatar? how to do gravatar? help me pls, thanks.

  44. Shujaat says:

    There is a problem in Feature post.. it doesn’t show the image if its not uploaded via Wordpress itself. Lets say i uploaded an image on tinypic and put the direct url of it, it doesn’t show up in Feature post. Is there any way to fix that?

  45. Ricky says:

    @Satish
    Sorry there was a silly mistake from my side. I think I didn’t install the theme properly. After reinstallation it is working like a charm. Sorry for the trouble.
    The theme looks sexy. Keep up the good work ;)

  46. There is no problem with SWIFT, you are having some unclosed HTML tag, that’s creating the problem.
    Check the posts on the home page for any unclosed tags.
    there should not be any conflict between atahualpha and SWIFT, it might be due to some plugins you installed recently.

    -Satish Gandham

  47. Ricky says:

    Yes it was working fine. I have sent u an email as well. What is the solution for it? Sinle page or post is working normal only home page is throwing that error.
    Strangly atahualpha 3.4.2 stopped working after installing this theme. Only version 3.4.1 is working well that is with some difficulty.

  48. Satish says:

    I cant really say, without it being live.
    Most probably, that might be due to a div which you forgot closing in your post.
    Are the pages containing the previous posts fine??
    Most probably they should be.

  49. ricky says:

    It is not working properly on my website. The homepage doesn’t look good, single page is working fine.
    What could be the problem?
    Screenshot: http://img186.imageshack.us/img186/8231/techgenuineatechnicalge.png

  50. pramodh says:

    I think this theme is awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am going to install it….

  51. Greg says:

    OK – some problems were between the seat and the keyboard (my fault), but the magazine layout seems to only work in chrome and IE.  I can’t seem to get it to work in firefox.
    Peace,
    G

  52. Greg says:

    This is a problem with zoom.  Zooming out (making the text smaller) seems to causes div #content .grid_10 19 or div #post-main 55 to become more narrow not allowing div .post mag-box 56 and div .post mag-box m_right 59 to line up side by side.

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Why are SwiftThemes server friendly..

SwiftTheme's use minumum number of images and minimum number of external files, thus reducing the number of HTTP reqests and thus reducing the load on server. This makes your site load faster.
Need help customizing SWIFT, Check out our support forum.

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Testimonials

Thank you very much for having created a wonderful theme! We use Swift on www.narconon.ca/blog with a few modifications. We like it very much! A few weeks after we applied this theme, our visits increased drastically (+more 400 visits/week)!
-Eric