just in case you haven't noticed, Phade has allowed you to change the forum skin.
Ah, I see you haven't noticed.
Well, at the moment there is only one skin available in the profile options but that's because only one is installed. Much like the main page, the forum skin can be developed by you.
Want to see what you could do with the forum?
Click here to see some demo skins
Making your own forum skin/template
Well, the easiest way is to actually edit the original template so go to http://www.phpbb.com and download the forum software (it's only about 600k). Unpack this to a directory and look in the templates folder.
Here you can find all the images that make up the forum. Now you just have to change them.
Step 1. Make a copy of the subSilver folder located in the templates directory. Make sure the subSilver folder that you copy is in its un-modified, original state. If you are not sure of this, then I suggest downloading it again to be safe. Put the copied folder in the templates directory also. Rename the copied folder to whatever your new template name is going to be.
Step 2. Edit and change the image files to look the way you want them to. If you want the original photoshop files instead of the gif ones you can get them from the phpbb.com download page.
Step 3. Now we need to go through every file in the folder, find all references pointing to 'subSilver', and change them all to point to your new template. You can either do this using Find and Replace in a text editor or you can speed up the process by using this program
Step 4. Rename 'subSilver.cfg' to 'your-new-template.cfg'
Rename 'subSilver.css' to 'your-new-template.css'
Step 5. Zip it and email it to Phade. He will then upload it into the templates folder and it will then be available via the profiles.
There you go. I hope this will get some of you planning some new ways to view your new fourm.
For futher information about style development and other issues, please refer to the phpbb fourms.
