ThemeKit Lite Theme

Content Carousel

ThemeKit Lite Carousel

In many respects a carousel is a better option than a slideshow on responsive pages and the image size can be much smaller.
The ThemeKit Lite Carousel is multifunctional in that it can display images or text content and can be used for displaying products, an illustrated navigation, user testimonials, quotes and so on …
Layout
The carousel can be centered with a maximum width setting or be switched to full width by checking a box.
The number of items to show can be set for each device type and the container has controls for background color and opacity, padding and item spacing.
Items
The items have options for an image with alt text, a heading, a styled span, text, another styled span and a full width CTA style link.
When the image option is used the lazy loading function should be turned on if the carousel is not in view on page load.
Navigation
The carousel can be navigated by grab and drag on computers and swipe on touch devices like tablets and phones.
The navigation arrows can be set to show or hide for each device type.

Icon Row

Icon Row

The row can have 2, 3 or 4 items.
When there are three items the last one aligns itself in the center of row 2 below the first break point.
The items stack vertically on phones in portrait mode.

Home

Columns

The columns are created using the CSS Grid Layout Module.
Each column has an <article> element which can have a border if required
The article has a heading, text and an optional link.
The icon and the heading are in a header element.

Slideshow

Icons

The optional icons are SVGs and are inserted by opening the SVG download folder, double clicking the file to open it in TextEdit in plain text mode, copying the code and pasting it into the SVG code box in the widget settings.
Icons can be round or square with a border option.

Carousel

Links

The optional links are positioned at the bottom of the container so that they remain in line despite varying amounts of content.
The links can be configured to open internal or external pages and have a new window option.

Grid

ThemeKit Lite Links

The ThemeKit Lite Links widget can be used for a horizontal navigation if required but its main purpose is to provide CTA style links to replace any text links in the page content.
Text links are outdated and should be avoided on responsive pages. Links on mobile devices need to have a minimum with of 32px for fingertips and 40px for thumbs and a minimum height of 28px. If the links are less than these dimensions they will be registered as unsuitable by the search engines.
Better By Design
Apart from the general layout style, the thing that sets a good website design apart is the details. If links or action tabs have a hover state it should have a transition applied to smooth out the change in state, A change in background color is more professional looking than a change in hover text color.
Adding an unusual animation to the hover - like the chevron to double chevron of the above links - adds that little extra design feature and makes the website more memorable to visitors.