There were a number of people who were unable to watch the complete Creating Themes for BlogEngine.NET webcast.  (The screen turned red at some point in the webcast.  It seems to be a memory consumption issue.)

I went ahead and made a Windows Media version available for download.  You can download it here.  It is huge, but it works fine (at least for me).

I also updated the flash movie, but it is still a large file so you could still have trouble.

Our family went to Lake Tobias today.  It is a small safari/zoo and was a great place to take the kids.  We had a great time.

While there, we saw a pen of Alligators.  I was enjoying watching them when I noticed this awesome sign along the back of the pen.

In case you can't read it, it says "Those who throw objects at the Alligators will be asked to retrieve them."

I thought it would be cool to put together a webcast to show the world how easy it is to make themes for BlogEngine.NET. 

In this 25 minute webcast, I'll walk you through everything you need to do to create a new theme for your blog.  Following my standard theme making process, I started with a template from oswd.org.  This time around, I'm converting a template called Curiously Green by NodeThirtyThree Design.  It is a nice theme to demonstrate with as it not super complex and yet has enough interesting parts to show off some of the neat things BlogEngine themes can do.

You can watch the webcast from this link.  It is a full screen 1024x768 webcast using flash.

Hopefully, it will be a useful aid in getting started in making themes.  In addition, preparing this webcast made me get my act together and finally finish the theme documentation out on the BlogEngine.NET wiki.  (Finish is too strong a word, but I've completed a pass through it and it is fairly complete and very useful at this stage.)

Lastly, in the webcast, I promised to make the theme available for download, so if you wanted to get a good look at the theme we did together, you can.  You can also feel free to use this theme for your site, if you'd like.

BlogEngine.NET Theme: Curiously Green

Update: Some people are having trouble with the webcast turning red about half way through.  I made a Windows Media version and it is available for download here.

Word is out that the new release of BlogEngine.NET has hit the street and I figured I'd add my 2 cents as well.

The latest version has a ton of really good additions and a nice measure of bug fixes to make BlogEngine.NET even more solid than before.  Here is a short list of some of what you'll see:

• Internationalization (BlogEngine.NET now supports 17 languages out of the box and more are coming and will be made available.)
• New Controls/Widgets (Ratings, Recent Comments, Recent Posts, Page List as well as updates to the previous one.)
• SQL Server support has been improved and we've made easier to get started with.
• The new Windows Live Writer stuff is included with tag support.
• Improved performance and stability (Yes, this seems like a generic thing to say, but it is true.)
• More admin control over the details of the site.
• A bunch of new themes. (There are more of these coming as well, but there are now 8 included with the download.)

It is a very solid release and I'm really enjoying the updates we've added in this time around.

I wanted to again thank everyone who has been helping out and trying the latest code.  The BlogEngine.NET community is very active and willing to help out.  I can't say enough how awesome the process has been.  The feedback, patches, and other help has been amazing.

Here are the links to see (if you haven't already):

• BlogEngine.NET 1.1 Release Notes
• Documentation (Instructions, How to, Reference)
• Discussion Board (Help, Suggestions, Issues)
• New Themes (Check out the new themes)
• SQL Server Setup Instructions