having a nightmare of a time designing and need suggestions

now im no stranger to designing i can write css animations in my sleep.. but after coming to jamroom im having trouble doing anything at all
im in the new ning to jamroom group i was very happy wwith ning 3 when it came out and still am but they are taking way too long to finish it
so im test moving here
my ning sites are www.dreadlockssite.com is the2.0 and http://ww3.dreadlockssite.com is the mobileresponsive 3.0
ww3 has a hell of alot of css but the majority of it was done in a day with some tweaking since i mean it was done enough to be ready to launch if the vids and events were addded
a year and 1/2 later they still arent so i was going to try jamroom as i liked some of what i heard
but in the time it took me to do most of that site i got nearly nothing done on here even though i worked nonstop for 18 hours
most of that timespent trying to fix simple thinjgs that should have been easy
like in elastic i uploaded a background.. wich applied itself to the header footer and wrapper and html and i think something else too.. in css in the template sand i tried making it fixed and stretched to full page in css that didnt work i deleted it in the images and it wouldnt go away i deleted every reference in every template and css file and it wouldnt go away

the craziest thing is the only thing that made it go away shouldnt have had anything to do with it
out of desperation after so many hours i started clicking random resets
the background color for "info logs' in admin logs css rest it and made it go away

frustrated i tried the new site builder beta
made a few menu items and panels and widgets all easy peasy but then tried changing the logo that says change this logo... and it wouldnt change it would upload id see it there i click select and save and it disapeared..
i tried 10 times
so gave up
went back to elastic got my logo up lil tallerthen default so i tried adjusting the header size instead of alowing you to imput a number only gives you 10px incriments and i perfect my sites down to a single pixel tolerence so that was no good so i go to fcss to fix it hbut thats not working as those controls take priority i guess
argh so lets try the other free template upload my logo and its all distorter ..yuck and upload a file to replace that big image ..but that doesnt replace it

so here i am thinking that even with pretty good css skills im getting nowhere getting nothing done

so heres where i need some advice
you see my sites www.dreadlockssite.com and http://ww3.dreadlockssite.com you see im in need of a huge social network with forums being primary photis blogs secondary i have a shops.dreadlockssite.com and dating.dreadlockssite.com as parts of my network so id love the on profile shops for our thousands of crafters and musicians

but i look at all the premium skins and they all look like they are only for bands except 1 photography

so my question is seeing what im working towards ..more like my 3,0 ww3 site with more added like the shops etc
what skins would you suggest as a starting point that will give methe functionality i need
and be very tweakable in the design ..
im vedry detail orientated and will style every tiny detail (if you saw what i did with the tinymce editor on the 3.0 youd flip out..1st and only site ive ever seen to style the text editor to that degree

so please make some suggestions on where to start since i already blew alot of money on a huge server upgrade planning on moving to jr but now just finding it so frustrating
i dont mind paying for a skin if it will work for me


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soaringeagle
head dreadhead at dreadlocks site
glider pilot student and member/volunteer coordinator with freedoms wings international soaring for people with disabilities
updated by @soaringeagle: 12/07/14 03:45:45AM

Michael has put hours in creating videos just to help people dig in right away. Here is the link. Hope this helps. It sure has helped me and many, many others! https://www.udemy.com/start-your-own-online-community/

- Reset caches in the ACP when you make css changes and are trying to see them.

- You may also have to run an integrity check from time to time.

- When im working with css reseting the cache becomes a habit.

* Moreover you need to ADD the link to your css file. Locate the include.php file and add the refrence to your new css file your writing. you will notice the others so just follow the lead.



* You will place your file in the css file will be dropped inside the skins/mySkin/css folder.

Hope all that helps.
updated by @developer-networks: 11/03/14 01:54:08AM

after 18 hours of sheer frustration i found that developer module to enable developer mode and finaly making progress
basicly cloned the skin and started working on that in devekloper mode and its coming along slowly

what a relief that was i know i can get a good design now
and after nearly 5 or 6 days uploading my import files are almost done so hopefully tomorow ill really didg in and get some work done

gonna try to adapt much of the css from the ning site (3.0) to this

one thing im still haveing a tricky time with is i got aw fixed background onthe html selector
i got a semy transparent container
i want a slightly less transparent header background but when i do its got that black background behind it thats just not going away unless i put background none then its sure white cant figure out why the backgrounds not showing through

very very rough draft www.greentechnologyforums.com (temporary spare domain i had...and wantto sell)
but ya see even if u turn down the opacity to 0 the backgrounds still not showing thru

but het at least im figuring it iut i was really starting to think the script was seriously buggy
cause typicaly in cms's logged in admins dont have caching to deal with at all

would be nice to have an admin nocacxhe module helps to remove sopam before guests get to see it and also u see changes instantly


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soaringeagle
head dreadhead at dreadlocks site
glider pilot student and member/volunteer coordinator with freedoms wings international soaring for people with disabilities

Similar to what b360 said but if you check out the developers course, https://www.udemy.com/developers-guide-to-customizing-jamroom/?dtcode=kcraOcN1N6cA, it explains how to tae an existing css theme and convert it to a jamroom skin.

Its already done Just log in.
-> Go to ACP
-> Core
-> Change "default cache seconds" to zero.
updated by @developer-networks: 11/03/14 03:44:40AM

just add opacity to the header


updated by @developer-networks: 11/03/14 03:43:36AM

Don't know about other CMSs but caching is used a lot with Jamroom and it really makes for a speedy 'live' site.
However, when developing, make sure you are running in Developer Mode (in the jrDeveloper module) and as a 'belt and braces' measure, set Default Cache Seconds to zero, as b360 suggested. Also, to be absolutely sure, goto the jrCore Tools section and clear the caches there. This will make absolutely sure that when developing, you see your changes instantly.


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Paul Asher - JR Developer and System Import Specialist