How to setup local environment for theme development?

Themes
1

Hey everyone,

Having some trouble getting the local setup to work when using a different theme other than the default. I ran ghost install local and then deleted the casper folder, replacing it with massively.

Is there a step I’m missing? Do I need to zip the massively folder before putting it into the project?

2

You don’t want to delete the casper folder, it’s the default theme so if your other theme fails, Ghost needs something to fall back to

There are 2 ways to get Ghost to find a theme -

  1. Upload a zip of the theme (easiest)
  2. Move the theme to content/themes/{name} and restart ghost. Your theme should show up in the Settings -> Design section of the admin panel
3

Ahh okay thanks, I didn’t realize that Ghost needed the casper theme.

Would step 2 be the way to go if I’m trying to do live development? I don’t want to have upload a zip every time I change the template

4

Yep! You might need to restart Ghost a couple of times, especially if you add or remove a file :slight_smile:

5

Got it! Lol I was overcomplicating things in my head. Thanks again

1 Like
6

No problem! Glad you got it working :slight_smile:

7

You should be able to see local changes by running ghost start -D to see local changes being applied.
(-D or development)