Over the last weekend, I created eight new three-column templates based on Douglas Bowman's Minima two-column template designs.



Below are links for download. There are four distinct coloring schemes, each with its stretch version (instead of the default fixed width). (In my upcoming tutorial I will show you how to move the smaller sidebar2 from center to the left, for styles yui-t4 & yui-t6.)

Minima:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima.xml

Minima Stretch:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-stretch.xml

Minima Blue:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-blue.xml

Minima Blue Stretch:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-blue-stretch.xml


Minima Dark:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-dark.xml

Minima Dark Stretch:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-dark-stretch.xml


Minima Ochre:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-ochre.xml

Minima Ochre Stretch:
http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/3col-minima-ochre-stretch.xml



You can see one of the templates live from this blog:

http://hoctro-minima-ochre.blogspot.com/

I will post a separate tutorial for Beta's newcomers on how to install these new templates to their fullest potential.

All I ask for anyone to use these templates for free, is to retain the credits at the very unobstrusive bottom of the page. It contains the links to Mr. Douglas Bowman's www.stopdesign.com homepage, Blogger's homepage, and my homepage.

At the top of the template there are two links to my storage site: hoctroarticles.googlepages.com. The reason is that the two CSS files are part of the YUI's strategic design to be separated from the webpage for reducing bandwidth. Since Yahoo! doesn't host these files, I decided to host them. You can view them at anytime to check the CSS code behind:

http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/fonts.css

http://hoctroarticles.googlepages.com/grids.css

These template are designed to be Beta-hack free. Thus, you won't see any of my hacks here, with the exception of the YUI's Grid system. Some other minor things are the "1 comment" fix, and the "comment locator" fix.

I hope this would help new, unexperienced Beta bloggers to have some three-column templates for their blogs with minimum understanding on how template works, yet still enjoy all the variations that the YUI Grid sytem allows.

Cheers,