Zen Cart Custom Template Notes

Zen Cart doesn't make it easy to create a template. There are four different folders you're going to want to eventually create, each with the same name but in different locations, and they each have their own purpose.

• /includes/languages/mytemplate/
  This one includes all of the language content files. It should have a copy of /includes/languages/english.php, which defines the site title, the menu text, and pretty much all of the short snippets of text that appear on the site.
• /includes/languages/english/mytemplate/
  This one should have copies of any of the files you wanted to modify from "/includes/languages/english/*.php". Also if you create any new pages, you should create their language file in here.
• /includes/templates/mytemplate/
  This is where sorts of subfolders go for actual templates.
  • /includes/templates/mytemplate/css/ - for stylesheets, but their names must begin with the word "style"
  • /includes/templates/mytemplate/templates/ - where your actual modified templates go, copied from /includes/templates/template_default/templates/. Any new ones you create have to be named tpl_*_default.php
  • /includes/templates/mytemplate/images/ - images you can call from whereever
  • /includes/templates/mytemplate/sideboxes/ - for custom sideboxes
• /includes/modules/sideboxes/mytemplate/
  This is where you can override sideboxes defined in /includes/modules/sideboxes/ or create new ones.

(Note that this page is really just a better organized and less informative version of Properly Customizing Your Site, Using Over-rides)