A template is a reusable blueprint for a site: a platform, plus a chosen set of modules and themes, each pinned to a specific version or set to "latest". Once you have a template, you can stamp out new sites from it, complete with everything already installed.
Templates really shine when you need many similar sites at once. Teaching a class where every student gets their own Omeka site? Running a workshop? Build the template once and create a site for everyone in one go.
Creating a template
Go to the Templates page in the menu and create a new template. Give it a name and pick a platform, Omeka Classic or Omeka S. You can also pick a specific platform version, or leave that blank to always install the latest.
📷 Screenshot: The new template form with the two platform cards and the version field.
After saving, open the template and use its Modules and Themes tabs to attach whatever the sites should come with. Each attached item defaults to "latest", meaning new sites get the newest version at the time they are created. If consistency matters more, use the versions dropdown to pin an item to a specific version.
📷 Screenshot: A template's Modules tab with several modules attached, one pinned to a specific version.
Creating sites from a template
This is the fun part. On the Sites page, next to the New site button, click Create Site From Template.
📷 Screenshot: The Create Site From Template form with a template selected and several email addresses entered.
The form asks for:
- Template. Which blueprint to use.
- Name. A base name for the new sites.
- Circle. Optionally group all the new sites into a circle, which makes a whole class easy to find later. More on those in Organizing with circles.
- Admin emails. A list of email addresses separated by semicolons, one per site you want.
One site is created for each address. Each person's email becomes the admin login for their own site, and every site gets the template's modules and themes installed automatically. So a list of twenty five students becomes twenty five ready-to-use sites, each with its own login.
To keep them apart in your Sites list, each site's name combines the base name with the first part of that person's email address.
The sites build in the background, just like a regular new site, so give them a little while. If you are curious what happens during setup, Creating your first site walks through it step by step.