BuddyPress.org

@Erich73, You would be best to make two themes for yourself; one as a child of the BP framework, and the other as a child of your first theme.

The first theme would include all of your custom CSS, images, etc… The second theme would bypass the home.php file and include any extra CSS or images that you might need. It’s simple once you see how it all plays together.

@alcina22, child theme files will always override any parent theme files. With that being said, if you need a home.php with 4 columns, then you make a home.php file in your child theme folder, and you add the extra code in your child theme’s function.php file to accommodate for the extra sidebar areas.

@Michael, BP1.1 should be backwards compatible, but once you’ve moved forward it is difficult to go back. The idea with 1.1 is that it’s something you’re going to want to commit to using, as there is so much deprecated code and renamed functions/extra functions, that your old themes will still work but are obsoleted by the new architecture.

If you have a HIGHLY customized theme, then it will make more sense to use your existing theme as your own framework, and make other themes work as a child of it instead. Basically you’ll want to compare and contrast the way that all the new 1.1 themes work, the functions they use, and the files it needs, and merge those files with your own. Using the BP framework isn’t REQUIRED, but it’s a great starting off point for most people. For the rest of us that have gotten used to making our own themes, we’re stuck making our own theme again for 1.1 if we want things done our way. It’s easier this time around though, I promise.