Drupal 8 theming method

Question

So I'm getting into theming in drupal 8. It's my first drupal version I have worked with. I know WordPress pretty good, and all programming languages.

Here's my question now: Is it true when making a custom theme in drupal, you don't have to code that much?! I don't really understand, I've made my basic theme, added some twig files, modded them, ... but the most of my work is (/will be) in the block, view, structure, ... department. Am I doing something wrong?

I've been trying to catch up with reading tutorials, but this question isn't really answered anywhere...

For example, if I wanted to add a header image to my theme, I just have to make a custom content type and edit the view, block, ... to add this? No coding required?

Thanks for clearing this up for me!

Answer 1

Drupal uses kind of nested templates. Like most outer is "html" template, which contains page head, includes js/css files and similar. It also includes next inner level, called "page" template. It usually contains common elements for all pages, like header (logo, menu, language switcher...) and footer. Then yet inner is template file specific for every page. If page is a node then it's node template or if it's a view, then view template... You can also have more inner templates, i.e. for specific block...or field.

https://www.drupal.org/node/2354645

Of course if you have different content types or block you can also have different templates for every one of them. They are set by following naming convention. So if you name it correctly, clear the cache and Drupal will star using your template instead of default one. So you can, but you don't have to override default templates.

Also when you crate your theme you can start from scratch, but you can also inherit some existing theme and just override some files.