---
name: "pelican-themes"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "pelican"
version: "4.12.0-1"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/pelican-themes"
---

# pelican-themes(1)

A theme manager for Pelican

## NAME

pelican-themes - A theme manager for Pelican

## DESCRIPTION

**pelican-themes** is a command line tool for managing themes for Pelican. See Themes \<#settings-themes\> for settings related to themes.

### Usage

```
pelican-themes [-h] [-l] [-i theme path [theme path ...]]
[-r theme name [theme name ...]]
[-s theme path [theme path ...]] [-v] [--version]
```

### Optional arguments:

- **-h, --help**

  Show the help and exit

- **-l, --list**

  Show the themes already installed

- **-i** *theme\_path,* **--install** *theme\_path*

  One or more themes to install

- **-r** *theme\_name,* **--remove** *theme\_name*

  One or more themes to remove

- **-s** *theme\_path,* **--symlink** *theme\_path*

  Same as **--install**, but create a symbolic link instead of copying the theme. Useful for theme development

- **-v, --verbose**

  Verbose output

- **--version**

  Print the version of this script

## EXAMPLES

### Listing the installed themes

With **pelican-themes**, you can see the available themes by using the **-l** or **--list** option:

```
$ pelican-themes -l
notmyidea
two-column@
simple
$ pelican-themes --list
notmyidea
two-column@
simple
```

In this example, we can see there are three themes available: **notmyidea**, **simple**, and **two-column**.

**two-column** is followed by an **@** because this theme is not copied to the Pelican theme path, but is instead just linked to it (see Creating symbolic links for details about creating symbolic links).

Note that you can combine the **--list** option with the **-v** or **--verbose** option to get more verbose output, like this:

```
$ pelican-themes -v -l
/usr/local/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/pelican-2.6.0-py2.6.egg/pelican/themes/notmyidea
/usr/local/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/pelican-2.6.0-py2.6.egg/pelican/themes/two-column (symbolic link to `/home/skami/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/two-column')
/usr/local/lib/python2.6/dist-packages/pelican-2.6.0-py2.6.egg/pelican/themes/simple
```

### Installing themes

You can install one or more themes using the **-i** or **--install** option. This option takes as argument the path(s) of the theme(s) you want to install, and can be combined with the **--verbose** option:

```
# pelican-themes --install ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/notmyidea-cms --verbose
```

```
# pelican-themes --install ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/notmyidea-cms\
                           ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/martyalchin \
                           --verbose
```

```
# pelican-themes -vi ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/two-column
```

### Removing themes

The **pelican-themes** command can also remove themes from the Pelican themes path. The **-r** or **--remove** option takes as argument the name(s) of the theme(s) you want to remove, and can be combined with the **--verbose** option.

```
# pelican-themes --remove two-column
```

```
# pelican-themes -r martyachin notmyidea-cmd -v
```

### Creating symbolic links

**pelican-themes** can also install themes by creating symbolic links instead of copying entire themes into the Pelican themes path.

To symbolically link a theme, you can use the **-s** or **--symlink**, which works exactly as the **--install** option:

```
# pelican-themes --symlink ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/two-column
```

In this example, the **two-column** theme is now symbolically linked to the Pelican themes path, so we can use it, but we can also modify it without having to reinstall it after each modification.

This is useful for theme development:

```
$ sudo pelican-themes -s ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/two-column
$ pelican ~/Blog/content -o /tmp/out -t two-column
$ firefox /tmp/out/index.html
$ vim ~/Dev/Pelican/pelican-themes/two-column/static/css/main.css
$ pelican ~/Blog/content -o /tmp/out -t two-column
$ cp /tmp/bg.png ~/Dev/Pelican/pelican-themes/two-column/static/img/bg.png
$ pelican ~/Blog/content -o /tmp/out -t two-column
$ vim ~/Dev/Pelican/pelican-themes/two-column/templates/index.html
$ pelican ~/Blog/content -o /tmp/out -t two-column
```

### Doing several things at once

The **--install**, **--remove** and **--symlink** options are not mutually exclusive, so you can combine them in the same command line to do more than one operation at time, like this:

```
# pelican-themes --remove notmyidea-cms two-column \
                 --install ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/notmyidea-cms-fr \
                 --symlink ~/Dev/Python/pelican-themes/two-column \
                 --verbose
```

In this example, the theme **notmyidea-cms** is replaced by the theme **notmyidea-cms-fr**

## Author

Mickaël Raybaud

## Copyright

2010–2026