So you are saying the default theme in 2.x is too different from this theme to just go with it? The look and layout now would be radically transformed by upgrading?
Is this sort of like why TOS has stayed the same for so long?
No. This theme was customized (by yours truly, mostly) based on the Yabb SE theme the SMF code came with at installation. The default theme (e.g., colors, icons, and etc) is very different from this. The "brand" of the forum should be preserved, which means doing a similar customization on the standard theme that came with the 2.x installation.
I don't know anything about the TOS software, other than that it's old and very proprietary, but my guess would be that it doesn't have the ability to take on any sort of a different look without a fundamental rewrite of the code.
SMF is very different from that. It is a much more sophisticated piece of software and is designed using a design philosophy that separates the content processing from the presentation (I believe they use the Model View Controller paradigm). That allows forum owners to customize the look of their forums, sometimes radically, without having to tinker with the underlying content processing logic.
It's like "skinning" - different looks can be relatively easily applied on top of the content processing end of things without having to redo all of the code.
That being said "easily applied" is a relative term and still requires that the templates that are used to render the display/presentation be modified and/or rewritten in certain respects. Unfortunately, I've been working 60-70 hour weeks the last couple of months, so I don't really have the big block of time I'd like to get the rewrite squeezed out in one go.
