in answer to your question about knowing php to make themes... i'm going to go out on a limb here, cuz i have never used php nuke but i know what it is. most likely you'll have to know a fair amount of the basics of php, if you're truely interesting in playing with the themes i think you'll find it very valuable to sit down at least for a good hour and go through a tutorial or a good startup guide to php. therefore becoming familier with php and understanding a little more of what it is that you're working with in php nuke. to build a theme in php nuke, it would be good to understand how the templates work, so that you know how to build them, that's why it would be good to know the very basics of php, because most likely that's all the templates are going to be, or at least not too complicated.
.. g/l, if u need some sites for tutorials and such, try:
codemonkey.com
phpfreaks.com
and of course, this site 🙂
