Kim, thank you for the comment. I think that “bottom bar” might be useful on single article pages, where people would like to find something else to read. It may be useful also for the information about the author (on single author blogs/webpages) especially if the user comes from a search engine. Placing too much information in sidebars is not very good as well and moving some of it to the footer might be one of the solutions.

I think that apple.com is a good example — notice how they try to reduce the vertical length of each page by placing different collapse/expand elements in the sidebars. And the “bottom bar” serves the purpose of secondary navgiation/product listing. I think that the vertical page length is really important here. After scrolling through long list of content, I wouldn’t expect any important information/navigation waiting for me at the bottom.

Regarding the theme — I have finished both of the plugins and will now work on Sunrise Racer theme. During the past month I have implemented many new features here on this blog (which uses Morning Racer theme), like the post excerpt thumbnails and the previous/next post navigation under each of the individual articles and I would also like to include them in SR. I hope it won’t take too long. Be sure, that I will send you an email as soon as it is ready.