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SEO Dave

Comment on WordPress Child Theme Functionality

WordPress Child Theme Functionality

Stallion Responsive in demo mode resets the main data roughly ever 500 pageviews with a random element which means could be 1 pageview or thousands (will average at 500).

The settings reset are those set under the following Stallion Theme options pages:

Stallion Theme
Child Theme Options
AdSense Ad Options
Chitika Ad Options
In-Text Ad Options
Layout Options
Colour Options
Promotion Options
Language Options
Performance Options
SEO Advanced Options

Additional options like the Widgets Anywhere options, options added to widgets including the display widgets feature, any SEO data added directly to the Post edit screens (the keyword phrases) remain intact. So only the main options pages reset

This gives users the ability to test Stallion without being able to run a site long term in demo mode easily: you could, but would be a lot of effort having to enter the main options at random intervals and going to mess with Google rankings overtime.

You are correct on how to use the Stallion child theme. Don’t edit anything under /stallion-responsive/ only make edits to /stallion-responsive-child/.

I created my own child theme feature that’s not part of WordPress core which takes child themes to a new level. With WordPress core child theme functionality the main theme template files like header.php, single.php, page.php etc… can be overridden simply by copying the file into the child theme folder.

If you wanted to change single.php for example you would take a copy of

/stallion-responsive/single.php

and paste it into

/stallion-responsive-child/single.php

And WordPress would ignore /stallion-responsive/single.php (like you deleted it) and use /stallion-responsive-child/single.php, so any edits to /stallion-responsive-child/single.php are what you see on the webpage.

Want to change back to the default single.php file delete/rename the /stallion-responsive-child/single.php file and wordPress will again use the original file.

It’s a really useful feature WordPress added, that’s basic WordPress child theme functionality you get with any theme.

Problem is WordPress core doesn’t offer this ability for all files within a parent theme folder, basically if it’s not a registers template file (header.php, single.php, page.php etc…) this doesn’t work, must be a registered PHP template file.

I extended this to almost all files under /stallion-responsive/ including css files under /stallion-responsive/colors/ and image files under /stallion-responsive/header/ and /stallion-responsive/thumbnails/ (this is where headers and thumbnails are).

There are a small number of files it doesn’t work with like the main options pages, but the rest it’s make a copy into the child theme and edit away. To achieve the same with an average WordPress theme requires understanding what a file does, filter out and replace it’s functions (really complicated)!!!

When making theme updates it’s a case of because you’ve not touched anything under /stallion-responsive/ it can be auto updated. The child theme when I make an update should be manually updated using FTP.

I can’t say the next Stallion update will work with whatever modifications a user makes to Stallion php files that’s been copied to the child theme. Things change between updates, so if you make major modifications via the child theme and the next update breaks the site could be something important was added to a file that’s been modified. I would go into the child theme folder and rename the files I’ve changed one by one (add a 0- to the file so single.php becomes 0-single.php sort of thing) and see if that’s the file causing the problem. When you find the file(s) make the modifications again to the new single.php file.

In the latest 8.1 update made minor changes to the child theme, latest copy of timthumb.php and copied over the mobile.png image file for all the colour schemes. For those who made no changes to the child theme simple case of FTP the entire /stallion-responsive-child/ over the current folder. For those who have made child theme customization it would be upload:

/stallion-responsive-child/timthumb.php
/stallion-responsive-child/style.css (just so it says version 8.1, not really NEEDED)

Entire folder:

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/images/

Assuming the user hasn’t added their own mobile.png files to the colour schemes. All default colour schemes have a mobile.png file, I added a copy of the mobile.png files for all the colour schemes to take into account a feature improvement (for making new colour schemes), but even here the images being copied to the child theme are only needed if the users makes their own colour schemes.

These files either weren’t changed or just minor text changes to the info to better describe features.

functions-child.php
functionsplus-child.php
st_responsive_child.php

Did change screenshot.png which is just the image you see for the theme under “Appearance” >> “Themes”, so not needed.

None of the thumbnails or header images were changed, no new features added etc… so Stallion Responsive 8.1 works fine with the Stallion Responsive 8.0 child theme (update not required).

The only file that was actually updated was /stallion-responsive-child/timthumb.php and even that’s not needed. The developers of Timthumb (it’s for creating small thumbnails) found a security flaw in their code, but I’ve already disabled the feature in the timthumb.php file for Stallion Responsive 8.0 because I didn’t want the ability to make thumbnails from images on other domains due to potential security issues, so the security flaw never had an impact on Stallion.

If I make a major change to the child theme I’ll let users know to definitely update it. I’ve deliberately kept the child theme simple so it doesn’t need my updates, so users can keep running without using FTP to make updates.

David

WordPress Child Theme Functionality

SEO Dave

Comment on WordPress Colour Scheme Creator

WordPress Colour Scheme Creator

For Stallion colour scheme customization there’s two built in features which I haven’t wrote tutorials about yet, though there’s detailed instructions on the relevant options pages.

One for on the fly edits that overrides individual colours and fonts.

One for creating new colour schemes based on the default colour schemes.

Both features are activated under “Stallion Theme” >> “Colour Options” : “Colour Scheme CSS Inline/File Creator Selector”

Note both these features work outside of the Stallion Demo reset, so you can create new colour schemes in demo mode and use them when you buy Stallion Responsive.

For the on the fly version, choose a default Stallion Colour scheme that best matches what you want (the “Stallion Theme Colour Scheme” drowpdown option at the top).

Select “Colour Scheme CSS Inline ON”.

Save options.

Under “Appearance” you’ll have a new options page: “Colour Scheme CSS Inline”

Any changes made on that options page are on the fly, no new CSS or php backup files are created, the CSS code is loaded inline on the browser page.

This is good for changing a few colours or fonts on a default colour scheme you are mostly happy with, but not for major modifications, we don’t want hundreds of lines of CSS code loaded inline.

Want to crate a unique colour scheme you can download the CSS file and a PHP backup for (can use on other domains) use the “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator” feature. This is the same as the inline version with the output saved to a colour scheme CSS file and a PHP options backup for future edits.

This is best used on a development site or if live for enough time to create a new colour scheme, turn off and use the new colour scheme like you would use a default Stallion colour scheme.

Step 1: Under “Stallion Theme” >> “Colour Options” set “Stallion Theme Colour Scheme” to “Empty”, this loads a blank colour scheme CSS file which means there are no theme colours or fonts used.

Set “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator ON”

Step 2: and choose a colour scheme under “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator Defaults” that’s closest to what you want to achieve colour wise.

After saving there’s a new options page under “Appearance” called “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator”.

On this option page you will find a similar options page as the inline version, but all the options are set with the colours and fonts from whichever colour scheme you selected under “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator Defaults”.

Until you click “Save Changes” the new CSS and PHP file hasn’t been created yet and your site will have no colours or fonts set (will look rubbish).

Step 3: Click “Save Changes” and the colours and fonts you’ll be working with will be used by your site.

If you loaded “White n Blue” as the colour scheme to edit, after clicking “Save Changes” Stallion will save a new version of the white n Blue CSS file and it’s PHP options backup file to the child theme folder. It;s important to have the child them active, otherwise the files are saved to the parent theme folder overwriting the originals making it harder to restore if you mess up.

Assuming you are using the child theme the new files are saved to

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/style-white-n-blue.css  That's the CSS file Stallion uses to addcolours/fonts to a site)

/stallion-responsive-child/mydefaults/stallion_color_css_white-n-blue.php That's the PHP options for a colour scheme Stallion uses to load the colours for editing.

If you make a mess of a default colour scheme and want to start again delete the two files above and load the colours back in as described in Step 2.

Every time you click “Save Changes” the two files above are recreated using the settings you see at “Appearance” >> “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator”.

There’s two easy ways to use this feature.

One edit a file as described above, when you’ve made the changes and are happy with them turn off the options page and set to use the colour scheme:

If you edited white n blue the settings would be

“Stallion Theme Colour Scheme” : “White n Blue”
“Colour Scheme CSS Inline/File Creator Selector” : “Colour Scheme CSS OFF”
“Colour Scheme CSS File Creator Defaults” : “Use Current”

Since there’s a new version of style-white-n-blue.css in

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/style-white-n-blue.css

Stallion will use that file instead of the default one under

/stallion-responsive/colors/style-white-n-blue.css

As you can see this overrides a default Stallion colour scheme meaning you can use the original without using FTP to delete:

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/style-white-n-blue.css
/stallion-responsive-child/mydefaults/stallion_color_css_white-n-blue.php

A slight adaptation of the above approach means you can create a new colour scheme and still have access to the original colour scheme without having to use FTP to delete anything.

Before carrying out Step 3 (Saving changes) under “Appearance” called “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator” scroll to near the bottom of the options and change:

“Theme Filename” : “style-white-n-blue.css”
“Theme Filename Backup” : “stallion_color_css_white-n-blue.php”

to

“Theme Filename” : “style-custom-01.css”
“Theme Filename Backup” : “stallion_color_css_custom-01.php”

Now click “Save Changes”. Rather than creating the files

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/style-white-n-blue.css
/stallion-responsive-child/mydefaults/stallion_color_css_white-n-blue.php

We create the files:

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/style-custom-01.css
/stallion-responsive-child/mydefaults/stallion_color_css_custom-01.php

Which are empty custom files for this use.

After making all the changes you want under “Stallion Theme” >> “Colour Options”

Set

“Stallion Theme Colour Scheme” : “Custom 01”
“Colour Scheme CSS Inline/File Creator Selector” : “Colour Scheme CSS OFF”
“Colour Scheme CSS File Creator Defaults” : “Use Current”

Your site will now use whatever CSS fonts and colours you changed that’s within

/stallion-responsive-child/colors/style-custom-01.css

And you’ll have a backup of those settings under

/stallion-responsive-child/mydefaults/stallion_color_css_custom-01.php

For future editing.

If you ever want to modify your custom colour scheme it’s go through Step 1 as described above, but set “Colour Scheme CSS File Creator Defaults” to “Custom 01” to load in the colours saved in the file “stallion_color_css_custom-01.php”.

You can go further as described on the options page and make your own Stallion Responsive child theme using your new colour scheme(s), but you can see for your own sites the above is more than enough with up to 20 slots for custom colour schemes.

The above is how I made and update all 40 default colour schemes. In a future update plan to make a modification to the feature to use a completely different set of CSS rules, right now it’s limited to the same sort of design, but different colours, I should be able to take it much further by loading different CSS rule sets.

David

WordPress Colour Scheme Creator