And as I have already asked: How exactly would I go about “copying” the customizations over? If there is a simple way to do it then that’s exactly what I’m looking for. But my guess is that it rather involves hiring a freelancer and telling him to recreate the site from scratch, based on the current layout. Or is there a simple way after all?
Hey @spektukal,
We have consulted our developers regarding your issue. Pro 5.1.5 supports up to WordPress 6.1 only. You can either downgrade your WordPress version or update the Pro theme. Since there are some modifications that has been done to the parent theme, which is not supposed to be done in the first place, you will have to decide what’s the next step to take from here. If you would ask me, cloning the live site to a staging site would be my first step. I will then use a child theme and compare the features from the live site and the staging site. I do not think there is a need to rebuild the site from scratch. On my initial inspection, I do not see any template file overrides or custom PHP codes on the parent theme.
Best Regards.
So could you explain how exactly you can clone the site, set up a child theme and move the customizations over to it? Do you just copy all the code in it? That would seem too simple and especially since the current theme is way out of date, I kinda doubt that it would work without any issues. Actually I’m pretty sure that updating the theme will create new problems again, as that’s what your theme always seems to do.
To try and speed this up a bit: I’ve just googled for it and found this post: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/56271439/how-to-move-all-modifications-made-in-a-parent-theme-to-a-child-theme
Containing this link: https://developer.wordpress.org/themes/advanced-topics/child-themes/#how-to-create-a-child-theme
The post makes it seem super simple while the link to the Wordpress guide contains a lot more things you need to do. But if I were to follow it, would this allow me to copy the modifications over?
Of course I assume there’s no guarantee that things will work flawlessly. Especially after updating the theme. But I guess as long as the parent theme remains at the current version it shouldn’t break everything. Right?
Also if you have any simpler guides for how to do this it would be appreciated, as the link I’ve mentioned does seem to be more in depth and I still don’t have too much knowledge about all that stuff. But I’d like to be able to do this myself if possible. And as long as I know exactly what to do copying or modifying some files shouldn’t be a problem.
Hey @spektukal,
To copy your website from live to a staging area, you may check our online documentation.
- https://theme.co/docs/how-to-migrate-your-site
- https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-create-staging-environment-for-a-wordpress-site/
Once the staging area is up, you need to install the child theme, you can find it here:
Then you need to check your current Pro 5.1.5 files and Pro 5.1.5 that have not been customized yet ( see secure note to download it) and compare them. If you find any customization, you need to copy that file in your child theme.
Hope that helps.
That sounds like it would require some effort and would be easy to mess up. But I’ve also seen online that there’s plugins that can do this for you. Do you have any experience with those? One specific plugin that is being mentioned is this one: https://wordpress.org/plugins/customizer-export-import/
Do you know if that would work with your theme? Or if there are any others that would? It does mention the “Customizer”, which seems to be Wordpress’ default option for editing sites. Since you have your own builder that replaces it I’m not sure if that plugin would work with it.
I’ve also just found this post here: How to copy over my X theme blog design from one blog to another
It mentions the export options in the “Theme Options Manager” in the X Theme. Could that work as well?
Hello @spektukal,
The most trusted way of migrating an X theme or Pro theme-powered site is by using the All in One WP Migration plugin. We haven’t tested the “Customizer Export Import” plugin by the way.
To fully clone the site, you can simply use the All in One WP Migration plugin.
Best Regards.
You know that I’m asking specificially about moving the customizations from a parent to a child theme, not just moving the site to another server, right? So could the plugin you mentioned do that as well?
One thing that came to mind though is that if I wanted to use the plugin I mentioned before to copy the customizations, assuming that it works of course, wouldn’t I need to install a child theme with the same version that the parent theme has now? Otherwise wouldn’t it cause the same issues as updating the parent theme does now?
And you didn’t say anything about that the export option in the Theme Options Manage in your themes. I am curious what that is for and if it could be used to copy customizations over to a child theme as well.
Hi @spektukal,
If you have made all the customization in the child theme only, I would suggest you download it through the FTP/CPanel, and later on you can upload it again.
Exporting the Theme Options can be possible with the plugin mentioned by my colleague as the plugin closes the database and imports it.
Thanks
At this rate I’ll have to keep posting here for weeks. Could you please give me a simple way or a simple answer for if it is possible to set up a child theme and copy the customizations over from the parent theme, on the same site? Ideally through the use of a plugin like " Customizer Export/Import" that I’ve mentioned before, so I don’t have to do everything manually.
And it really would help if you took at least a quick glance at what has been posted here before. Otherwise I just keep repeating everything that has already been said over and over again and we’re not getting anywhere. It’s been a whole week now since I’ve posted this request and you still keep giving me conflicting reponses, ignoring everything that was already mentioned.
Hey @spektukal,
The plugin https://wordpress.org/plugins/customizer-export-import/ is not useful in your case. This plugin only imports/exports the customizer option in default WordPress. If you follow my recommendation above, you can transfer the customization from the parent to the child theme.
Thank you.
I have seen people mention this plugin specifically because they have used it to copy over customizations from a parent to a child theme. So I guess I will try it and see if it works. If not then I’ll try the manual method you’ve posted or hire someone to do it. If the plugin does work I might report back here since that knowledge should help some of your other customers with the same issue.
Hi,
I’ve just remembered a question I’ve already asked here but that you’ve failed to respond to:
If I set up a child theme with the latest version and try to copy the customization from a parent theme that is an old, outdated version, would there be no problems? Wouldn’t I have to use the same version for the child theme as the parent theme? Since updating the parent theme always gets rid of the customizations. Or is that only because of the update process itself?
Hey @spektukal,
When setting up a child theme, the compatibility with the parent theme generally isn’t reliant on having the exact same version. Child themes are designed to inherit the functionality and styling of the parent theme, regardless of whether the parent theme is updated or not.
Hope that helps.
Yes, I am aware that parent and child theme can have different versions. What I was asking specifically is: If I want to move the customizations from the parent to a child theme, would I not need to install the same version for the child theme? If you have set up a child theme then the parent theme’s version doesn’t matter. But it probably matters when trying to move the customizations. Does it not? Or why else does it mess up the site if you update the parent theme without having a child theme set up?
Hey @spektukal,
It is acceptable for the child theme and parent theme to have different versions since the child theme primarily extends the functionality of the parent theme. When customizations are made directly to the parent theme, updating it to the latest version can lead to the loss of these customizations. This occurs because the updated version of the parent theme replaces the existing code, including any custom modifications made in the parent theme’s files. This underscores the importance of using a child theme to safeguard customizations, ensuring they remain intact even when the parent theme is updated.
Hope that helps.
From your reply I’m still not sure if you understood the problem in this specific situation. But if it’s only the “reset” of the theme basically that gets rid of the customizations, then shouldn’t it be possible to just disable that? Or to copy the customizations and then paste them back in after an update. I kinda doubt it’s that easy since an update surely changes some other things. And that’s why this seems like an issue.
If I just copied the customizations from the parent theme over to a newly created child theme, and both are different versions, would this really not cause any issues? If I did it manually, only copying the relevant parts, then I might be able to avoid it. But if you basically just copy/paste all the code in it over, surely that wouldn’t work. Or would it?
Hi @spektukal,
If you are copying it from the parent theme to the child theme, the customization will work as it is.
Thanks
I finally got around to fixing this issue and as I mentioned before I wanted to give you some info on it.
Surprisingly all I had to do was install the child theme and activate it. That didn’t mess up the layout of the site and I could update the parent theme afterwards without issues. So now the site is finally back in working order. And I’m only left to wonder why updating the parent theme if you have no child theme set up messes up the site, while installing a child theme with the latest version and switching over to it seems to not affect it at all.
But yeah, this info might help some of your other customers. It sure would have helped me if I had known that this problem could be solved so easily. But all I’ve ever heard from you guys is that I will lose my customizations if I install a child theme, so I have to copy everything over manually, etc.