Preview Theme "Bug"?
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I’m trying to preview a theme that requires a home page to be set up with a template under “Page Attributes”. Unfortunately, during the preview, Page Attributes only displays the “Parent” drop-down option, and not the additional “Templates” drop-down option the developer shows in their instructions.
The developer says this is a “bug” with WordPress, and that the system is looking to the actual active theme for templates (or at least for Page Attributes), not to the previewed theme. He hinted that this wouldn’t be a problem if WordPress.com allowed templates to be set within the Customizer, but that can’t happen right now.
The issue becomes a real problem with unlimited premium themes. If I purchase just the one theme, I could set up a test site, configure it and then ask for a refund if it didn’t fit my needs. If it did, I could simply transfer it to my live site. However, unlimited themes can’t be transferred from one site to another, which (I believe) leaves “preview” the only option for testing.
Can someone help me figure out what to do here? Thanks.
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Thanks for the feedback. The Customizer on WordPress.com – and indeed in all of WordPress – doesn’t currently allow you to see what a particular template might look like as you make customizations. You first need to apply the template to the page, then open the Customizer.
I’m trying to understand what you’re referring to here:
The issue becomes a real problem with unlimited premium themes. If I purchase just the one theme, I could set up a test site, configure it and then ask for a refund if it didn’t fit my needs. If it did, I could simply transfer it to my live site. However, unlimited themes can’t be transferred from one site to another, which (I believe) leaves “preview” the only option for testing.
Could you perhaps explain what you’re trying to do in more concrete terms so I can better assist? I think knowing what your goal is will help a lot. Thanks!
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Unless I’m missing something, when I attempt to preview the site I only get access to the Customizer, which doesn’t have an option to set page templates. If I back out of the Customizer, the system also backs me out of preview.
The developer of the theme “Creative Portfolio” seems to be confirming this “bug”. In other words, a large chunk of functionality for certain sites doesn’t seem to work with the current version of Customizer, which forces us to “buy before we try” so to speak.
One one hand, buying isn’t a huge deal. I could always buy the theme under a test site, and then transfer the theme to my live site if I like the way it works because you allow us to transfer purchased themes from one site to another.
On the other hand, I don’t believe this “preview workaround” is available if I want to take advantage of the “unlimited themes” upgrade because (unless I’m wrong) themes cannot be transferred between sites if they are purchased under this upgrade.
My point is, the purpose of preview is to try before you buy. I understand there may (or may not, I don’t really know) be technical limitations to preview functionality in general, but for some sites templates are absolutely necessary before you can try. If we can’t access them, preview is useless. There is one viable workaround, but that won’t work if you want the “unlimited themes” upgrade.
I appreciate your help on this. Thanks.
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Unless I’m missing something, when I attempt to preview the site I only get access to the Customizer, which doesn’t have an option to set page templates.
That’s correct. You would need to activate a theme, choose a page template, and then launch the Customizer.
On the other hand, I don’t believe this “preview workaround” is available if I want to take advantage of the “unlimited themes” upgrade because (unless I’m wrong) themes cannot be transferred between sites if they are purchased under this upgrade.
That’s correct, but I’d like to suggest a workaround:
Unlimited Themes has a 30-day refund period. You could use it on your test site to try out a bunch of themes, and then issue yourself a refund before the month is out. Then, purchase your chosen theme on your live site. One thing to keep in mind is that you’d need to copy over any theme customizations like Customizer theme options and CSS, so you’d probably want to allow a couple of days’ overlap between the time you cancel the Unlimited Themes upgrade and the time you purchase the theme on your live site.
Would this option work for you?
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It might technically work, but previewing really should be easier. Thanks for your responses.
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You’re very welcome. We recognize that this is a definite shortcoming of the preview functionality in the WordPress Customizer right now – both on WordPress.com and across the self-hosted WordPress landscape – and it’s something on the radar to be improved in the future.
Let me know if I can be of help with anything else.
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