Responsive Theme updates impact thousands of users, cause broken themes and child themes as core files are changed and hidden form access.
Hi folks, @allanmvm here to discuss the recent updates to the Responsive Theme and the many inquiries I am receiving from frustrated and confused users.
As most of us know, using a child theme is supposed to be a good thing, right? Some would argue but the concept makes sense, work on a copy instead of ruining the original,a common sense approach most can digest. Typically theme developers make updates to their themes to rectify security vulnerabilities and bug fixes that are needed to enhance or protect users f the theme. CyberChimps however is making changes that are impacting users in a negative way of late. In the last 6 months alone, the Responsive Theme has gone through major changes to core files and recently the main style css file was hidden from access in the themes dashboard theme editor. Even with a child theme, many discovered a broken site or blog after updating the parent theme. and new users are lost when trying to create a child theme with the latest versions. In another attempt to assist the many users contacting me about this issue, I have created a short but clear video that sheds some light on the matter. I show where the style css file has been moved to in the latest version, and I also show 2 additional methods of modifying the theme without even creating a child theme at all. My video tutorials on child themes for the earlier versions still apply if you are using older version 1.9.3 or earlier of which a lot of people are still using believe it or not, especially in other countries. Check out the short video here:
I hope this short tutorial helps diminish the headaches being felt by many users especially our Newbies (hang in there Newbie, help is on the way)
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By Allan Whitney Owner/Administrator MindVisionMedia.net
Greetings to all from Allan at MindVisionMedia.net and I hope this post find you well!
My name is Allan, and I use WordPress everyday. There a re a few things I keep wishing WordPress had built in to the new design. This post examines a few ideas I have for the awesome development team at WordPress.
Add Comment Settings to Media File Parameters: Please give us an option to set this while already setting parameters for the media file.
By default, WordPress sets comments to on for media files. You must manually turn them off as they are not turned off in the Discussion settings along with pages and posts.
Seeing comments when you turned them off can be confusing to most. But this little know back door that allows comments (especially comment spam) to enter unobstructed. Having an option to quickly turn comments on or off for media files while looking at and setting the main parameters for the image anyway would be super convenient. Personally I had to go back and turn them off individually for over 100 images. Unfortunately there is no bulk editing feature to edit multiple media files at once. You can do this for pages and posts but not media files. This would be another great addition to the media section while you're adding the above-mentioned comments option guy's, add extended bulk media file actions (hint)... Add Updated User Count to Dashboard: It would be nice to have an updated user count when logging in or "hovering" over the User link in the Dashboard.You can quickly notice if you have gained or lost users when you log in to your WordPress Dashboard.
This gives you the ability to prioritize your time in the Dashboard by knowing right away if you need to do User Management during this session. Lets say I have 132 users when I log out, but the next time I log in, I have 148 Users, now I know that I need to do some User management right away to check the roles for these new users and any management tasks I have set up for my members. It can be visible already or appear when you hover over the user link as with some of the other Dashboard menu items. Hopefully I'm not the only user who sees a use for this and it would be relatively simple to add this particular convenience feature to an already elegant and user-friendly interface.
Add Settings for Revisions: Oh boy, this one holds a special place in my WordPress heart. Please give us a setting to turn revisions on or off, or at least restrict how many we want to save on an individual post basis. Having every single edit saved is not practical for non-editorial, article or Blog-style sites. And for some websites who challenge their allotted query limit on their database, this is a factor that can make or break a site. I shaved over 12MB off of my database recently just from unneeded revisions.
The feature is necessary but not in its present configuration. I'm hopeful that enough threads are on this topic to get the attention of WordPress so they add this much needed feature in the next update.
Add Vertical Space to "Edit Window": While creating or editing a page or post in the page/post editor, the vertical height of the content window is unnecessarily short and tight. It would be fantastic if it was at least double the height it is now.
Oh that's too much you say? No it isn't, not at all if you are a designer or developer or someone who creates content on a regular basis.
You could always use more perspective and less scrolling! Besides, the sidebar area where you set the featured image, tags and categories in the page/post editor, consumes a considerable amount of vertical real estate and often extends way down the page, leaving the short edit window way at the top.
More height would eliminate so much scrolling back and forth while creating or editing a page and make better use of all the vacant space in the content area that is currently all white space while scrolling to see the rest of the options in the lower part of the sidebar. This one just makes sense guys from a developer and editor stand point, all that unused space below the current edit window, lets push that stuff down and add 2-3 times the height to the edit window in WordPress. I think even WordPress would end up enjoying this modification! Chime in folks, let WordPress know your thoughts and ideas. It is an Open-Source Project that can't continue to grow and dominate without real-time feedback for some its most frequent users...
By Allan Whitney Owner/Administrator MindVisionMedia.net
