Archived topic
Child Theme - create a new one or use an existing one?
7 replies · Started by Giangerolamo on July 23, 2017
Hi All,
I am quite new to Wordpress and I need some reassurance.
I have installed the Pro version of Generate Press. I currently have a website in beta and I installed a copy of it in a subdomain to use as a sandbox to do some experiments in a controlled, non-live environment.
It seems like that for some of the changes to the UI I have in mind it is better to create a child theme.
As I see there are some GP child themes available - like Exhibit and Mantle - I assume that installing and modifying one of them can generate the same result as creating one myself without the hassle. Am I correct in my assumption?
The rationale for using a child theme is that I am not sure if the customisation I a planning to do will be erased by a future update of GP. According to multiple sources, doing them in a child theme would solve this potential problem.
PS
Congratulation to the team for creating maybe the cleanest and neatest theme available.
Hi
The theme developer has provided a starter child theme if you dont want to create your own https://docs.generatepress.com/article/using-child-theme/#installing-a-child-theme
Any changes made to those other GP child theme like Exhibit will be overwritten to the best of my knowledge. More informed persons will give a difinitive answer but in the meantime you can safely use the child theme in the link above.
Hi Jamal,
This is already a very good answer that nails the point precisely on the head. Thank you for that.
I will try and give my feedback on the result while I wait for more answers.
Best
It really depends on how much customization you plan on doing outside of the customizer.
If not a lot, I would recommend sticking with Simple CSS and Code Snippets. Code in there will be fine through updates:
https://docs.generatepress.com/article/adding-css/#simple-css
https://docs.generatepress.com/article/adding-php/#code-snippets
First paragraph here explains when you should consider a child theme: https://docs.generatepress.com/article/using-child-theme/
Let us know if this answers your question :)
Leo, thanks for your additional info.
Put it simply.
First of all, remember I have little experience with Wordpress, but I built some skills on Webflow. Therefore I am quite used to that way of achieving results graphically via a front-end editor.
For this reason, I started using Elementor because of similarities to the way I was working in Webflow, and because on their website, they state clearly compatibility with GeneratePress (between the few themes they claim to support).
Said that I honestly admit I have little or no idea of which sort of code Elementor generate and where.
The changes I am making are to achieve - and I am getting good results so far - an end result that is a sort of mix between Newspaper theme by tagDiv (I can provide a link to the graphical result if you wish) and Voice theme by Meks (and again, I have an example to provide).
I am clearly shying away from some excessive levels of complications both themes display, yet the end result is supposed to be a "magazine".
The rationale for a child theme was to stay on the safe side of my assumptions that at the next upgrade I might incur in losing some customizations.
I hope the above makes some sense for the purpose of this conversation.
Best.
There's definitely no harm is adding a child theme if you think you may need it at some point.
They become necessary when altering the theme templates, which usually isn't necessary.
Ok. Thanks all for your precious advice.
Glad we could help :)
