Don’t edit the Twenty Ten theme! Your changes will be over-written the next time you upgrade WordPress or the theme. For this reason, it is recommended that you consider creating a child theme for your customisations.
I tried to create a child theme but it confused me a little. I created a directory called “child” in my theme directory and created a style.css file. When I activated the theme, my site defaulted to the original twentyten look. I assumed that because the child theme imports the style.css from my parent theme that the site shouldn’t change when the child is activated.
I must have been doing something wrong. Here is the code I was using in the style.css I uploaded to the child directory.
/*
Theme Name: childtwentyten
Theme URI: http://mywebsite.com/
Description: Child Theme for Twenty Ten
Author: Andrew
Author URI: http://mywebsite.com/
Template: twentyten
Version: 0.1
*/
@import url(“../twentyten/style.css”);
Everything you’ve posted sounds correct. If you uploaded a custom background via Appearance-.Background when using TwentyTen, you’ll have to carry out the same process for this child theme.
If already made a few changes to the twentyten theme unfortunately – custom header, custom background, menu header hidden at the top of each page, website title hidden at top of header image…
Would I need to replicate allof those in the child theme as well?
Yes. The changes you made the Twenty Ten’s style.css file or its template files will be lost when you next upgrade WordPress. Custom header & custom menus are theme specific, so have be configured for each theme – even child themes.
Okay! So I will need to track all the changes I made to the parent theme and duplicate them in the child theme. Shouldn’t take too long.
After I’ve done that and activated the child theme, my site shouldn’t change in appearance at all correct?
Now, when I get that completed, is it simple to change the body text color in the child theme?
my site shouldn’t change in appearance at all correct?
Correct.
is it simple to change the body text color in the child theme?
Yes. All you have to do is edit (or add) the appropriate entry in the child’s style.css file. I usually recommend using Firefox & the Firebug add-on for this kind of work. Off the top of my head, something like:
body,
input,
textarea {
color: #fff;
}
in the child’s stylesheet should sort out most of the text – although there may be a few odd areas that you’ll have to specify separately
Odd areas such as link color, hover color, post color, etc? I think I have found references to changing most of those on the forum so I should be able to find it easily.
Thanks for your advice!!
Andrew
Odd areas such as link color, hover color, post color, etc?
Pretty much. A search on '#666' in the original style.css file might throw up some likely candidates but there’s also some lighter grey text for the post meta & date, from what I recall.
Great Advice , but can you tell me please how do i start a child theme ?
thank you..
