Child Theme Best Practice

[RickD]

Curious if anyone makes a child theme from a StudioPress child theme? So basically if you want to use Monochrome Pro as your theme, do you then create Monochrome Pro Child to inherit everything from Monochrome Pro or do you directly customize Monochrome Pro?

I ask because I envision that if StudioPress makes big changes to the Monochrome Pro theme after I start using it I may not be able to update to the latest and greatest unless I make a child theme from Monochrome Pro.

I hope what I'm saying makes sense and someone can weigh in.

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-Rick R. Duncan

[Anita]

You wouldn't make a child of a child. If you anticipate making quite a bit of customization and modifications to Monochrome that really takes it from working and functioning like the demo, you should just use that version as your own "child" theme. You are free to rename it to a custom theme name for your use.

At a later date if Monochrome Pro is updated and you see features in it you'd want in your version, you can implement them manually. Just look at the changelog to see what changes were made.

That's how I would do it but other developers may have their own way. But if I were only changing a few things, i.e., CSS and a few custom functions, I'd use a functional plugin.

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Love coffee, chocolate and my Bella!

[RickD]

Thank you Anita.

In the past I've always done it the way you mentioned. Since I haven't been active with Genesis for the last 2-3 years I wasn't sure if anything changed due to Gutenberg and the changing of ownership.

Is the future of the Genesis Framework still stable? As in do you envision it to be around for another 3-5 years? I did find the Genesis Block Theme but it's in BETA so I don't want to use that in Production yet.

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-Rick R. Duncan

[Anita]

@digitalredeye I understand! There's a lot going on but from my understanding, the Genesis Framework will be around for a long time. I can ask @david-vogelpohlwpengine-com to chime in here for more clarification.

I know they are focused on growing StudioPress products to keep up with Gutenberg and WordPress. But from what I was told, the Genesis Framework will continue to be updated and themes will be too.

I still would continue to work with the child themes in the manner described. It's much easier for me personally to keep track of things, especially on a per-client basis.

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Love coffee, chocolate and my Bella!

[thewingpk]

Hi Hope you are doing well

A child theme allows you to change minor aspects of your site's appearance while retaining the look and functionality of your theme. To comprehend how child themes function, it is necessary to first comprehend the relationship between parent and child themes.

As stated in the overview, a child theme inherits the parent theme's look and feel as well as all of its functions, but it can be used to modify any part of the theme. Customizations are thus kept separate from the parent theme's files. Using a child theme allows you to upgrade the parent theme without affecting your site's customizations.

Themes for children:

Make your changes portable and replicable.
Separate customization from parent theme functions;
Allow parent themes to be updated without wiping out your customizations;
allow you to benefit from the parent theme's effort and testing;
save development time by not reinventing the wheel; and
are an excellent place to begin learning about theme development.

Thanks

Regards TheWing.Pk

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