Yet another child theme problem – Can't activate child theme

What did you use to create the child’s style.css file?

Very good question. I used TextWrangler on my Mac. I’ve seen problems with creating files using the regular TextEdit app adding a bunch of extra scripting to the files but I don’t *think* TextWrangler is doing this. When I view the file with other readers, all of them appear to preview the text correctly (ie. I don’t see any weird characters anywhere).

You can’t name you Child Theme the same thing as your Parent Theme:

Theme Name: Rustic
Template: rustic

These two values must be different. Try naming your Child Theme “Rustic Child Theme”

Unfortunately, I’m not a Mac user but I’m pretty sure that TextWrangler shouldn’t cause any problems. It’s listed on https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Glossary#Text_editor However, you might want to re-check the File/Save settings. My guess is that WP is having problems trying to read the style.css file.

@chip: Oh – well spotted! I completely missed that!

@chip – That is good information and makes complete sense. I changed the name, however, the theme still isn’t showing up. Just to clarify, the theme should appear as an option under “Manage Theme”, right? I don’t need to “install” it since it’s already on my web server?

Esmi – I’m thinking your idea is probably correct. Do you by any chance know which encoding format works for sure? Unicode? Western?

the theme should appear as an option under “Manage Theme”, right?

Correct.

FWIW, I use ANSI encoding/UNIX format when saving theme files on a PC.

Well, what the heck. I changed my file to Unicode-8/UNIX and it’s still not working. Is it possible for my parent theme to somehow prevent the use of a child theme?

I’ve checked all the permissions on the files. It’s probably something really dumb.

Not all themes are particularly child-theme-friendly but I wouldn’t have thought it could block a child them from being shown in the Theme list. What did you rename the child theme to?

Not all themes are particularly child-theme-friendly but I wouldn’t have thought it could block a child them from being shown in the Theme list

That’s what I thought, but I wasn’t sure.

Here is how the file currently looks:

/*
Theme Name: Rustic-Child Theme
Theme URI: https://www.williambrentblack.com
Description: Child Theme for Rustic
Author: Wbb
Author URI: https://www.williambrentblack.com/
Template: rustic
Version: 0.1
*/

@import url(“../rustic/style.css”);

At the very least, it should be listed at the bottom of the page, under “Broken Themes”. If you find it there, can you report the exact error message?

Also, you need to report the Template name exactly as it appears in Theme Name of the Parent Theme’s style.css file. So, try changing this:

Theme Name: Rustic-Child Theme
Template: rustic

to this:

Theme Name: Rustic-Child Theme
Template: Rustic

Also, you need to report the Template name exactly as it appears in Theme Name of the Parent Theme’s style.css file

Tried that too but it’s still no joy. I’m not seeing any “Broke Themes” section under the Manage Themes section.

I normally wouldn’t do this, but I just enabled directory access to my website temporarily. If you guys would’t mind taking a look, maybe you can find something wrong that I’m not seeing?

https://williambrentblack.com/wordpress/wp-content/themes/

Sorry, guys and gals. ??

@chip – I confirmed that the parent style.css is named Rustic, which matches my child header name. Unfortunately, still no go.

Theme Name: Rustic

Tried that too but it’s still no joy. I’m not seeing any “Broke Themes” section under the Manage Themes section.

You also have two Themes, “Rustic Child” and “Rustic Child Temp”, in your Themes directory, both of which claim the same Theme name. You might want to remove one, or give one a different Theme Name: header.