Theme is officially in the repo but only works with WP4.4

I can no longer preview anything. I get the same warning:

“Twenty Sixteen requires at least WordPress version 4.4. You are running version 4.3.1. Please upgrade and try again.”

Since there is no WordPress version 4.4 it doesn’t make much sense.

Yet again, please warn people that this is still a BETA.

In the latest release New version of Twenty Sixteen – 0.1.20151012, the Readme.txt states the following:

Contributors: the WordPress team
3 Requires at least: WordPress 4.4
4 Tested up to: WordPress 4.4

Does this mean I should stop using this theme until WordPress 4.4 is released?

To anybody on this thread,

This was posted on October 2, 2015: https://make.www.ads-software.com/core/2015/10/02/update-on-twenty-sixteen/ and within the text is the following quote: “Twenty Sixteen now also will require 4.4-alpha”.

The only way you can get the current versions of Twenty Sixteen to work properly is to upgrade your website using the WordPress Beta Tester Plugin located here:
https://www.ads-software.com/plugins/wordpress-beta-tester/. You have to install it, enable it, and then choose option #2 (Bleeding edge nightlies) on its Settings page.

If you have never done that before, I would very carefully read both the Reviews and Support Tabs for the plugin. Otherwise, you’ll have to wait until WordPress 4.4 comes out in the first week of December to download the finished product of Twenty Sixteen.

Hope that helps.

@shapeshifter 3:
You don’t seem to get my point. I am fully aware, Twenty Sixteen will be the default theme for WordPress 4.4 which hasn’t been released yet. My point is though that a theme, which is available to the public should also work with at least the latest released version of WordPress or should at least show some information why it doesn’t work with the current version of WordPress.

People trust in the WordPress repository as a source of working themes and plugins. Currently this theme doesn’t.

@shapeshifter 3 EXACTLY what @bego Mario Garde said. Why was this even released if it’s only going to be for WordPress 4.4? I have done a LOT of beta testing and beta version’s were only released to beta testers.

In the case of the WordPress installation that had previous broken due the Requires at least: WordPress 4.4 I went into the functions.php file and edited the file

/**
 * Twenty Sixteen only works in WordPress 4.4 or later.
 */
/*if ( version_compare( $GLOBALS['wp_version'], '4.4-alpha', '<' ) ) {
	require get_template_directory() . '/inc/back-compat.php';
}*/

/**
 * Twenty Sixteen only works in WordPress 4.3 or later.
 */
if ( version_compare( $GLOBALS['wp_version'], '4.3', '<' ) ) {
	require get_template_directory() . '/inc/back-compat.php';
}

I’ll wait until the final version with WordPress 4.4 is released in December before I run any more updates.

Bego Mario Garde,

I did get your point…

I was just trying to prevent others from getting as irritated as you are.

I agree with points made above.

this theme was added to the main theme repository, and at one time, did work with the latest version of wordpress (4.3.1) but has been changed (in functions.php) to require 4.4. 4.4 does not even exist as a production version and is a beta/test version only.

I don’t understand why the theme was added and used by many users and then changed in this way. obviously it is going to break websites that use it, change it back, and if the requirement for 4.4 is needed, then bypass the condition in the theme or at least remove it from the repository until the level of wordpress matches the theme.

Al

I would recommend as many current users as possible to post comments about their displeasure here: https://make.www.ads-software.com/core/2015/10/02/update-on-twenty-sixteen/.

AND, maybe it has been recently decided that the Twenty Sixteen theme will be presented as the Flagship Theme for some of the new Feature Plugins that have been recently merged into the core for the upcoming release of WordPress 4.4 https://make.www.ads-software.com/core/2015/10/13/week-in-core-sept-28-oct-11-2015/. If that is the case, maybe a decision had to be made (Mid-Stream) to NOT provide backwards compatibility for pre-4.4 WordPress releases. Don’t know for sure…just thinking.

@lesliekirk Thanks for your cue! I did push it a step further by by adding a functions.php to my child theme. Including only this in it:

<?php
/**
* Twenty Sixteen functions and definitions
*
* Set up the theme and provides some helper functions, which are used in the
* theme as custom template tags. Others are attached to action and filter
* hooks in WordPress to change core functionality.
*
* When using a child theme you can override certain functions (those wrapped
* in a function_exists() call) by defining them first in your child theme’s
* functions.php file. The child theme’s functions.php file is included before
* the parent theme’s file, so the child theme functions would be used.
*
* @link https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Theme_Development
* @link https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Child_Themes
*
* Functions that are not pluggable (not wrapped in function_exists()) are
* instead attached to a filter or action hook.
*
* For more information on hooks, actions, and filters,
* {@link https://codex.www.ads-software.com/Plugin_API}
*
* @package WordPress
* @subpackage Twenty_Sixteen
* @since Twenty Sixteen 1.0
*/

/**
* Twenty Sixteen only works in WordPress 4.3 or later.
*/
if ( version_compare( $GLOBALS[‘wp_version’], ‘4.3-alpha’, ‘<‘ ) ) {
require get_template_directory() . ‘/inc/back-compat.php’;
}