Child themes allow you to make small or large changes to the parent theme’s design or structure in an update safe way. Any changes made in the Sweetdate child theme override original files.
To get started with using a child theme you’ll first need to have the Sweetdate theme installed, then install and activate the child theme that comes bundled with Sweetdate.
Design changes
You can add custom CSS to your child theme by saving it in the style.css file. This can be added in various ways but the two most common are
– Go to WP Admin > Appearance > Editor > Sweetdate Child > Style.css
– Editing style.css directly via your favourite code editor. Navigate to /wp-content/themes/sweetdate-child/style.css
Note: You may find you do not have an ‘Editor’ option under the ‘Appearance’ menu. This is because it has been disabled in your wp-config.php file.
Additional code
You can add custom PHP to your child theme by saving it in the functions.php file. This can be added in various ways but the two most common are
– Go to WP Admin > Appearance > Editor > Sweetdate Child > Functions.php
– Editing functions.php directly via your favourite code editor. Navigate to /wp-content/themes/sweetdate-child/functions.php
Note: Entering custom code in your functions.php via the editor may result in an error that takes your website offline. If this happens you should connect via SFTP / FTP and remove the code from /wp-content/themes/sweetdate-child/functions.php.
Note: You may find you do not have an ‘Editor’ option under the ‘Appearance’ menu. This is because it has been disabled in your wp-config.php file.
File structure
You can edit template files by copying them from the Sweetdate folder to the Sweetdate child folder. You’ll find there is no other folder structure in the Sweetdate child theme by default and you will have to create the folders to match the identical path yourself.
Example:
If you wish to edit the Paid Memberships Pro checkout template then you would copy the checkout.php file from the path below
/wp-content/themes/sweetdate/paid-memberships-pro/pages/checkout.php
Navigate to your Sweetdate child theme folder and create the below folders (shown in bold)
/wp-content/themes/sweetdate-child/paid-memberships-pro/pages/
Once the folder structure is in place copy your checkout.php file into the newly created pages folder.
/wp-content/themes/sweetdate-child/paid-memberships-pro/pages/checkout.php
You can now safely edit the copy of checkout.php from within your child theme.
Further reading
You can read more about child themes at WordPress.org
