Need help? Check out our Support site, then


WordPress.com Forums » CSS Customization

Initial start up for CSS stylesheet editing on wordpress.com

  1. mcsue
    Member

    I've had wordpress.com blogs for years with custom CSS editing. All of the CSS for the blog appears in the CSS Stylesheet Editor. It is fairly easy to edit and change.

    We are working on a new site. We had it set up almost perfectly, generating the page from a standard theme. We paid for custom editing, and today the page says that it is active. But when I get to the stylesheet editor, it does not show the CSS like our other blogs do. There is a standard message there. I don't seem to be able to remove it, although I certainly seem to have messed up the blog several times by trying to get it out of there.

    There must be some small (probably dumb) setting or something on this one that I missed. How do I get the CSS Stylesheet Editor to show the CSS like our other blogs do?

    The blog I need help with is bearskinoutfitters.wordpress.com.

  2. timethief
    Member

    What is the URL of the blog you are referring to please?
    All CSS editing is theme specific editing. What is the name of the theme you are working with?

  3. outfittingatbearskin
    Member

    The link I accidentally placed in the initial post was the wrong one. The one that we're working on now is http://bearskinoutfitting.wordpress.com/ The theme is a modified Adventure Journal.

  4. dearlexephotography
    Member

    I'm having the same problem I think. I'm new to wordpress and CSS. I've paid for the upgrade but when I get to the custom design menu there is nothing in the box where I would have thought all the code would be... there's just a message explaining what css is and what not. I'm so new to css/wordpress that I was just thinking this is just how it works... help?

  5. dearlexephotography
    Member

    oh by the way the link to my blog is dearlexedesigns.com and the theme is the Ever After theme

  6. katbellies
    Member

    I am having the same problem with Fresh & Clean theme at katbellies.wordpress.com and still waiting for an answer on this...

  7. mcsue
    Member

    A week later and all we have for reponses to this topic are more people saying they have the same problem. Perhaps we should all ask for a refund of our custom design fee since we can't actually access the css we paid for.

  8. 1tess
    Moderator

    This looks like a problem staff needs to take care of. I'll put a modlook on this thread. Please subscribe so you will be notified when there is a response.

  9. timethief
    Member

    @dearlexephotography
    As all CSS editing is theme specific and this thread is for the Adventure Journal theme, which is not the one you are using I suggest that you start your own thread by using this link > http://en.forums.wordpress.com/forum/css-customization

  10. timethief
    Member

    @katbellies
    As all CSS editing is theme specific and this thread is for the Adventure Journal theme, which is not the one you are using I suggest that you start your own thread by using this link > http://en.forums.wordpress.com/forum/css-customization

  11. timethief
    Member

    @Tess
    The date on this is February 11th and designsimply is working on threads date February 3rd at this time.

  12. justpi
    Member

    To find the original CSS of the theme you're using, you go to Appearance > Custom Design > CSS, click "Edit" next to "Mode: Add-on" and click the "theme's CSS" link.
    You can also find it here (click name of theme then click "style.css"):
    https://wpcom-themes.svn.automattic.com/

    But, unless you are a real expert, you don't tamper with the original CSS. You can copy it and save it in a text file for reference, but you retain the Add-on mode, and in the CSS editor you enter only the changes you make.

    For example, the CSS for the post titles in Tarski is this:

    .post-title {
    border-bottom: 1px solid #CCCCCC;
    font-family: 'Times New Roman',Times,serif;
    font-size: 2em;
    font-weight: normal;
    line-height: 120%;
    margin: 0;
    padding: 0 0 0.1em;
}

    Suppose you wish to make the post titles a bit smaller; the only thing you'll add in the CSS editor is this:

    .post-title {
    font-size: 1.9em;
}

    To examine your page and identify elements, selectors and rules, as well as try out changes, you can also use the Firebug add-on in Firefox, or similar extensions in other browsers.

  13. 1tess
    Moderator

    @tt

    I fished this out of the forum spam filter, so it was not modlooked.

    I don't know why I didn't find it before (I check the spam filter everyday), but because I didn't know the answer, I tagged it for staff.

  14. bonnyreg
    Member

    Thanks, thanks and bigger thanks justpi. I have spent days trying to work this one out by asking anyone and everyone, and reading all relative resources at my disposal - and I thankfully stumbled upon your info above.

    Cheers Pal - Bonny Reg

  15. designsimply
    Staff

    @mcsue / @outfittingatbearskin, sorry I didn't see your note sooner! I checked http://bearskinoutfitting.wordpress.com/ and I found that the Custom Design upgrade has been applied to that blog and should be working properly. I also made a change to the default CSS for your blog as a test, and you will see that if you look at the Appearance → Custom Design → CSS page.

    Note that WordPress.com supports the major browsers, but they must be up to date. Please make sure you are using an updated web browser: http://browsehappy.com/

    For everyone else that has commented, I've tested the CSS editor in a few different browsers and it is working in my tests. If you are still having trouble, can you please reply back here and mention what browser and browser version you are using?

  16. bonnyreg
    Member

    Thank you kindly for your reply. I Will check it out.
    Regards

  17. mcsue
    Member

    @designsimply and to everyone else who helpfully replied, thank you. But our problem is not quite solved, or perhaps I just don't understand the explanations. We know that our custom CSS is working. That was never in question. We did find how to see the original CSS of the theme, which is somewhat helpful--but still not what we want to look at.

    What we want to view, the same way we do with several other blogs we've had on wordpress.com for many years, is the modified CSS--the CSS as it exists right now, after many time-consuming changes.

    I make very small changes to our other blogs often using the current CSS. I can change a font size or slightly alter a color, but I have to be able to see what it is now in order to make a functional change. This was always available before on our blogs, and in fact is still there on the rest of them.

    If I can't get at it and work with it, is there a way we can at least see all of it?

  18. designsimply
    Staff

    @mcsue, it sounds like the custom CSS added for the current blog you are viewing and your other blogs was setup differently. When you save custom CSS, you should really only be posting change into the CSS edtior—and not copying the entire original CSS stylesheet, which it sounds like that's what you did for your previous blogs. What typically happens, is someone finds the link to the theme's original stylesheet, copies the entire thing, pastes it into the CSS editor, and then starts making changes. The problem with that is that if you don't adjust every url() value then it can cause problems with your theme and the layout won't necessarily match. That's why we recommend only pasting in changes rather than copying a whole bunch of CSS into the editor. Now, if you are an advanced CSS user, you can actually do the opposite—paste the entire original theme stylesheet into the CSS editor, but then you have to know enough about CSS to go through every piece of it and make sure it's updated to work properly. Also, using that option makes it so any later updates or bug fixes to the original theme won't get applied to your blog since you copied the original version. The CSS replacement mode was really meant for you to use if you wanted to get rid of ALL of the original theme's CSS and start over from scratch.

    So, if I understand correctly, you want to paste the entire stylesheet into your editor, and my reply is to note that I would recommend against that and I wouldn't recommend it for the other blogs either. However, if you'd still prefer to do it that way you can. :) You can find the original theme CSS linked if you click "Edit" next to "Mode: Add-on" in your Appearance → Custom Design → CSS page. You would need to copy all of that CSS, paste it into your CSS editor, re-apply any previous CSS changes you made, and also check the CSS over to make sure it is updated to work properly in a new location (i.e. make sure any url() values are full URLs beginning with http://).

Topic Closed

This topic has been closed to new replies.

About this Topic

Tags