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[Resolved] General input – due to absolute frustration

This support ticket is created 6 years, 11 months ago. There's a good chance that you are reading advice that it now obsolete.

This is the technical support forum for Toolset - a suite of plugins for developing WordPress sites without writing PHP.

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This topic contains 7 replies, has 2 voices.

Last updated by Beda 6 years, 11 months ago.

Assisted by: Beda.

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#609972

I have been trying to deal with toolset for a couple years now. Although, there are many aspects of it that are soooo GREAT, you really cut yourself short. It is clear that you look at your customer base as developer or website designers. But there are some of us who are not. We are people who decided to create a wordpress website and your collection of plugins appeared to solve many issues. But it is very difficult to work with, and as soon as we figure something out you go an change things so what worked yesterday doesn't work tomorrow.

recently I decided to try to reduce some conflict in a website I created that centers around toolset. In an attempt to reduce "conflicts" and troubleshooting as well as simplifying things for me so I can service my customers better.

Todays issue was images not loading up in forms that I had created and WORKED literally for YEARS, now I bring them to the new site and now the images won't load up. turns out I can't use my css anymore, and the labels I used for those css codes to work with that specific form is no longer allowed.

After going back and forth to determine this I was given documentation to use css. In that documentation there was information that we can now put form content next to each other using grids.. Great I thought. In this process I decided to go with toolset layout as what I thought would be my theme, only to find out that I have to use a theme. I thought lets be safe an use one you recommend, I chose avada with a child theme. Yeah well it has its own fusion core and builder that doesn't work. I tried using the layouts I wasn't getting anywhere with that either. BUT I decided to try it again today to use with a form so I can have part of the form be side by side. Yeah, doesn't work.

So today alone I found out 1. you changed things that worked just fine before as far as styling forms to the point I can't even comprehend the documentation on how to do it because you clearly only want developers or designers to use your plugin.
2. have to change all of my forms, 69 to be exact and change out any styling and style coding to ensure my forms work.
3. layouts still don't work and
4. despite the claim to be able to put form content next to each other you really can't

I know you are thinking there must be a conflict. well
1. if there is a conflict with avada and their required download of fusion core and fusion builder I suggest you don't recommend it.
2. if you have a conflict with woocommerce I suggest you figure that out
3. you really shouldn't have a conflict with your own plugins - if you do you might want to figure that out.

4. and now I suddenly get gaps before some of my views - yep have a ticket for that as well.

in all reality if you have conflicts with the very few light other plugins I am using then I it really is still a problem as they have nothing to do with what your plugins do.

But most of all if you don't get anything else from this please please please understand that you do have people who are not developers or designers trying to use and work with your plugin, and again I have spent years tinkering getting beyond frustrated and down right angry with this group of plugins. Please please please stop making things more difficult.

You cannot go wrong with have easy to understand documentation. you just can't.

#610117

Thank you for the feedback, we value every voice and try to do our best to fix every issue.

Please let me shortly reply to your comments about the singular issues you reported.

you changed things that worked just fine before as far as styling forms to the point I can't even comprehend the documentation on how to do it because you clearly only want developers or designers to use your plugin.

I assume this is the issue handled here:
https://toolset.com/forums/topic/feature-images-are-not-uploading/#post-609798

What Minesh outlines there has been working like this since I support CRED. This is now since 2,5 years.

Those ShortCodes are required, and CSS classes are used exactly like Minesh elaborates, this is not something Toolset Defines, it is how CSS works.

layouts still don't work

Toolset Layouts will never work with a Page Builder.

Please let me explain the purpose of Toolset's single Plugins:

1. Types: Register content types. Logically this should for example not be used together with ACF, as that plugin does the same. It would be overkill to have 2 plugins with the same functionality

2. Views: Show the content on the front end and search it. Here for example it's redundant to add another Plugin that does the same (create searches for example).

3. CRED: Create, Edit, Delete content and users from the Front End. The same here, for example, if you use WooCommerce, you have to turn off WooCommerce's email and user account handling, as otherwise it would be doubled (as CRED also provides it)

4. Layouts: This is a template Builder. Page Builders are as well template builders. Either you use Layouts, or another builder.
Toolset Layouts can be integrated with PHP so to be a real template builder where you edit the entire site (header, footer, content, sidebars) with it, or you just activate it and then it will only replace the_content (just as content templates).

Any theme not using the_content() (As suggested by the WordPress codex) will not work with Toolset Layouts.
Any page builder active on site makes either the page builder or Toolset layouts obsolete. Only one should be used.
We elaborate that on every single integration page where it is needed:
https://toolset.com/documentation/user-guides/using-toolset-with-wpbakery-page-builder/#installing-toolset
https://toolset.com/documentation/user-guides/using-toolset-with-beaver-builder/#installing-toolset

In the cases of the Themes, which come with required Plugins, we elaborate every single case on how it has to be used (and how not), even if you add Layouts to the mix:
https://toolset.com/documentation/recommended-themes/toolset-and-avada-theme-layouts-and-custom-templates-without-coding/#designing-the-interior-with-toolset-and-avada-fusion-builder

Of course, if anything in these documents does not work as it states, or is unclear, please let me know, I will fix it immediately if I can, or escalate this to the Developers to fix.

You should not have to fix your site just because we decide to change things.
If this has happened exactly like this, please link me to the thread reported or let me know if we need to create a new one.

Related to the reported CRED issue, these ShortCodes and classes have been required since more than 2 years now. This is visible on all documentation pages and also google history viewer will show this ShortCodes always where required.
The CRED forms are not expected to work properly if those are missing oar altered in a way that breaks them.

Of course, again, if there is wrong behavior please let me know then we can look at this issue together.

despite the claim to be able to put form content next to each other you really can't

I am not sure what you mean here. You can use Bootstrap in CRED Forms, but if your theme conflicts with Bootstrap, that might generate conflicts.
Please can you link me to an eventual ticket, so I can look at what you mean?

Related to conflicts, we try to fix them as soon as possible and as fast as possible, but often this also requires cooperation of the third parties.
With WooCommerce we are fully compatible - on what we document. There are a few things that do not work well (such as variable products created with CRED for example).
If you see bugs with this, please let me know and I will escalate them
You are not responsible to solve them, we are, this is correct, and we will, if we are aware of them.

Right now there are a few open reports - mainly between CRED and WooCommerce.
Eventually you see more issues, and eventually I can help solve them - if it exist, please can you link me to the thread as well?
I can then check the issue and eventually provide a fast solution.

Related to develop/not-develop users of Toolset, we are aware of this.
It is very difficult to make it best for both.
The developer wants less GUI, the non-developer wants more of it, etc.

With Toolset, the current goal is to create websites with as less as possible of PHP (none, to be honest) but you need full knowledge of CSS, HTML and JS.
As well, Toolset has a higher learning curve than WordPress. Obviously, this is as well because Toolset packs not one plugin or platform but at least 5. Each with an entire set of features. It is impossible not having a learning curve here.

We constantly try to make the workflow smoother (I think you will love the new Many to Many GUI, for example), and easier to follow.
Here we are often required to listen to the users, because they (you) are the ones using this product after.

Please, if you have any suggestion related on the GUI, how to improve, etc, we are very eager to listen to them. You can submit the suggestions as well by this forum.

We are even open to schedule calls, wether for support or suggestions. It does not need to be written, which can be time consuming:
https://toolset.com/toolset-support-policy/ask-support-video-call/

We really want to create the product you will love.

Please do not hesitate to submit specific tickets, and if you are feeling the support assigned is not taking you seriously, let me know, I will handle.

Please also rest assured that your feedback has reached management.
Amit (our Support Manager) may not reply here directly, but I informed him about this ticket, and he is aware of the feedback you provided.

Please let me know any specific issue with which I can further help!

#610197

Let me back up a bit and give a better picture here. As I said I am NOT a designer nor a developer. I am a housewife/business owner who decided to have a wordpress website despite not know one thing about websites or wordpress. I literally taught myself everything whether it is correct or wrong, good or bad. I had features in my site that I thought your plugin would make easier. Despite it's extreme complication it's core function and purpose for my site is good, and quite frankly I don't think I can replace it, which adds to my extreme frustration with your plugin cuz it is NOT user friendly in the least for someone like me. I understand there is an EXTREMELY large learning curve for someone like me when using your plugins, but give me a bit of credit I have made it this far. I am hoping you will heed my thoughts that could make your plugins just a bit better. After all I highly doubt I am alone, just go look at your volume of tech support questions.

I am going to talk about the theme aspects first. Over the course of time that I have been doing this I have heard over and over and over that the issue is with the theme, go to the theme the issue is with another plugin. NO one ever thinks the issue is with there own theme or there own plugin. It is never ending. When I decided to simplify my site; make it hopefully have less conflicts, less troubleshooting and less time consuming on the back end the very first thing I did was re evaluate a theme. the main things I really want in a theme, is header flexibility, I want to be able to have different headers on various pages and possibly slideshows on them. I would like a sidebar and maybe some widget flexibility but that isn't crucial and lastly control of colors and what not. Oh and for it to have a working child theme so I don't have to worry about theme updates. I didn't think that was asking for too much. So since my goal is to reduce theme conflicts and my core is toolset I went to toolset for guidance. Now that I told you this in the last conversation you come back with documentation. First of all until you actually upload and even buy a theme sometimes you do not know what you are getting. Second of all since I am not a developer or a designer I will tell you 90% of your documentation is jibberish. You can tell me all day long that layouts doesn't work with fusion and I won't know what you are talking about till I actually see fusion. But beyond that IF fusion is a required aspect of Avada and it conflicts with layout which is where I got the recommendation from ( reviewing layout integration) WHY in the world would you recommend it at all. That literally set me up for a huge set of issues. Third I simply don't have time to try to decipher every word and how it will conflict with a theme that give you just enough information to get you into trouble. Bottom line is make your documentation simpler and don't recommend a theme that it required core conflicts with your plugins. That makes absolutely no sense.

If you have another theme that you would recommend that meets my requested needs above and DOESN'T conflict with your plugins I would love to hear about it. However, I have been through so many themes and paid for so many that I later where told were conflicting or just didn't meet my needs I am not overly interested in paying for one but will if it is reasonable AND meets all needs.

As far as codes. I understand the basics of css and maybe even some html. I have gotten this far anyway and had things working until I had the bad manner to decide to create/change to an new website. All my css in views, cred, etc were working in my old site, but suddenly doesn't work in my new site.

You mention that things shouldn't break when you update. Really?!?! A perfect example is Maps. It worked one day, then we had to have updates (cuz we should ALWAYS have the latest version) the next day it didn't. The post field I had been using up and left the building. Gone, now I don't have what I needed to have the maps show up. What I saw in my Group field no longer matched the documentation. This happens A LOT, so again your documentation becomes irrelevant. I literally gave up couldn't get it to work to save my life. I decide to try again now that I am in a new site, Got a new API, Saw that the Address button is there, Still can't get it to work. Go through the steps when pulling up the Map (which is now different than Address in the post form, consistency would help) view including the marker. Oh but wait it is NOW a 2 step process, I know full well it wasn't before. You changed thing that literally made maps break. If these breaks didn't happen you wouldn't have the amount of tech support questions you do.

If coding works in one aspect of your plugins it would be logical that it would continue to work in other aspects. As an example. Views (although I may be doing it wrong) I use the views slug as the views div class and Id I use that same slug in the css so the css can identify (at least in my mind) the view it is supposed to style. This has been working for me for almost years. So in my logic, since cred forms also uses a class and css it would stand to reason that you would add a slug to the class and the css. This worked for me for almost years. including the uploading of images. Until now. What has changed?
I'm in a new site, but I changed the information for the posts etc. EVERYTHING works except the uploading of the images. I am told it is because of what I have in the class, now I can't style the form cuz it doesn't work. I am thrown documentation. that I literally cannot make head or tales of. for one it is all jargon, and you don't show ANY practical details. (As a side even when you have videos you show the bare bare bare minimum. I leaves more questions that answers) Why do we suddenly have to have something different? Or if you answer is you don't then why way everything working before?, or better yet I know things changed cuz in went back to compare my two sets of settings now you have a legacy sheet for those before 1.9. Now things are even more messed up and I have no idea where to even begin.

I am trying to make my site better, simpler, less time consuming, I don't want to have to keep re creating the wheel here. I don't have time for it. You made changes that broke creds, you just did. It happen all the time that is WHY people don't want to update to the newest version, Isn't that why you allow us to download old versions. Saying things shouldn't break is just wrong.

What I am hoping to get from YOU...
1. UNDERSTAND things from my perspective, get out from behind the scenes and put yourself in my shoes or the shows of a layman and ask if you would want to deal with these things if you were running a business to boot?

2. Realize your documentation 1. is not always the answer. 2. it is complicated and taxes a brain that is already confused and frustrated because we have been trying to fix the problem before we go to tech support, including going to your documentation. If is was as clear as you think you wouldn't have so many questions going to tech support.

3. Most of all I would like you to refer a theme or two that won't conflict with layouts so I can use it if I decide. That will allow me to have different headers on different pages including sliders if I so choose. I can have a sidebar, possibly widgets and I can do some styling, finally a child theme that actually works.

as a side note you might want to re evaluate the themes you guest in the layouts integration for conflicts and by the way they all suck.

finally I have undone all the work I did with my cred forms, absolutely no styling of any kind cuz I simply can not wrap my brain around your documentation and nothing makes sense.

somehow I have content templates and view not working which is still up in the air. The tech even said it doesn't make sense i have things set up properly. Oh well another day of frustration and going backwards as I try to figure these things out.

Thank you for your time.
I look forward to hearing from you on a theme.

Lori

#610216

I unterstand.

I have begun the same way - I thought myself.
And Toolset also was a hard step.

After 2 years working with it I am familiar with the issues.

Now, let's narrow this down:

- You do not like the themes we offer integrations for, that is fine.
We suggest them for several reasons, one being the huge amount of users desiring these themes to be integrated.

You are not forced to use them, Toolset does not provide Themes (We do not suggest Toolset Starter Theme anymore) or forces to use one.
The more a Theme is coded by WordPress Codex, the more it will work with Toolset.

- To use Toolset, you need to fully master CSS; HTML and (eventually, not absolutely needed) JS.
I cannot change this, as this is how Toolset is offered.

- When things break due to whatever reason, our first goal is to solve it.
Then, sometimes things break because "they worked" in past but where wrong.
These things may break, and then we often can not change the situation.
Those cases are rare.

- I understand our DOC is complicated and myself file, and suggest, several edits - coming from my analysis but also from Client's feedbacks.

What I can do for you in this ticket is help you to solve the issues.
If you have feedback for the state of Toolset in general I suggest to present the concerns to amit.k@onthegosystems.com directly. He will be happy to communicate with you by email or even a call, to sort them out.

Now, to solve the issues.

1. I understand you have a higher expectations from a Theme than most users, and want full control.
2. You correctly recognized Toolset (despite it's complexity) to be the solution that you actually are after.

So, I offer you to download this theme:
hidden link

Then, install Toolset Views, Layouts, CRED, Types, and whichever other Toolset Plugin you need.

You can now build the entire Theme with Toolset Layouts.

Give it a try, it takes 20 minutes to set this up on a local MAMP/WAMP install.
If you want, schedule a call as previously offered, I am happy to walk you through.
I suspect you will like the Theme.

I created it. This is not a Toolset Product but my own theme which you are free to use, and eventually adapt to your own boilerplate.
If you open the code files, especially index.php. you will see a well documented and structured code, that has in mind one thing:
Teach how to use Toolset Layouts with a Fully integrated theme.

Please acknowledge that this theme is not an OnTheGoSystems product and the supporters here cannot support it.
But, I can tell you that I run 3 websites with, all using Toolset, since several years, and I never had a single issue with this Theme.

Please also acknowledge that it is not fully WooCommerce Compatible, this would need a small adjustment.

What I want to show you with this, is solely the usage of Toolset in a Theme that is properly coded, and has a tiny integration with the Plugin (something that is usually not done, when you use any other theme).
Eventually you like this - and then we can move towards a solution for you, I can help you with this, if you think that could be a good Road to go.

Second, I suggest each problem you mentioned in your previous comments (related the technical aspects of Toolset, which are not working) to be filed as a Ticket.

If you have done so already, please point me to them.
As said, the CRED issue, there is little we can do. Those Forms have never been different - at least not the past years.
Still, you can style every single aspect of a CRED form, and every single aspect of a View Loop, content Template, or field.
If you need help with specific issues please open one ticket for it.

All the other problems you mention, I would like to analyze them as well, help you to solve it, so you can move on.

Last, I suggest, if you have doubts on how to use Toolset, or things are not clear, please also drop us a line in the forum.
(BTW; there are plans to make the process to contact us much faster and more pleasant for the user).

I also suggest, that you assign me to those tickets when you create them, or any other Supporter you think is on top of the problem you experience with Toolset.

You can also mention this in the report without assigning it, the Supporters will take care and assign it to the correct person.

I am sure, that with not many tickets, we can sort out every issue, and increase the knowledge of how to use Toolset in a way that will make documentation obsolete for you.

This may sound impossible, and yes, you will always need to check the DOC for references, but the main workflows will become logic, once it is clear why things work as they work (or don't).

What do you think about the ideas above?

#610223

I am interested in the theme, because I am unable to find the features I want.
My site is basically a business membership site. I would like each business to be able to at the very least have an image on the top of their page reflecting their own business. If that is possible Great.
I also do need woocommerce, as it is a membership site. I also use memberships and subscriptions currently but if that becomes an issue I am open to other suggestion to accommodate the same aspects.
I would like to be able to put items in a sidebar. images and text, videos not needed.
again if you are able to accommodate these things and I can move forward with less conflicts great.

I am going to touch base one last time on Cred. At this time I don't know who was helping me however he insisted I need

[credform class='cred-form cred-keep-original'] at the top of my cred form. However the very vague documentation says

Styling form elements
Form
By default, a CRED form has class: cred-form

[credform class="cred-form"]

It may be freely changed. **** notice this line? This is 1 area I am extremely frustrated. which is it. the above line mandatory or your documentation? It can't be both. and that is all it says about styling elements. so my question would be then what? Nothing. Also

this vague tidbit

Do not load CRED style sheet on front-end
If you want to disable the default styling to be loaded by CRED, you can set this in the settings. Go to the Toolset -> Settings page and click the Forms tab. There, select the Do not load CRED style sheets on front-end option in the Styling section.

Global CRED styling options
Global CRED styling options
Please note that in this case, you need to provide all the necessary form styling yourself, including the one for form elements, error messages, and others.

Loading the CRED legacy style sheets
If your site’s forms were created with CRED prior to the 1.9 version, it needs to load a legacy stylesheet that makes the old forms look good.

This option is found on the same CRED Settings page as seen in the image above.

When you update CRED from a version prior to the 1.9 version, the plugin will automatically mark this option for you, so that your existing forms keep looking good.

I can guarantee that my cred forms were prior to 1.9, the simple fact that we need the legacy sheet now proves the changes. also now it is basically too late. so many changes to accommodate all the hoops makes it too late i am sure to just check the legacy box. Either way I would have to go through all the forms for the 4th time. and again I say after looking at this documentation. "Okay then what?" Nothing. vague, which makes it irrelevant. It tells us nothing.

I appreciate your help and I am willing to try your theme. Help me make it woocommerce compatible.
I hope I can choose layout vs no layout.

bottom line is I am fine getting something up an running, as long as the long run is less trouble shooting.
I may not be a master of css or htms or js but i have made it this far on my own. If the wordpress world would stop giving contradictory information it would be great. as I have shown above, you can't have things both ways and expect us to know which way is right.

thank you

#610233

1. Everything you outline is possible with this method of integrating Toolset Layouts in a Theme

2. My theme does not, and will not anytime soon support WooCommerce, unfortunately I have no time for this.
But the integration does not require a lot of work. It is done already but the code needs to be adjusted to use the correct classes, as outlined by WooCommerce Documentation.

I cannot help you directly with WooCommerce code but the Theme offered already features all the code in place as per WooCommerce's documentation:
https://docs.woocommerce.com/document/declare-woocommerce-support-in-third-party-theme/
The problem right now is that you will see a notice when you activate WooCommerce when you use it with this theme.

That is why I suggest to just download it to play with the integration of Layouts (which yes, you can choose if to use or not, of course). If you like it, create your own theme with this boilerplate.

Then you are all set, and have 100% control.
Read the Code in the theme, it is more comments than code.
I really intended to create a learning boilerplate for people who need the most out of Toolset and WordPress.

It will help you greatly to understand how you can integrate Layouts in a theme, that requires almost no files on top of the mandatory ones, and hence... cannot conflict with a lot of other software.

3. You can also just use Twenty Seventeen theme but there you can not edit anything else but the Content Part, when you use Layouts.

4. I analyzed the CRED issue and was the one reporting both issues to the Documentation team in past, and that is why in exactly 2 places we mention exact technical restrictions of the forms.
Previously, this was not documented at all, and I requested the updates, but I was not thorough enough.
I forgot that in the section of Styling forms, there is the mention again of the "class" attribute.
The correct approach is this:
- https://toolset.com/documentation/user-guides/creating-cred-forms/
[credform class='cred-form cred-keep-original'] – mandatory

- https://toolset.com/documentation/user-guides/styling-cred-forms/#cred-forms-markup-overview
class – sets the class for the field. You can set classes only to fields that render with simple HTML tags:
Native CRED form fields: post title field, input textfield for flat taxonomies.

Types and Generic fields: Single Line, Multiple Line, Date (only the main input, the dropdowns for hours and minutes do not add it), Number, URL, Select, the parent selector field.

5. This, is wrong, I missed it when I requested the DOC update:
https://toolset.com/documentation/user-guides/styling-cred-forms/#styling-form-elements

I am requesting it tomorrow - as I am off already actually.

6. It is correct, CRED has updated to Bootstrap, and for forms previous to the preliminary releases you need the legacy sheet.
I think this was also announce in a Blog Post:
https://toolset.com/2017/05/cred-1-9-views-2-4-layouts-2-0-and-access-2-4-released/

Anyway, you are right, this DOC is as well a thorn in my eye, and I ask for perfection there, 2 of them mentioned above.
I apologize that I did not see this detail you mention as well.

I will spare some time and re-read this all again, update it and control it's right.

#610234

Thank you!!!!

Sometimes being heard and validated is just as important and getting to the bottom of an issue. I am clear I have A LOT to learn.

I have downloaded your theme, and will try to work it out, I will Look at the woocommerce info as well.

I figured you were off now, and am surprised you are still communicating.

Have a nice rest of your day and thank you I appreciate it.

Lori

#610321

Thanks!

I'm looking forward to your feedback about.
I am relatively sure you will like how (generally) Layouts works on this Theme.

I would suggest, if you like it, to then go ahead and craft your own base theme - you can simply use mine, and rename it completely with a search/replace in any code editor.
While you should not remove any file existing, as those are likely the "minimal" set of a good working theme, you can control even more granulated how you integrate Layouts (I could show you that, if you for example even want to build the menu with Layouts.)

More about that I would suggest we handle in separate tickets (Technical topics).

I will be back Monday (or today I am here too).

Please let me know any doubt you have.
You can also ask me "why I used this and that code" in my theme.
Since it's purpose is to make your time with Toolset better, I am happy to answer such questions
Keep in mind that the theme isn't a OnTheGoSystems product, hence we do not support it.

But for educational purposes I am happy to answer any questions about.

Have a great weekend!