Support

Most theme issues fit into a small number of categories. A layout looks wrong after an update. A style change is not appearing. The mobile menu is not working. A plugin is conflicting with something. The path through each of these is more systematic than it might feel in the moment. This support section organizes the common approaches so you are not starting from scratch each time something goes wrong.

Start with the FAQ if you have a specific question. It covers the most common setup and configuration issues with direct answers. The sections below go deeper on categories where more context helps.

Common Issue Categories

Layout and Display Problems

The first question with any layout problem is whether the issue appears with caching disabled. Hold Shift and click the reload button in your browser (or press Ctrl+Shift+R on Windows) to bypass your browser's cache and force a fresh load. If the problem disappears, the issue is a stale cached file, not a theme or code problem.

If the layout problem persists with caching disabled, the next step is to isolate the cause. The fastest method is to switch to a default WordPress theme (Twenty Twenty-Four or similar) temporarily. If the problem disappears, the issue is in Blaskan or something interacting with it. If it persists on the default theme, the issue is in your content, plugins, or WordPress configuration.

Common causes of layout problems:

• A plugin injecting inline styles that override theme styles
• Custom CSS in Appearance > Customize > Additional CSS that has a conflict
• A child theme stylesheet with an error
• A caching plugin serving a compressed or modified version of the stylesheet

Typography and Font Issues

Blaskan uses system-safe web fonts with self-hosted fallbacks. If the typography looks different from the demo, the most likely explanations are:

Operating system rendering differences. Font rendering varies between Windows, Mac, and Linux. The same font at the same size can appear slightly heavier or lighter depending on the operating system's text rendering engine. This is normal and does not indicate a configuration problem.

A plugin modifying font loading. Some performance optimization plugins defer or remove font loading in ways that cause fallback fonts to appear. Check your optimization plugin settings if the fonts look wrong.

Custom CSS interference. Check Appearance > Customize > Additional CSS for any font-family or font-size declarations that might be applying unexpectedly.

JavaScript Not Working

If the mobile menu toggle is not functioning, or a search overlay is not opening, the cause is almost always a JavaScript conflict or error.

Open browser developer tools with F12. Go to the Console tab. Reload the page. Look for error messages. A red error message pointing to a specific file and line number tells you where the conflict is originating.

Common sources of JavaScript conflicts:

• Multiple versions of jQuery loaded by different plugins
• A plugin that calls jQuery in a way that conflicts with how WordPress loads it
• A script optimization plugin that is deferring or removing scripts it should not touch

Deactivate plugins one at a time, reloading after each, to isolate the conflict.

Browser Cache Handling

Browser caching is a solved problem once you know what to look for. It trips up theme users more than any other single issue because the symptoms look identical to a real code error.

Clear the browser cache completely and do a hard reload before reporting or investigating any visual issue. On Chrome: Settings > Privacy and security > Clear browsing data > check Cached images and files > Clear data. Then reload the page.

If you use Cloudflare in front of your WordPress site, clear the Cloudflare cache in your Cloudflare dashboard after any theme or plugin changes. Cloudflare's cache operates above WordPress and can serve stale files to all visitors.

If you have a WordPress caching plugin installed (common with any managed hosting setup), clear that cache too. Most caching plugins have a prominent Clear Cache button in the admin bar or plugin settings page.

Plugin Conflicts

Plugin conflicts are common, temporary, and solvable with methodical isolation.

The isolation method:

1. Note exactly what the problem looks like.
2. Go to Plugins > Installed Plugins.
3. Deactivate all plugins except WordPress's built-in ones.
4. Reload the page and check if the problem is gone.
5. If yes, reactivate plugins one at a time, checking after each.
6. The reactivation that brings the problem back identifies the conflicting plugin.

Once you have identified the conflict, you have a few options: configure the plugin differently to avoid the conflict, replace the plugin with an alternative, or contact the plugin developer with the specific conflict details.

Some plugin categories are more prone to conflicts with themes than others:

Optimization plugins (Autoptimize, WP Rocket, LiteSpeed Cache, etc.) that combine, minify, or defer CSS and JavaScript can interfere with theme functionality. Check the plugin's settings for exclusion lists and add theme-specific files if needed.

Page builders (Elementor, Divi, etc.) can override theme templates and inject their own layout system. If you use a page builder, understand that it takes over template rendering in ways that may not align with Blaskan's design decisions.

SEO plugins generally do not cause layout conflicts but can affect how the site title and meta tags render. If your title tags look wrong, check the SEO plugin settings for title format controls.

Responsive Debugging

Checking responsive behavior requires testing at the actual breakpoints rather than at arbitrary window widths. Blaskan has three key breakpoints: below 640px, between 640px and 960px, and above 960px. Test at each.

Browser developer tools include a device emulation mode. In Chrome, press F12, then click the device toggle icon (or press Ctrl+Shift+M). This lets you simulate specific viewport widths. Test at 375px, 640px, 768px, 960px, and 1200px as a starting set.

Common responsive issues:

Content overflowing horizontally. Typically caused by a wide element (a table, a long URL without word-wrap, a wide image with explicit pixel dimensions) that breaks out of its container. Inspect the overflowing element in developer tools and check its width value.

Text too small on mobile. If you have set font sizes in pixels in a child theme, they may not scale appropriately on small viewports. Use relative units (rem or em) for font sizes.

Menu not collapsing correctly. The mobile menu depends on JavaScript. Check the console for errors. Also verify the viewport meta tag is present in the site's head section.

For detailed notes on breakpoints and how the layout adapts at each, see responsive breakpoints and layout logic.

When a Child Theme Is the Right Tool

A child theme is not a complexity you should avoid. It is the correct solution whenever you want to modify a WordPress theme in a way that survives future theme updates.

Use a child theme when:

• You need to change PHP template files (header, footer, archive templates, single post templates)
• You want to add custom CSS that should persist through theme updates
• You need to add functions to functions.php
• You want to override specific template parts

Do not edit the parent theme files directly. The next time Blaskan updates, those edits will be overwritten.

The basic child theme setup is straightforward. Create a folder in wp-content/themes/ with a name like blaskan-child. Inside it, create a style.css with the required child theme header, and an optional functions.php to enqueue the parent stylesheet. The child theme basics documentation walks through this setup with practical examples.

Quick Reference

For setup and configuration questions, the documentation covers the full configuration path. For specific questions about theme behavior, the FAQ has direct answers to common scenarios.