Installation & Setup Theme

  1. How to Install the WordPress Theme through Dashboard?
    • Download the “.zip” file of your Theme on your Computer. (DO NOT EXTRACT IT)
    • Directly Upload “.zip” file by going in Appearance > Themes > Add New > Upload.
    • That’s All! Enjoy your theme.
  2. How to Install the WordPress Theme using FTP?
    Installing the Theme Using FTP. If the method 1 did not work for you. You can update or install the theme using FTP as well. FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol and is generally available with all Websites. FTP Login details are provided by your host like Hostgator, Bluehost. You have to log into cPanel to get your FTP Credentials. To log into FTP you can try FileZilla or Transmit(for mac).
    • For this method first log into your site via FTP.
    • After Login now browse to the folder located at wp-content/themes.
    • Unzip the theme file you downloaded from InkHive and upload only the Extracted folder to your Server. For example if you downloaded plum.zip you extract the files first, and then upload the resultant plum folder.
    • Now, Log into your WordPress site and navigate to: Appearance > Themes to activate your uploaded theme.
    • That’s All, You are done!
  3. Installing through cPanel
    • Go to your cPanel. Generally accessible through yourdomain.com/cpanel/
    • Once you are in the cPanel. Navigate to File manager.
    • From the File manager, go to the folder -> public_html/yoursitename.com/wp-content/themes/
    • Delete the Existing Theme Folder if any (of the same name)
    • Upload the .zip file.
    • Once the .zip file is uploaded, you can right click on it, and choose extract.
    • Go to your wp-admin dashboard and Activate the Theme.

Updating Theme

How to Update the theme to latest Version? Note: This method is for updating the theme versions (pro to pro, free to free), and not from upgrading from free to pro version.
  1. Install the plugin named “Easy Theme & Plugin Upgrades”. You can also get it from following link: https://wordpress.org/plugins/easy-theme-and-plugin-upgrades/
  2. Now Download the “.zip” file of your Theme on your Computer. (DO NOT EXTRACT IT)
  3. Directly Upload “.zip” file by going in Appearance > Themes > Add New > Upload.
  4. After installation click on Activate link.
  5. Hurray! You have successfully updated your theme to the latest version.

Setting Up the Theme Using Customizer

Once the Forest Pro Theme is installed. You can start setting up the theme.

Before you set up the theme. Make sure that your site has some pages, posts, categories and featured images.

How to use Theme Customizer?

  1. To Configure your Forest theme using Customizer log into your WordPress dashboard.
  2. Go to Appearance > Customize.
  3. Customize window of your Forest theme will be loaded which will look like following:

This section contains Following Settings:

Logo: Here you can upload a Logo for your Website. Crop & Resize the logo perfectly on your computer before uploading it.

Site Title: By the using Site Title option you can insert a site title to your Forest Theme.

Tagline: You can use Tagline option to insert a tagline for your website which can be a small description of your website.
Site Title Size: You can use Site Title Font Size to adjust the size of Title:

 

Header Settings

This Contains Numerous setting

gs which can be useful for you to set up the perfect header.

  • You can have 2 different Header Styles with 2 different alignments.
  • There is a Basic Settings option that lets you set different basic settings such as follows:
    • Hide Search Button in Header
    • Hide My Account & Cart Link
    • Hide Search in Top Bar
    • Hide Header contents while using Header Style 3
    • Search Bar Place Holder it lets you write something you desire instead default text Search…
  • It also lets you set the Header image for your theme

 

  • Basic Settings list

Featured Content Areas

How to use Featured Content Areas?

This theme has Many Featured Content Areas to display your Featured Posts. These Featured Posts can be set through a Category.

And for all of them to work, make sure you have sufficient posts in the selected categories, and you have defined Featured images for All of them.

Featured Post/Product Showcases

With this theme, you can use WooCommerce and there are some showcases to display your products and posts. These showcases are listed as Featured Post Showcase and Featured Product Showcase

Working With Image Thumbnails

With this theme, you are likely to run into Issues with Images, if you are new to WordPress.

Setting Up Featured Images for Posts?
If you haven’t set any Image on your Homepage and you are seeing a Blank Dummy Image. That’s because you have not set any Featured Image Yet.

 

How to set Featured Image?

  1. To set a Featured Image, go to Edit Post and on the Edit page, at the bottom, you will see.
  2. Now click on Set featured image > Select An Image To Upload Or Choose From Already Existing Images.
  3. Next, Click onSet featured image button.
  4. Now an image will be set on your post. Click Update to make changes visible. Make sure that the Featured image you upload is large enough.
    Min Width: 600pxMin Height: 400px[ATTENTION: Smaller images will not resize properly.]

 

How to use Header Image?

  1. To set a Header Image, go to Appearance > Customize and on the Customize Page, on the left section(Pane) you will see “Header Settings” option.
  2. Now click on Header Image > Add New Image > Now Upload Or Choose From Already Existing Images.
  3. Next, Click on Select and Crop button.
  1. Now Crop Image according to your image message or Skip Cropping your Header Image will be set on your website.
  2. Click Save & Publish to make changes visible.
[ATTENTION:  You can add more than one Header Image and can also set them to Randomize Suggested Headers in this case images will be automatically changed whenever you refresh your page.]

 

Skin Designer

By Default, the theme has 3 Skins. And the Pro version of Forest Theme has another advance option which is Custom Skin it lets you use unlimited colors for your theme.

You can also select colors for Site Title & Tagline.

To use Custom Skin you need to go to Customizer > here look for Skin Designer and open > Choose Skins as Build Custom Skin > now you will get color options for various areas.

 

Fix issues Related to Improper Image Sizes

All Images are Different in size. Why?

You won’t have this issue in your Forest Theme. If you have recently come from a Different theme, your Images will all be of different sizes and will break the theme’s layout.

  1. To Forcefully Resize All Images and solve this issue, Install and Activate the Plugin named  “Regenerate Thumbnails Plugin”.
  2. You can download this plugin from the following link:

https://wordpress.org/plugins/regenerate-thumbnails/

[ATTENTION:  All the images uploaded while “Forest Theme” is installed, will automatically be resized. You don’t have to worry about selecting the Correct Sized Images. Just make sure they are Large enough. No Fixed Size Recommended.]

 

Static Page vs Recent Posts

Forest theme provides Static Front Page section which supports two types of Home Page Display:

  1. A Static Page
  2. Or Your Recent Posts

 

  1. A Static Page: It will set a Regular Page to your Website’s Home. This is useful if you are not planning on maintaining a Blog and using this theme on a Static Website.
  2. Your Latest Posts: It will show the Latest Post on your Website’s Home Page.

 

Navigation Menu

Forest theme supports two Navigation Menus. The Important one is Primary Menu to Show in the Header.

You can also enable an alternate menu to show up instead of the Social icons as discussed earlier in the Header Settings.

How to Set up Navigation Menu?

  1. Go to Appearance > Customize > Menus.
  2. Now Create Menu you want to display on your website.
  3. After creating a New Menu you can Add Items to it as shown in the following image
  4. You can Drag & Drop Added Items to make them Sub Menu Items.

Menu Basic Settings

There is another option in Menu Basic Settings in Forest Pro theme it gives you two more options as follows

i. Sticky Top Bar: It makes your website’s Top Bar Sticky.

ii. Sticky Menu: Sticky Menu allows your website’s menu to be stick with the top screen while scrolling the website.

Google Web Fonts

This theme supports 650+ Google Fonts. You can choose from 2 Fonts which will automatically be placed at various locations on the theme depending on the context.

  • Title Font
  • Body Font

 

Social Icons

You can also Choose Up to 30 Social Icons and display up to 10 social icons at a time and there are over 7 Animation Effects for the social icons in Forest Pro theme.

 

Google Analytics

It lets you add Google Analytics code to your website’s footer you just need to paste the code in the customizer and make sure to paste code without <script> tag.

This will let you display advertisements on your website. You just need to paste the Adsense code to the customizer to display the adds.