Dear experts,
I am currently running the SO Vantage theme and using SO Page Builder throughout this site. Until recently everything was displaying well, but with the latest updates I have a number of glitches, which all seem to be related to a JetPack conflict, as disabling JetPack returns normal behaviour. The issues are:
– Google map on homepage not showing (used to be fine, and yes the API key is being used)
– Footer not displaying properly on all pages (seems to be fine for pages with simple text-only content, such as the “About” page, but not for most others)
– Some images not loading (can be fixed by disabling the “Photon” component of JetPack, which I have done)
– Some graphical details not loading (such as arrows on buttons, which I have on the “Learn” pages)
I would like to keep JetPack running if possible, but the site in its current form is not good, especially because of the missing map, which is a key feature of the landing page. Current version numbers that may be relevant:
WP 4.9.1
Vantage 1.6.8
JetPack 5.6.1
Page Builder 2.6.0
Any advice and help will be appreciated. Many thanks.
Hi Kyo,
I’ve had a quick look at your website and it appears as though you’re using Jetpack without issue. Do you still need help with this issue?
Hi Alex,
Unfortunately the problems remain as they were before – there should be a Google map at the bottom of the landing page, but there’s currently just a blank space. The footer also doesn’t load correctly on most pages. If you look at the “About” page or the “Publications” page, the footer is correct – logo, address, RSS feed and links. Elsewhere only the logo and address appears. There are also supposed to be arrows on the forward/back buttons at the bottom of each page in the “Learn” section, which don’t appear. All issues are resolved if I disable JetPack, but I’d rather not do that to keep various JetPack features, if possible.
Thanks, and happy holidays.
Hi Kyo,
Would it be possible for you to send me an export for the layout builder in your footer? To do this please navigate to WP AdminAppearanceWidgets and open the Layout Builder widget in your footer widget. Click the Layout button in the Page Builder toolbar. Then click import/export and then click download. Please upload the export to a 3rd party file hosting site such as teknik.io.
Hi Alex,
Firstly happy New Year :-)
Secondly, you can find the json file for the site footer here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/jifi6q4la016ngu/layout-31122017.json?dl=0
I’ve just updated the site from Vantage 1.6.8 to 1.6.9, and unfortunately the same issues still remain, so help still appreciated.
Hi Kyo,
Happy New Year! :)
Thanks. Is the Google Maps not being added via the layout builder? I ask as I can’t find any usage of the Google Maps widget (or even an embed code) in the provided layout.
If it’s not, can you please clarify what you’re using to add it?
Hi Alex,
The Google map issue and the footer issue are separate i.e. the map is not part of the footer, it has its own space on the home page (currently large white area at the bottom of the page, above the footer). The Google map is being added with the SiteOrigin Google Maps widget via Page Builder, as used to construct the entire home page. The footer is being added with the Layout Builder widget via Appearance > Widgets > Footer, just as you described previously.
I am developing via Chrome and using Firefox and Safari to test, as I can clear the caches of those browsers easily (I have many things running in Chrome). I notice that the behaviour is actually different in these browsers. Both don’t display the homepage map, but currently …
… Firefox (v57.0.3) shows the footer correctly on the “About” and “Publications” page. The “About” page footer looks like this:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/vo4ybykgdp6xyfa/SFUHEP_About_Footer_Firefox.png?dl=0
… Safari (v11.0.2) shows the footer correctly only on the “Publications” page. The “About” page footer looks like this:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/4i5108y8qnnr6h4/SFUHEP_About_Footer_Safari.png?dl=0
In fact, even this behaviour isn’t consistent – I moved around the site a few times in Firefox, and sometimes the footer did not load correctly on the “About” page. If I just keep reloading, then eventually the footer can reappear. This trick doesn’t seem to work with Safari though.
Again, as mentioned previously, all these issues disappear by disabling JetPack, so it is definitely a JetPack-SiteOrigin conflict here …
Hi Kyo,
Ah. Hm. Can you please disable Jetpack Stats to see if that helps? I ask as according to the markup of the footer there’s a reference to Jetpack Stats in the footer.
Oddly, I can’t seem to replicate this issue on a different site (also using Vantage) so I’m unsure why it’s specifically affecting your website but as no one else has reported this issue, I doubt this issue is specific to Vantage and more related to your setup overall.
Can you try disabling all non-SiteOrigin plugins (leave Jetpack active) and see if this fixes the issue? You’ll need to clear all your caches after disabling your plugins.
If it does fix the issue, then try re-enabling your plugins one by one until the issue comes back. This procedure will help diagnose which plugin is causing the issue.
Once we know that, we’ll be able to look at what might be causing the conflict and either solve the problem or help you find an alternative plugin.
If the above doesn’t help, I would recommend trying a reinstall of Vantage and Jetpack.
Hi Alex,
Apologies for the late response here, I’ve been working on other projects recently and have only just had time to come back to this now. After a lot of tweaking I found the source of the issue, which was the RSS feed that I had in the site footer. Summary:
With RSS in footer:
– Google map doesn’t display
– “Learn” section forward/back buttons don’t display
– Footer doesn’t display correctly (i.e. RSS content and links missing)
– ~8 secs page loading time
– Not communicating properly with JetPack
Without RSS in footer:
– All display issues disappear
– ~2-3 secs page loading time
– Communicating properly with JetPack
I could see there was a JetPack communication issue via JetPack > Dashboard > Debug (at the bottom of that page), which took me to a page with a message “It looks like your site can not communicate properly with JetPack”. Other than JetPack and SiteOrigin plugins, I only have a couple of others, so not much to play with in terms of turning things off and seeing what happens. However, I still did this and found that site performance did improve and the map and footer content was returned, but still a bit glitchy i.e. would sometimes require a page reload, and loading was still not very quick. This did not remove the JetPack debug error though.
Based on the loading time I was wondering about the RSS feed being called on each page, and, sure enough, when I got rid of it then all issues disappeared. It’s my guess that the RSS call was taking up a lot of resources and the draw from the few plugins was pushing it just a little bit further, so when plugins were disabled the demand was reduced just enough for performance to improve, but not quite perfectly. Getting rid of the major draw from RSS then sorted it out properly.
As mentioned before, none of this was an issue prior to the updates made about a month ago, so there is some difference in behaviour with JetPack + SiteOrigin + RSS. I seem to remember fairly long page loading times before the display issues though, so I’m assuming RSS was the culprit at that point too.
One remaining observation that is not associated with the above at all, but which you may find useful – I notice that page loading with Firefox is nowhere near as smooth as with Chrome or Safari. With Firefox, the page sizing and fonts are all initially incorrect for a second, and only then does the page twitch and sort everything out correctly. This behaviour does not happen with those other browsers, which display sizing and fonts correctly straight away.
Anyway, this is all just feedback that will hopefully be useful for you. I’m fine without the RSS feed if it takes so much loading time and screws other things up, it was simply a bonus element rather than a key feature. The site now works well and looks good. Thanks for all the help.
Kyo