importing less file from outside themes directory

[cheekyboots]

I'm trying to import a .less file from a folder inside the plugin directory. It doesn't compile the LESS when I do this. It works fine from within the theme's directory tree. Is it possible for me to import from elsewhere?

[roborourke]

Hey,

Is it to use LESS within a plugin? There's some code which could use some work which tries to determine the directory path from the URL of the LESS file which is unfortunately isn't very straightforward in WP. I think I will have to make a wrapper function which does the check and parses the files using their paths as arguments and then returns a URL for use with wp_enqueue_style().

I'll keep you posted.

[franz-josef-kaiser]

@cheekyboots What is the exact problem you're having? Currently I'm having some issues with a crappy server where I run into restrictions (open_basedir). Is this the case, or is it something else? Also: If you got errors. Do they come from WP LESS, or from the lessc library (the included submodule)?

[cheekyboots]

Hi, I keep some LESS in a plugin that contains core functionality I reuse for all my projects. I'm trying to import this into the styles.less in my theme.

I don't get an error exactly, it just doesn't compile it. If I look at styles.css it still contains that import line above all the CSS: @import url("../../../../plugins/core/vendors/bootstrap/less/variables.less");

So the browser tries to import it as a CSS file so it just shows up as text, not interpreted.

[franz-josef-kaiser]

@cheekyboots Please confirm if you have PHP error reporting turned on (E_ALL/E_STRICT) in your wp-config.php. Because in this case you could have the same problem. Mine compiles on the second page reload, but is missing parts of it in the final file in the cache-less folder. But on the first run, I get this error and I'm not sure if it comes server side (not getting it local) from a wrong setting in the php.ini, or if it comes from using the latest lessc file or if it is a problem inside our WP LESS code.

[cheekyboots]

I turned on error reporting and fixed some other stuff that popped up...but this remains the same.

[roborourke]

Its really strange that it finds but doesn't parse the file... What happens if you remove the .less from the @import URL? Lessc assumes it needs parsing if there's no file extension.

[cheekyboots]

I don't know that it is finding it. It just leaves that @import line as it is written. It shows up above all the style declarations in style.css, untouched. Removing the extension doesn't produce a change.

The browser can find it, because the @import statement reads just like it was a normal CSS @import statement. So that has nothing to do with LESS.

[franz-josef-kaiser]

Ok. This then isn't connected to the problem I have here. Could you show how you enqueue your styles, how you load WP LESS and which files show before?

[cheekyboots]

Um, that's a lot of code to paste in, I do i in the standard way and I'm not sure my exact code matters? It works just fine in all other respects, and it will parse this file if I put it within the theme directory, so there is no problem loading or running WP-LESS or enqueuing styles. It only stops working if I put it in the directory of one of my plugins.

Is nobody able to replicate this, is that the problem?

[franz-josef-kaiser]

How should anybody be able to replicate this without knowing your exact setup?

Von unterwegs...

Am 28.10.2012 um 01:39 schrieb cheekyboots notifications@github.com:

Um, that's a lot of code to paste in, I do i in the standard way and I'm not sure my exact code matters? It works just fine in all other respects, and it will parse this file if I put it within the theme directory, so there is no problem loading or running WP-LESS or enqueuing styles. It only stops working if I put it in the directory of one of my plugins.

Is nobody able to replicate this, is that the problem?

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHub.

[cheekyboots]

If it's a software bug it would not be dependent on "exact setup". Only if it's a problem in my setup would setup be relevant, and as the program functions otherwise perfectly, I don't think my setup is the problem. Or at least not in regards to the questions you asked about. Perhaps it a function of other parts of my setup, like running locally on a Mac using XAMPP rather than say, on a server running Linux. But you didn't ask about that.

[roborourke]

I've raised an issue on the lessphp issue tracker here https://github.com/leafo/lessphp/issues/337

This one feels like a parser problem to me, hopefully leafo can confirm whether it is wp-less or not.

[roborourke]

@cheekyboots sorry its been so long, I've updated to lessphp 0.3.8 which has a method to help you out. If you do the following it should scan your plugin folder too:

add_filter( 'less_import_dirs', function( $dirs ) {
    $dirs[] = '/path/to/your/plugin';
    return $dirs;
} );

Happy days :)

[gabrielfuller]

How do I get this to work? I am trying to access less files in this structure: [theme_folder]/includes/bootstrap/less/*.less

What do I need to do to get it to parse those files? Right now I am getting parse error: failed at @import "styles.less";

[roborourke]

Can you show me the code where you enqueue the less files and the less code with the imports?

Robert O'Rourke sanchothefat.com +44 7816 329424

[gabrielfuller]

I am using the below code to queue the base styles sheet in less: wp_enqueue_style('less-style', get_stylesheet_directory_uri() . '/styles.less');

It works perfectly. But when I try and import it does not work... @import "includes/bootstrap/less/bootstrap.less";

parse error: failed at `@import "includes/bootstrap/less/bootstrap.less";

[roborourke]

Ah ok. That definitely used to work, I have the same kind of set up on a client site. Will look into it.

I assume its the default bootstrap.less?

What happens if you comment out the @ imports in there?

Robert O'Rourke sanchothefat.com +44 7816 329424

[gabrielfuller]

It still does not work. I tried this as well: @import "test.less";

test.less file contents: body{ font:Arial; }

Still gives this error: parse error: failed at @import "test.less";

[gabrielfuller]

I figured it out! My IDE was encoding my text files as UTF-8 with BOM. Once I changed all the less files to use UTF-8 without BOM encoding, suddenly everything started to compile. I think it is working as needed now!

[roborourke]

Aha! So glad you found that, not sure I would have figured that out... I couldn't reproduce the problem at all. I had a different BOM related issue just yesterday!

On 12 June 2013 17:21, Gabriel Fuller notifications@github.com wrote:

I figured it out! My IDE was encoding my text files as UTF-8 with BOM. Once I changed all the less files to use UTF-8 without BOM encoding, suddenly everything started to compile. I think it is working as needed now!

— Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com/sanchothefat/wp-less/issues/22#issuecomment-19337199 .

Robert O'Rourke sanchothefat.com +44 7816 329424