I am trying to:
Find out why certain custom fields on my site keep disappearing.
Link to a page where the issue can be seen: hidden link
I expected to see:
In the Brochures and Certificates section, there's a file / title we keep adding and then hours later its gone. We seen this happen multiple times now where it seems to save or a period of time, then disappears later. Any idea why?
Instead, I got:
A blank field. It randomly disappears. We've seen this happen on other pages too. Do you know what can cause it.
We have multiple people working / translating pages on our site at the same time, could that cause issues?
Thank you for contacting WPML support, I'd be happy to help you with this issue.
For now, I see the custom field "Certificates" displays on the product page in the default language (English) and second language (French), please check this screenshot hidden link
Also, I don't think it is related to WPML because your screenshot indicates the issue happens in the default language (English). And I think it could be an editor removes a certificate file or two editors are working on the same product at the same time and causing this issue.
You can try to create a test product on yourself and tell them don't edit this product then observe the issue again.
So the issue is only that one specific field keeps disappearing. Ill attach two screenshots, one showing the missing field, and one showing the field appearing on our staging site. Could this issue of fields disappearing be caused by Custom Field names that arent unqiue? Do all our field names have to be unique site wide even if they are in different field groups? Also could fields disappear if we use the "copy once" vs "translate" setting?
>> Could this issue of fields disappearing be caused by Custom Field names that arent unique?
Yes, it could be. When editing a post/page, you should have a unique field name. The values for the fields are stored in exactly the same place in the database. One of them will always overwrite the other. You need to rename one of these fields.
>> Do all our field names have to be unique site-wide even if they are in different field groups?
I think you can have the two fields with the same name in different groups but they should not be available in the same post/post type.
>> Also could fields disappear if we use the "copy once" vs "translate" setting?
I think it is not related in this case. You are editing the post in the default language, where the post, custom fields and other data are not translated.
Thanks for that information! Could you also tell me if I use the "Translate Independently" button after duplicating a page, does it affect the individual custom field settings? So if I have custom fields set to "copy" or "copy once" does clicking "Translate Independently" override those settings? Im just curious how that works and if there could be any potential issues there with content disappearing?
>> if I use the "Translate Independently" button after duplicating a page, does it affect the individual custom field settings?
No, the field preference still works as it is.
Can you please share some screenshots (full screen) of when you edit the product and that custom field preference (WPML > Settings > Custom Fields translation)? hidden link
I had a question about repeater fields. We have a bunch of custom repeater fields and often notice issues when trying to delete or reorder those repeaters on translated pages, it affects our english versions as well. We dont want this to happen, is there a way to stop it? It seems the settings of "copy" or "copy once" dont always work with repeaters unless Im missing a setting? We had a situation where deleting some repeater fields deleted the content on our english page.
