Background video element stopped working – phatvideobg.js

  • dubblethunk · Member ·

    I had a few background video elements on my site, which have been working perfectly but suddenly failed yesterday on a couple of pages.

    Looking at the errors through Chrome’s Inspect tool, the error seems to be related to a ‘phatvideobg.js’.

    The background element works with block colours or images, but selfhosted videos or Vimeo/YouTube links do not load.

    The background video element works on our homepage: http://bit.ly/3JOn80w

    But fails to load on any new pages or this About page: http://bit.ly/3nfFBez

    The video element should be behind the ‘What We Do’ and ‘How We Do It’ sections.

    Any help would be greatly appreciated! Totally stumped as to how this broke or how to resolve.

    Thanks in advance!

    The blog I need help with is: (visible only to logged in users)

  • dubblethunk · Member ·

    Fixed!

    I realised when Vimeo content was used for the header background, it somehow kills the video content in the other elements on the page.

    Not ideal but thankfully there’s a workaround via selfhosting the header content.

  • aleone89 · Staff ·

    Hey!

    Glad to see that’s fixed and thanks for sharing the solution!

  • dubblethunk · Member ·

    Maybe you could help on my next issue though…

    I’m trying to get these header/background videos to now play on mobile devices, but the theme I use seems to replace all videos with images on mobile. Do you know if there would be a way to override this somehow? The theme is Noha, and support from the author seems to have stopped a while back.

    Or should I be starting a new thread on this?

  • staff-doublebassd · Staff ·

    Hey there,

    That is definitely a question best suited for the theme developers since Noha is not a third-party theme developed by us. I found out where you can contact them:

    https://themeforest.net/item/noha-a-modern-agency-wordpress-theme-for-creatives/20119090/support

    Hope this helps.

  • dubblethunk · Member ·

    Thank you. I did try emailing them a couple weeks ago but it seems support may have finished, there’s been no activity on their social channels or themeforest page for a couple years.

    Looking at the theme’s JS and CSS, I’ve found the PhatVideo parts which load the background video, I believe this needs overriding when mobile is detected. Do you know where I might be best seeking assistance on customising this script/code?

  • staff-totoro · Staff ·

    Hi there,

    Do you know where I might be best seeking assistance on customising this script/code?

    Apologies, but we can’t help with your issue directly because we don’t host trago.studio on our WordPress.com managed hosting.

    To explain, we are a fully managed hosting provider and use a custom server environment that is optimized for WordPress, provides built-in security and performance improvements, as well as in-house support for your site questions.

    Because of the way we’ve optimized our service, we also use a customized version of WordPress that is different (under the hood) from what you use at your current provider. As a result, we do not have access to your site and are not familiar with the source of your issue.

    I did try emailing them a couple weeks ago but it seems support may have finished, there’s been no activity on their social channels or themeforest page for a couple years.

    I will say that this is what we would consider a bad sign. When a theme is abandoned (e.g. no longer receiving software updates) its’ only a matter of time before it continues to break further as the WordPress platform advances and adds new features.

    Outdated themes and plugins are also the #1 vector for site hacks, so they reprensent a serious security issue over time as well. If this is a recent purchase you made with Theme Forest I would ask for money back. I would also consider switching to another theme, one that is receiving current support.

    You definitely have the option to move your site to us so we can provide in-house help, but as it stands now, we’re not able to help beyond the advice I’ve given above. We do offer built in security scanning and incremental backups for sites we host on WordPress.com, but we don’t have a way to help with your self-hosted WordPress site since it uses a different version of the core WordPress software.

    The good news is that help is available here at the open-source WordPress forums: https://wordpress.org/support/forum/how-to-and-troubleshooting

    The folks in that forum are more familiar with the version of the WordPress platform that you are running on trago.studio and may be able to guide you futher.

    Hope this helps point you in the right direction!

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