Illegal string offset errors

what does your header.php file look like? can you share it on pastebin?

can you see this? Click on the underlined text

thanks for your answer
best

i dont think that was your header.php file. that didnt even look like PHP. the error says there is a warning on a certain line of your header.php file. that is what we would have to look at

try this instead?
https://pastebin.com/EnA5R6d3
thanks a million

This second file proves that the error is in line 6 and 8 of the first file
ie. the following highlighted in bold font

if(is_single() || is_page()) { $post_or_page_id = $post->ID; }
$data = get_post_meta($post_or_page_id, “custom_meta_values”, true);
if($data[“hide_thumbnail_on_single”])
$custom_settings[“layout”][“hide_thumbnail_on_single”] = $data[“hide_thumbnail_on_single”];
if($data[“columns”])
$custom_settings[“layout”][“columns”] = $data[“columns”];

but I don’t know I to solve this since I have not coded this and my web designer is no longer a web designer and unavailable

try replacing that section with this:

if (is_single() || is_page()) {
    $post_or_page_id = $post->ID;
}

$data = get_post_meta($post_or_page_id, "custom_meta_values", true);

if ($data["hide_thumbnail_on_single"]) {
    $custom_settings["layout"]["hide_thumbnail_on_single"] = $data["hide_thumbnail_on_single"];
}

if ($data["columns"]) {
    $custom_settings["layout"]["columns"] = $data["columns"];
}

it looked like some curly brackets were missing

We corrected it, but now we get two errors

Warning: Illegal string offset ‘hide_thumbnail_on_single’ in /htdocs/public/www/wp-content/themes/ac2-theme/header.php on line 12 Warning: Illegal string offset ‘columns’ in /htdocs/public/www/wp-content/themes/ac2-theme/header.php on line 14

and

Warning: Illegal string offset ‘hide_thumbnail_on_single’ in /htdocs/public/www/wp-content/themes/ac2-theme/header.php on line 16 Warning: Illegal string offset ‘columns’ in /htdocs/public/www/wp-content/themes/ac2-theme/header.php on line 20

I pasted the index php file here <https://pastebin.com/9XcMDMEW&gt;

Thanks in advance!

try using single quotes in ALL of your array elements and see if that helps.
for example, change this:

if ($data["columns"]) {
    $custom_settings["layout"]["columns"] = $data["columns"];
}

to this:

if ($data['columns']) {
    $custom_settings['layout']['columns'] = $data['columns'];
}

The only other thing I can think of is that there isn’t an array or there aren’t any values set for it.