Style Sheet Editor

All controls that are contained inside the Application Designer control library are rendered using a style sheet. Application Designer delivers a variety of predefined styles but also allows to you to create your own styles sheets.

The Style Sheet Editor simplifies the creation of your own style sheets: on the one hand, you can define the very basic style elements (main colors to be used), and on the other hand, you can change a controls' style definition on the lowest level.

This document covers the following topics:

For information on how to define a style sheet in the Layout Painter, see Defining a Style Sheet.

For further information on style sheets, see Adapting the Look & Feel in the Special Development Topics.

Invoking the Style Sheet Editor

When you invoke the Style Sheet Editor, the following dialog appears.

Style Sheet Editor

Start of instruction setTo invoke the Style Sheet Editor

  • In the Development Tools node of the navigation frame (which is visible when the Tools & Documentation button has previously been chosen), choose Style Sheet Editor.

Defining the Location for your Own Style Sheets

Application Designer provides a set of predefined style sheets. They are available in the directory <your-webapplication>/cis/styles and their names have the prefix "CIS_".

When you create your own style sheets, they are placed in the above directory by default. You can also define another directory for your own style sheets.

Start of instruction setTo define another location for your own style sheets

  1. Choose the Configuration button which is shown in top right of the Style Sheet Editor.

    The following dialog appears.

    Configuration

  2. Choose the option button for the desired location (within the web application or outside the web application).

  3. Specify the path to the directory.

    If you want to store your own style sheets within the web application (which is recommended), you have to specify a relative path.

  4. Choose the Save and Apply button.

Creating a New Style Sheet

When you create and save a new style sheet, it is written to the directory that has been defined in the Configuration dialog.

You can determine that your new style sheet is immediately applied to the current session.

Note:
By default, your pages are rendered with the CIS_DEFAULT style sheet which is one of Application Designer's predefined style sheets.

Start of instruction setTo create a new style sheet

  1. In the Variant drop-down list box, enter the name for your new style sheet.

  2. Choose the Open button.

    The following dialog appears.

    Style Sheet Editor

  3. Modify the values on the different tabs according to your requirements. See Changing a Style Sheet for information on the Style Details tab.

    Note:
    When you choose the Other Variant button, the dialog is shown again which appears when you invoke the Style Sheet Editor. You can then open another style sheet or create a new style sheet. If you have not saved your input previously, it is lost.

  4. To save your changes, choose either the Save button or the Save and Apply button.

    When you save a new style sheet for the first time, it is created in your style sheet directory with the extension css.

    When you choose the Save and Apply button, the style sheet file is immediately applied to the current session.

Opening an Existing Style Sheet

When you open an existing style sheet, you can modify it according to your requirements and/or immediately apply the style sheet to the current session.

Start of instruction setTo open an existing style sheet

  1. From the Variant drop-down list box, choose the name of the style sheet that you want to open.

    Note:
    In addition to the style sheet names, the drop-down list box also shows the paths to the corresponding files in the file system.

  2. Choose the Open button.

    The dialog with the style sheet definitions appears.

  3. Modify the values on the different tabs according to your requirements. See Changing a Style Sheet for information on the Style Details tab.

    Note:
    When you choose the Other Variant button, the dialog is shown again which appears when you invoke the Style Sheet Editor. You can then open another style sheet or create a new style sheet. Any changes that you have applied after the last save are lost.

  4. To save your changes, choose either the Save button or the Save and Apply button.

    When you choose the Save and Apply button, the style sheet file is immediately applied to the current session.

Changing a Style Sheet

Application Designer provides an internal style template in which all the default style information is kept. A newly created style sheet is identical to this template. All style updates that you apply to your style sheet are stored within a separate file which has the extension info. For example, if you named your style sheet "MyStyle", your style sheet directory contains the file MyStyle.info.

Note:
The style sheet directory also contains GIF files. They are generated according to your specifications for background, font, border color, etc. Each style sheet has thus individual GIF files. When you modify, for example, a color setting, new GIF files are generated which overwrite the previous GIF files.

When you edit a style sheet, you define the standard settings such as the font size on the General tab. All of the settings defined on the General tab are then assigned to individual controls on the Style Details tab via the corresponding variable (for example, @@FONTSIZE@@). See Overview of Variables.

Style details

Start of instruction setTo change a style sheet

  1. Expand the tree on the left and select the name of a style sheet class.

    The attributes for the selected class are shown on the right.

  2. Select the attribute that you want to change.

    An arrow is shown at the beginning of the selected line. The attribute name and value are now shown in the text boxes at the bottom of the dialog.

  3. Specify another value for the attribute. For example, if you want to define another color, you can define a color value such as #FF0000 (instead of @@FONTCOLORDARK@@).

    You can also define a different name for a property. As soon as you choose the Update button, a new entry is created in the style sheet. This entry must be a valid CSS style sheet definition. For example, when you change the attribute name from color to background-color, this is a valid definition. When you specify an invalid attribute name, this will not have any effect. For example, when you change the attribute name from color to hello, this will not have any effect even though the new entry hallo @@FONTCOLORDARK@@ will be created.

  4. Choose the Update button.

    When you have changed a default entry of the Application Designer style template, the changed information is now shown in bold in an additional line. For example:

    Style details

    Notes:

    1. If you do not want to take over a property from the style sheet template, specify "DELETE" as the attribute value and choose the Update button. All attributes that are marked with "DELETE" are not included in your style sheet.
    2. If you want to take back a style update (that is: a change which is indicated by a bold line), delete the corresponding attribute value (that is: set it to blank) and choose the Update button. The bold line will disappear.

Overview of Variables

The following variables can be defined on the Style Details tab:

@@FONTCOLORDARK@@
@@FONTSIZE@@
@@FONT@@
@@LIGHTBACKGROUND@@
@@HEADLINEBACKGROUND@@
@@BORDERCOLOR@@
@@DARKBACKGROUND@@
@@TITLEBARBACKGROUND@@
@@FONTCOLORLIGHT@@
@@BUTTONHEIGHT@@
@@BUTTONIMAGE@@
@@BUTTONCOLOR@@
@@FONTCOLORINACTIVE@@
@@CONTROLERRORBACKGROUND@@
@@CONTROLEDITBACKGROUND@@
@@CONTROLDISPLAYBACKGROUND@@
@@LIGHTTITLEBARBACKGROUND@@
@@VARIANT@@
@@FIELDHEIGHT@@
@@FIELDBORDERCOLOR@@
@@CONTROLPOPUPINPUTONLYBACKGROUND@@
@@SHADEDDARKBACKGROUND@@
@@SELECTEDCELLBACKGROUND@@
@@SELECTEDBACKGROUND@@
@@EVENCELLBACKGROUND@@
@@ODDCELLBACKGROUND@@
@@TABAREALEFTPADDINGFIRST@@
@@TABAREALEFTPADDINGSECOND@@
@@EMPTYCELLBACKGROUND@@
@@SHADEDSELECTEDBACKGROUND@@
@@ODDCELLBACKGROUNDVAR1@@
@@EVENCELLBACKGROUNDVAR1@@
@@SELECTEDCELLBACKGROUNDVAR1@@
@@EMPTYCELLBACKGROUNDVAR1@@
@@ODDCELLBACKGROUNDVAR2@@
@@EVENCELLBACKGROUNDVAR2@@
@@SELECTEDCELLBACKGROUNDVAR2@@
@@EMPTYCELLBACKGROUNDVAR2@@
@@TITLEBARHEIGHT@@
@@COLORTOPIC1@@
@@COLORTOPIC2@@
@@COLORTOPIC3@@
@@COLORTOPIC4@@
@@COLORTOPIC5@@
@@COLORTOPIC6@@
@@COLORTOPIC7@@
@@COLORTOPIC8@@
@@COLORTOPIC9@@
@@COLORTOPIC10@@

Regenerating Your Own Style Sheet from the Style Sheet Template

From release to release, Application Designer adds new controls to its control library. As a consequence, the style sheet template is typically enhanced with every new control (for example, new style classes are added). As your style changes are kept in a separate file which has the extension info, your style sheet can easily include the enhancements. You just have to regenerate your own style sheet file.

Important:
After the installation of a new Application Designer build, you have to regenerate your own style sheet(s).

Start of instruction setTo regenerate your own style sheet

  1. From the Variant drop-down list box, select the name of your style sheet.

  2. Choose the Refresh button.

    The following command buttons are now shown: Selected Variant and All Variants.

  3. Choose the Selected Variant button.

    Note:
    Choose the All Variants button if you want to regenerate all existing style sheets.

Using a Version Control Tool

If you want to secure your style sheets with a version control tool, it is sufficient to keep the files with the extension info under version control. The actual style sheet file (with the extension css) is just a generation result out of the INFO file.