Styles

A style is a defined set of resources, such as images and cascading style sheets, that controls the appearance of the Cognos 8 Web interface. The branding images and fonts are also part of the style.

The resources for the styles are located in the c8_location/webcontent/skins directory.

The following predefined styles are available in Cognos 8:

If the predefined styles do not meet your requirements, you can create your own style and make it available in Cognos 8 .

At run time, individual users can choose any of the available styles to use in their Web interface . Ensure that all users have access to at least one style.

The initial style settings for new users are determined by the default user profiles. For information about changing the user profiles, see Managing User Profiles.

Managing styles involves:

• Adding new styles

• Controlling access to styles

• Modifying styles

Add a New Style

You add a new style to create the style object in Content Manager and to associate it with the style resources in the product directory.

Use this functionality to add a custom style or to create different styles based on the existing style resources. For example, you can add a new style named blue and associate it with the corporate style resources in the c8_location/webcontent/skins/corporate directory.

Before you can add a custom style, the style resources must exist in the c8_location/webcontent/skins directory. For more information about customizing styles, see Customizing Styles.

Steps

1. In Cognos Connection, click Launch, Cognos Administration.

2. On the Configuration tab, click Styles.

   The new style wizard appears.

3. Click the new style button .

4. Type a name for the style and, if you want, a screen tip and description.

   The style name can be any word or phrase you want. It does not need to match the name of the product directory where the style resources are located.

   Tip: You can specify the style name, description, and screen tip only in the product language you currently use. To specify these values for different languages, you can later modify the style .

5. Click Next.

6. Specify the location of the style resources:

   • In the Style location name box, type the name of the style directory where the style resources are located.

     You can specify one of the predefined style directories, such as corporate, classic or modern, or a custom directory, if it exists.

   • In the Preview image URL box, type the URL address where the preview resource for the style is located.

     An example of a preview resource can be a Web server page, a video, or an image.

7. Click Finish.

Control Access to Styles

Users may need to use different styles in their Web interface depending on the company branding requirements, locale, or product implementation. For example, the styles for Asian users may have specific characteristics that do not apply to users in other geographical locations. Therefore, these styles can be hidden from non-Asian users.

You can control access to styles by setting access permissions on them. To make a style available to end users, you grant execute permissions for the required users, groups, or roles. No other permissions are needed. As a result, the style appears in the users’ preferences in Cognos Connection . Users can use the style, but they cannot modify it.

Read, write, or set policy permissions can be granted for administrator users. Traverse permissions are irrelevant in relation to styles.

For more information about security, see Access Permissions.

Steps

1. In Cognos Connection, click Launch, Cognos Administration.

2. On the Configuration tab, click Styles.

3. Click the properties button for the style you want.

4. Click the Permissions tab.

5. Select the Override the access permissions acquired from the parent entry check box.

6. Grant the required type of access permissions.

   • For end users, grant execute permissions for the users, groups, or roles you want to have access to this style.

   • For administrators, grant read, write, or set policy permissions.

   For more information, see Set Access Permissions for an Entry.

Modify a Style

You can modify an existing style to

• change the style name, description, and screen tip

  You can rename any of the predefined or custom styles to use style names that are more appropriate for your Web interface.

• add, change, or remove the style name, description, and screen tip for different language versions of the product

  You may want the style name, description, and screen tip match the users’ product language.

• change the style directory

  You can associate an existing style with a different style directory in c8_location/webcontent/skins. You may need to do this when, for example, the names of the style directories change as a result of the product translation into different languages.

For more information about the style general properties, see Entry Properties

Steps

1. In Cognos Connection, click Launch, Cognos Administration.

2. On the Configuration tab, click Styles.

3. Click the properties button for the style you want.

4. On the General or Styles tab, modify the properties as required.

5. Click OK.