Modifying a Theme

You can customise a theme to produce a new graphical style using the theme editor.  Each theme is made up of a large number of elements such as background images, fonts, colours, and margins; to reduce the amount of time you spend creating your own graphical style you should select a theme from the gallery which closely matches your requirements then make any necessary modifications as follows:

To modify the colour scheme of a theme

The following example explains how to modify the palette of a theme to create a new colour scheme.

• Click on the group where you wish to apply the new theme.
• If this group does not already have a theme applied click the change button in the themes area to display theme options. The themes currently in use on your web site will be displayed alongside the groups where they have been used:

• Click the Add a new theme button to display the theme park.
• Click on the theme you wish to copy; this may be a theme from the Endis gallery or the gallery from your own organization.  The new theme will be added to the list (with a “(2)” appended to the title if this name has already been taken).  To edit this theme:
• Click the  button to display the theme editor.
• The colour palette on the left-hand side of the screen shows the colours used by this theme: 

Changing any of the colours in this palette will replace the corresponding colours on all pages which use this theme.

• Click on a colour to display the colour selector; pick a new colour either by clicking on the colour map, or by entering a colour value in the space provided.
• Once you have selected a new colour the preview pane will be updated accordingly.  Repeat this process for the other colours in the palette if required.
• Click the Save button to commit any changes.

See applying a new theme or layout above for more information on applying the modified theme to your web site.

To modify the style elements of a theme

The following example explains how to change other aspects of a theme to customise the look of your web site.  You may wish to amend a copy of an existing theme using the method described above to retain the old version for future reference.

• Click the   button next to the theme you wish to modify.

The Styles area of the theme editor is made up of a large number of elements contributing  to the appearance of your web site.  Many of these elements are grouped together.  For example, under the content group the text element controls the appearance of text in this theme:

Inside the text group other elements describe the appearance of specific types of text, for example, the appearance of headings and hyperlinks.  Properties for each of these elements are cascading; this means that if you select, for example, the verdana font for the text element all elements below will also use the verdana font unless another font is specifically selected.

The properties for each element are displayed on the right-hand side whenever an element is selected.  The text element, for example, has the following properties:

indicating that all elements below will use the verdana font and will be 10 pixels high (unless they have been altered specifically). Properties which have been set for this element can be removed by clicking the   button.

In many cases you can locate a particular element for editing by clicking on the item in the preview pane.  For example to change the size of the text at the top of each component:

• Click on the header as illustrated below:

The Middle element of the title bar group will be selected automatically.

• In the font/alignment properties enter a new font size: 

• The preview pane will be updated shortly afterwards.  By turning off the capture clicks feature you can navigate throughout the web site to see the effect of the changes you have made if necessary.
• Once you have made the appropriate changes to your theme click the save button.  See the applying a new theme or layout chapter above for more information on applying this theme to your web site.

Note: you may wish to give the modified theme a different name before saving to help you identify it in future.