Customizing Enterprise HelpDesk

This section covers a variety of ways to customize Enterprise HelpDesk, all of which are considered “power customizations”.

Power customizations involve using the Microsoft Access development environment, Visual Basic, Javascript, and other advanced techniques to customize Enterprise HelpDesk.

Moving Fields Between Tabs

You can move fields between tabs by making a simple change in the project .def file.

To move a field to another tab

Open the project .def file.

Open the tblDtsFields table.

Find the record for the field you want to move, and change the value in the nDestinationTabID field.

nDestinationTabID specifies the tab that contains the field. You can find the tab IDs in tblTabs.

Regenerate any existing Web views.

Creating an Attachments Field

Create an attachments field:

ID	Tab Name
0	Overview
1	Description
2	Resolution
3	Detail
4	Contact

Open the project .def file.

Open the tblDtsFields table.

Copy the record for the Attachments field and paste it into a new record.

Change the nID, tTableName, tName, tCaption, tLabelCaption, and tBoundControlName fields.

If you want to put the new attachments field on a different tab, change the nDestinationTabID field.


tblDtsFIelds field	Description
nID	Unique ID for the field.
tTableName	Name of the attachments table in the DAT database. The attachments table stores information about attached files. Also, the name of a table in the USR database (the table is named <tTableName>Temporary).
tName	Name of the field in the attachments table (DAT database) that stores the name of an attached file.
tCaption	Label used in choice lists.
tLabelCaption	Default label for the field in a Web view.
tBound ControlName	Internal name for the field.

Create an attachments table

In the DAT database, copy tblAttachments. Use the tTableName of the new attachments field as the name.

Change the name of the tAttachments field in the new table. Use the tName of the new attachments field as the new name.

Create a temporary attachments table

In the USR database, copy the tblAttachmentsTemporary table. Name the new table <tTableName>Temporary.

Add a record to tblDtsTables

In tblDtsTables (DEF database) copy the record for the attachments table. Change tTableName and tTableNameTemp to the names of the new attachments tables in the DAT and USR databases.

Customizing URL Buttons

Each of the default URL buttons (URLButton

, MailToButton

, and RemoteControl

) has four CSS classes, along with four associated :hover classes. The Web View Editor automatically determines which CSS class to use based on the field type and the field attribute settings. For example, the CSS classes used for URLButton are determined as follows:


When	These CSS classes are used
Column Span=1	URLButtonState1 URLButtonState1:hover
Column Span=2 CSS Class = MemoFieldWidth	URLButtonSpanTwoState1 URLButtonSpanTwoState1:hover
Column Span=2 CSS Class = SpanTwoWidthOne	URLButtonTwoWidthOneState1 URLButtonSpanTwoWidthOneState1:hover
Field already has a button (for example, a date field).	URLButtonSecondButtonState1 URLButtonSecondButtonState1:hover

These CSS classes are defined in the CensusMain.css style sheet in CensusWeb\Views\CensusWebVD\Theme\css.

Each different pair of CSS classes positions the button differently, by changing the value of the CSS left property.

The :hover pseudo classes change the background image to give a rollover effect.

To define your own buttons, copy the URLButton classes, change the class names, and point the background-image property to your button images. For example:

For button rollovers, you’ll need two versions of your button image. Your button images should have a one or two pixel margin (so there’s some space between the field and the button). Alternatively, you could adjust the left property.

To use these new classes, just use MyButton as the value of the URL Button CSS attribute.

Customizing the Inventory Tab

You can easily customize the list of reports that appears on the Inventory tab. You can:

Remove reports.

Reorder the list.

Change report names (captions).

Add separators between reports.

Change the title of the reports list (by default, the title is “Reports”).

To customize the list of reports on the Inventory tab, edit the file tmplInventoryTab.rec, which is located in the folder

In templInventoryTab.rec, the reports list is stored in an array named arrReports. arrReports is an array of arrays, that is, each element in arrReports is itself an array. Each of these arrays contains information about a different report.

GetOpenReportOnClickFunction(...) returns the onClick event handler, which opens the report when a user clicks it. Do not edit this function call.

<tooltip> is the text displayed when a user points to the button beside a report.

In tmplInventoryTab.rec, the caption and tooltip are specified by text that looks like this:

When you generate a Web view, this text is replaced with the name of the report.

<html-markup> is html markup that is inserted into the list after the report. For example, you can add separators by adding “<hr />”.

To reorder the list of reports:

In tmplInventoryTab.rec, change the order in which the reports are added into the arrReports array.

Some reports add a separator (“<hr/>”), so you may have to edit the report arrays to put the separators in the right places.

Generate the Web views that include the Inventory tab.

To remove reports:

In tmplInventoryTab.rec, comment out (or delete) the reports that you want to remove.

Generate the Web views that include the Inventory tab.

To change a report name:

In tmplInventoryTab.rec, replace the text that looks like this:

“<Mq:ReportCaption>155.10</Mq:ReportCaption>”

with the report name you want to see.

Remember, the tooltip is the second element in the array, and the caption is the third.

Generate the Web view.

To add a separator between two reports:

In tmplInventoryTab.rec, find the array for the first of the two reports.

Change the fourth element of the report array from "" to "<hr/>" (or to whatever HTML you want to use as a separator).

Generate the Web views that include the Inventory tab.

To change the title of the reports list:

In tmplInventoryTab.rec, find this document.write statement (near the end of the file):

document.write(
	m_objWebPart.GetHTML_ListContainer(
		"Reports",
		"../../theme/images/images/ListImage.gif",
		arrReports
	)
);

Change the first argument to GetHTML_ListContainer() from “Reports” to the title you want to see.

Generate the Web views that include the Inventory tab.

Customizing Reports with Crystal Reports

About Crystal Reports

Using Crystal Reports, you can add features such as charts, formulas, field highlighting, and running totals to a listing report. You can also import graphics (such as company logos) and completely reformat a listing report.

To build custom reports, you need Crystal Reports v8.5 or v9.0. Crystal Reports must be purchased separately from Crystal Decisions or another supplier. You also need a Report Creation API license.

A Customized Listing Report

Customized listing reports appear on the Custom tab of the HelpDesk Web Report Viewer. After you customize a listing report, you cannot edit it in the Report Editor. You must use Crystal Reports.

Step 1: Creating a Listing Report

A custom report is based on a listing report. The listing report defines the data (the issues and fields) that will be available in Crystal Reports when you customize the report.

To create a new listing report:

In HelpDesk Admin, create a new listing report in the Report Editor with the desired query and sort.

Add all the fields you want to use in the customized report.

Do not select the Custom check box.

Step 2: Create an .rpt File

Crystal Reports uses the .rpt file format to save reports. When you view a report in a Web view, HelpDesk Web creates an .rpt file for the report. The .rpt file is saved inside the view folder, for example, in:

For each report, Enterprise HelpDesk requires two .rpt files: one for the portrait orientation, and one for the landscape orientation.

To create an .rpt file:

In HelpDesk Admin, set the Standard Report Engine option to Crystal Reports 9 or Crystal Reports 8.5, so Enterprise HelpDesk uses Crystal Reports for listing reports.

Log on to a Web view and click Reports to open the Report Viewer.

Click the Listing tab, click the new report, and then click View.

Save a copy of the report from the Report Viewer and use this as your working copy. When you save a report from the Report Viewer, the .rpt file includes the issue data, so you can preview the report in Crystal Reports and use the Chart Analyzer. The .rpt file created by the Web view does not include any issue data.

Click Show and then in the Layout list, click Landscape.

View the landscape version of the report to create the .rpt file for the landscape orientation.

You don't need to save the landscape report from the Report Viewer. You can create the customized version of the landscape report from the customized portrait report.

Step 3: Move the Report to the Custom Tab

To move a listing report to the Custom tab:

In HelpDesk Admin, open the listing report in the Report Editor and select the Custom check box.

Step 4: Customize the Report in Crystal Reports

To customize the report in Crystal Reports:

Open the .rpt file with Crystal Reports. Use the copy of the report you saved from the Report Viewer.

Edit the report. For example, you can insert graphs, change fonts and colors, insert custom headers and footers, group and sort fields, hide fields, add summary fields (such as count or average), and much more.

Save the .rpt file.

Copy the .rpt file to the Reports folder and rename the .rpt file so it uses the default report name.

Log on to the Web view and open the report.

Step 5: Copy the customized report to the CustomizedFiles folder

When you generate a Web view, the contents of the Reports folder are deleted. To save your customized reports and make sure they are copied every time you generate a Web view, you have to copy the .rpt files to the CustomizedFiles folder.

Customizing HTML Reports

About HTML Reports

By default, Web views use HTML to display Listing reports. You can customize this HTML by editing the XML files that define the HTML page template.

TmplRpt_listing_<type>.xml

HTML template for an HTML report page, including the table that contains the report data.

ValueCell_listing_<type>.xml

HTML template for a table cell that displays a field value.

CaptionCell_listing_<type>.xml

HTML template for a table cell that displays a field caption.

<type> is either “tabular” or “multicolumn” (the two types of listing reports).

Enterprise HelpDesk generates the HTML reports by transforming raw XML data into HTML using an XSL style sheet. The three .xml files are templates for the XSL style sheet.

Changing the CSS Styles

The CSS styles used by the HTML reports are defined in the TmplRpt_listing_<type>.xml file.

Reports are used to format attachments to e-mail notifications. Using an embedded style sheet ensures that notification attachments are formatted. If you want to use an external style sheet, you must use an absolute URL to locate the style sheet.

PlaceHolders

The empty elements (such as <ReportHeader/> and <TableCells/>) in TmpRpt_listing_<type>.xml are placeholders. When Enterprise HelpDesk generates a report, it replaces these placeholders with report-specific data.

<ColumnHeaders/> is a placeholder for the field titles.

The file CaptionCell_listing_<type>.xml contains the HTML template for a field title, where <CellWidth /> and <CaptionCell /> are the width and title from the Report Editor.

<TableCells/> is a placeholder for the field values.

The file ValueCell_listing_<type>.xml contains the HTML template for a field value.

<ReportCaption /> is the name given to the report in the Report Editor.

<ReportHeader /> is the title text from the Page Editor. <ReportHeaderCSS /> is the formatting applied to the title text.

<PageHeader /> is the header text from the Page Editor. <PageHeaderCSS /> is the formatting applied to the header text.

<PageFooter /> is the footer text from the Page Editor. <PageFooterCSS /> is the formatting applied to title text.

To see the generated HTML, open a report in a Web view and then view the page source.

Customizing the Report Used to Print Issues

The information in this section applies only if you use Crystal Reports for listing reports. See Viewing Reports for more information on using Crystal Reports for listing reports.

The report used to print issues is named “Current Issue - Detailed”. If you edit this report in the Report Editor (of HelpDesk Admin), the changes apply to all Web views of the project.

folder, where <project> is the name of the project and <view> is the name of the Web view. The portrait version of the report is used to print issues.

To customize the report:

View the portrait version of the report in a Web view. You can either print an issue or view the report with the Report Viewer.

Viewing the report creates the .rpt file.

In the Report Editor (HelpDesk Admin), mark the report as a custom report (select the Custom check box).

This prevents Enterprise HelpDesk from overwriting the customized report if the report definition changes.

Using Crystal Reports, customize the report (add graphics, change fonts, rearrange and align fields).

Put a copy of the customized report in

CUSTOMIZEDFILES \#Project#<project> \#WebView#<view> \Reports

When you regenerate the Web view, the customized version of the report is copied to the Web view folder.

Deleting Users

You can disable users, but this does not delete the user from the database, because existing issues may refer to the user (as either the owner, submitter, or contact). If you don’t want to see disabled users in the Contact, Owner, and Submitter fields, you can either:

Delete the user from the users database (the file Users.mdb in Jet/MSAccess, or the database USERS_MDB in SQL Server).

Remove disabled users from the Contact, Owner, and Submitter choice lists.

However, if an existing issue references the user in its Owner, Submitter, or Contact field, the field will be empty. In some cases this may cause an “invalid use of null” error.

If existing issues reference disabled users, it may not be practical to delete the user accounts for ex-employees or contractors, because you probably want to keep a historical record of who reported, submitted, and resolved issues. In that case, you may want to add some sort of prefix to the names of disabled accounts.

Before you delete a user or remove the user from the choice lists, you should check if any existing issues reference the user.

To check if a user is referenced by existing issues:

Open the users database, and open the tblUser table.

The users database is the file users.mdb (Jet/MSAccess) or the database USERS_MDB (SQL Server).

Find the record for the user you want to delete, and get the value in the User ID field.

For example, if you want to delete the demo user, the User ID is 2.

Open the issue database for the project.

The issue database is the file <project>01.dat (Jet/MSAccess) or the database <project>01_DAT (SQL Server).

Open tblDts and look for the user ID in the columns of choice list fields that use tblUser. For example, nUserID (Owner), nOriginatorID (Contact), and nSubmitterID (Submitter)

To sort the table by user ID, click in the nUserID, nOriginatorID, or nSubmitterID column. Then in the Record menu, click Sort and then click Sort Ascending or Sort Descending. Then scroll through the records to see if the user owns any records.

Note that the revision history (the tblDts_History table in the DAT database) also references users. And while unlikely, queries, summary reports, time reports, and notifications may also reference specific users. The definitions of queries, reports, and notifications are in the project .def file.

If existing issues do reference the user, you can always reassign open issues, but closed issues can be a problem. You may want to keep a historical record of who reported, submitted, and resolved an issue. If so, you have to keep the disabled users.

Removing Disabled Users from Choice Lists

Instead of deleting users from the users database, you can prevent the Owner and Contact lists from showing disabled users. However, if an existing issue references the deleted user in its Owner or Contact field, the field will be empty.

Removing disabled users from choice lists:

Open the .def file for the project.

Open tblDtsFields and find the owner (nID = 11) and contact (nID = 13) records.

In the tWhere field, add "And fDeleted = 0" to the Where clause. For example:

Where (([nID] >= 0 And [tName] <> '') Or [tName] 
= '<User>') And fOriginator = 0 And fDeleted = 0

Adding a Choice List of Users or Contacts

To add a choice list of users:

In the Field Editor, create a new field.

In the Type list, click Multi-Choice List or Single Choice List.

In the Table Containing Choices list, click tblUser.

tblUser cannot be viewed or edited in the Choice Editor.

Apply the changes (click Apply or Close).

In Microsoft Access, open the project .def file.

Open tblDtsFields and find the record for the new field. In the tWhere field, type:

Where (([nID] >= 0 And  [tName]  <> '') Or 
	[tName]  = '<User>') And fOriginator = 0

The [nID] >= 0 condition removes the macros defined in tblUser (the users database):

The fOriginator = 0 condition removes contacts, so that the list contains users only.

To add a choice list of users and contacts:

Timestamping

About Timestamping

Changes to a memo field can be time-stamped. For example, you can time-stamp the changes, comments, notes, and follow-ups that are added to an issue description over time.

User ID	User Name
-4	<Contact>
-3	<User>
-2	<Previous Owner>
-1	<Owner>

Timestamping requires two memo fields, one for input and one for storing the timestamped log. When an issue is saved, the Web view automatically copies the contents of the input field to the log field.

Enabling Timestamping in New Projects Based on HelpDesk

You need to set the Html code after control attribute of the timestamping fields. The required HTML is included below. Note that it is formatted for readability—the Html code after control attribute takes a single line of text.

Description

Description Log

Notes

Notes Log

Adding New TimeStamping Fields

Step I: Add two memo fields:

Use the Field Editor to create two memo fields. For the input field, clear the Show in Choice Lists and Maintain Revision History check boxes.

Step II: Get the name of the timestamp log field:

You need to get the internal name of the timestamp field. The internal name is a name that looks like "mem_58_mem_58_FieldName" (and that is not a typo).

If you have Microsoft Access, you can get the internal name by opening the project .def file and looking in the tblDtsFields table. The field name is composed from the values in the nID and tBoundControlName fields:

The tBoundControlName field includes a repeat of the”mem_<nID>” string. That is why the string appears twice in the name.

If you don’t have a copy of Microsoft Access, generate a Web view for the project. Then get the value of the name attribute of the text area control associated with the timestamp log field. You can find this in the tmplRecord.html file, which is located in the HTML folder of the view:

Step III: Set the HTML code after control attributes:

Before you generate a Web view, you must export the two fields and set their HTML code after control attributes.

For the input field, enter this HTML code (as a single line of text):

<script type='text/javascript'>
document.write( 
	parent.objCustomCode.getCodeAfterField( 
		'%fieldname%', 
		'<timestamp-log-field-name>' ) ) 
</script> 
 
<timestamp-log-field-name> is the field name you found in the previous step. Note that the javascript is case sensitive.

For the timestamp log field, enter this HTML code (as a single line of text):

<script type='text/javascript'>
document.write(
	parent.objCustomCode.getCodeAfterField(
		'%fieldname%',
		'' ) )
</script>

Customizing Timestamping

By default, each time a new entry is added to the timestamp log, a line that looks like this is added:

You can customize the way the timestamp log is formatted by editing MoveControlData() in Js\CustomCode.js. For example, you could insert a line of dashes to separate entries, add tabs (\t), or add more line breaks (\r):

getDateTime() returns a string that includes the date, time, name of the current user, and current value of the Progress field.

objSourceControl.value is the new input to add to the timestamp log, and objTargetControl.value is the content of the timestamp log.

Timestamping with One Memo Field

You can implement timestamping with just one memo field. To do this, you use the HTML code before control attribute to insert a text area control above the timestamp log field. This text area control is not tied to any database field. It exists only to allow input, which is copied into the timestamp log field when you save the issue. The advantage to this approach is that you avoid storing an extra memo field in the issue database. The disadvantage is that you cannot use HelpDesk Admin or the Web View Editor to customize the input text area (for example, to change the caption or position of the control).

function getInputMemoField( inputFld, logFld ) 
{ 
var strOutput; 
 
strOutput="<textarea  class='MemoFieldWidth'  "; 
strOutput+="name='" + inputFld + "' "; 
strOutput+="wrap=physical  rows=10 cols=73"; 
strOutput+="onfocus=\"parent.MemoGotFocus('" + inputFld + "')\" "; 
strOutput+="onchange=\"parent.OnMemoRecordChanged('" + inputFld + "')\" "; 
strOutput+="onkeypress=\"parent.OnMemoRecordChanged('" + inputFld +"')\"></textarea><br>"; 
 
strOutput+="<script type='text/javascript'>"; 
strOutput+="document.write(parent.objCustomCode.getCodeAfterField('" + inputFld + "','" +logFld + "'))</script>"; 
strOutput+="</script>"; 
 
return strOutput; 
}

Customizing Notifications

Changing the Format of Attachments

One of the choices in the Include list (Notification Editor) is Detailed. Detailed attaches a report to the notification message. This report includes most, if not all, of the fields for an issue.

If you do not use Crystal Reports, attachments can be either HTML files or text files. If you do use Crystal Reports, attachments are RTF files by default. You can change this to be PDF, text, or a number of other formats.

See Viewing Reports for more information on using Crystal Reports for listing reports.

To change the format of a notification attachment:

Open the project .def file.

In tblMailContents, change the nFormatType for the attachments. (Attachments have nType = 3 in tblMailContents).


NoFormat	0	Excel40	20
CrystalReport	1	Excel50	21
DataInterchange	2	Excel50Tabular	22
RecordStyle	3	ODBC	23
RichText	4	HTML32Standard	24
Comma Separated Values	5	Explorer32Extend	25
TabSeparatedValues	6	NetScape20	26
CharSeparated Values	7	Excel70	27
Text	8	Excel70Tabular	28
TabSeparatedText	9	Excel80	29
PaginatedText	10	Excel80Tabular	30
Lotus123WKS	11	PortableDocFormat	31
Lotus123WK1	12	HTML40	32
Lotus123WK3	13	CrystalReport70	33
WordForWindows	14	ReportDefinition	34
Excel21	18	ExactRichText	35
Excel30	19	XML	36

Attaching Information

By default, the Revision Record and Summary are included in the body of the e-mail notification message. You can include this information as separate attachments.

To do this, open the project .def file and in tblMailContents change the nType to 3. nType determines where the content is put in the e-mail message.

Adding Custom Mail Contents

nType	Description
1	Subject
2	Body of e-mail message
3	Attachment

In the Notification Editor, the Include list specifies what to include in an e-mail notification message. You can add items to this list. The items can be used as the message subject, inserted in the message body, or included as attachments to the message.

To add an item to the Include list of the Notification Editor:

Define a function in the macro6.bas file.

This function should return the content you want to include in the e-mail message.

macro6.bas is located in the project sub-folder of the HelpDeskServer folder (for example:
HelpDeskServer\HelpDesk\macro6.bas)

Open the project .def file, and in the tblMacro table, add a row for the new function.

tName is the name of the macro.

tFunctionName is the name of a function defined in macro6.bas.

nType specifies what arguments the function takes:

1 = No Arguments

2 = Issue Record

3 = Revision history

4 = Expression

In the tblMailContents table, add a row for the macro.

Use the same tName as you did in tblMacro.

nType specifies where to include the contents:

1 = subject
2 = body
3 = attachment

nFormatType specifies the format:

4 = rtf
8 = text
14 = word
31 = pdf
32 = html40

When nType = 2, nFormatType must be 8 (text). Otherwise you'll end up with a plain text e-mail message that contains RTF or PDF and is never sent. This will hold up all your notifications.

Example Macros

Public Function GetCustomMsgBody() 
 
Dim fsObj 
Dim txtStreamObj 
Dim emailbody 
Dim strFileName 
 
strFileName = "C:\Messages\msg.txt" 
 
Set fsObj = CreateObject( 
"Scripting.FileSystemObject") 
 
Set txtStreamObj = fsObj.OpenTextFile( 
strFileName, 1, False, False) 
 
emailbody = txtStreamObj.ReadAll 
 
txtStreamObj.Close 
 
GetCustomMsgBody = emailbody 
 
End Function

This example shows how to write a function that takes the revision history as an argument and extracts a field value.

Public Function GetSubject(oCensusApplication, lngDtsRecordID, recRevisionHistory) 
 
Dim lngLastRevisionNumber  
Dim rstValue     
Dim variablename 
 
If oCensusApplication Is Nothing Then 
Exit Function 
End If 
 
If recRevisionHistory Is Nothing Then 
Exit Function 
End If 
 
'get the last revision number 
GetRevisionNumberRange recRevisionHistory, 0, _ 
lngLastRevisionNumber 
 
' Get the value for the field from the table 
' of the last revision in the given set. 
 
Set rstValue = oCensusApplication.CurrentProject._ 
DataStores.Item(32). _ 
GetConnection(1).Execute( _ 
 "SELECT tBriefDescription FROM tblDts_History_ 
WHERE nID=" & lngDtsRecordID _ 
& " AND nRevisionNumber=" _ 
& lngLastRevisionNumber, , 1) 
 
' Build subject line that looks like: 
' HELPDESK [Ticket 37] - Cannot print PDF file 
If Not rstValue.EOF Then 
If Not IsNull(rstValue.Fields(0).Value) Then 
GetSubject =  "HELPDESK [Ticket " &_ 
lngDtsRecordID & "] - " &_ 
rstValue.Fields(0).Value 
End If 
End If  
End Function

In the SELECT statement, tBriefDescription is the internal name for the Summary field. You can find the internal field names in the tName column of the tblDtsFields table in the project .def file.

Adding New Notification Reports

Enterprise HelpDesk can use reports to format information included in e-mail notifications. For example, the Detailed and Summary items are formatted by reports. You can define new reports and add them to the list of items that can be included in an e-mail notification message.

To add a new report for notifications:

In HelpDesk Admin, use the Report Editor to define a new listing report.

Save and preview the report.

Exit HelpDesk Admin.

Open the project .def file.

Open the tblSystemCustomReports table, find the record for the report you just created, and get the nID value.

Open the tblMailContents table and create a new record.


Field	Description
nID	Next available ID number for a record in the tblMailContents table.
tName	Name that will appear in the Include list in the Notification Editor.
nType	2 = include in message body 3 = attachment
tFunction	The GenerateReport function takes care of generating the report for the notification message.
tArguments	<nID>.10, where <nID> is the ID of the report in tblSystemCustomReports.
nFormatType	4 = rtf 8 = text 14 = word 31 = pdf 32 = html40 See Changing the Format of Attachments for more format type values. When nType = 2, nFormatType must be 8 (text).

The report should now be available in the Include list of the Notifications Editor.

If you’re using Crystal Reports for your listing reports, you’ll have to create a Crystal Report report file (.rpt) for the new notification report.

To create an .rpt file for your notification report:

View the report in a Web view.

This creates an .rpt file in the CensusWebVD\<project>_<view>\Reports folder. For example:

C:\Program Files\PC-Duo Enterprise
	\HelpDeskServer\CensusWeb\Views
	\CensusWebVD\HelpDesk_HelpDesk\Reports

Copy the .rpt file to the HelpDeskServer\<project>\Reports folder. For example:

C:\Program Files\PC-Duo Enterprise
	\HelpDeskServer\HelpDesk\Reports

Rename the file by removing “portrait” (or “landscape”) from the .rpt file name.

Branding the Web View

About Branding

You can customize the look of a Web view by editing the CensusMain.css style sheet in CensusWeb\Views\CensusWebVD\Theme\css.

Put a copy of your customized style sheet in the CUSTOMIZEDFILES folder. For example, in #AllProjects#\Theme\css or #Project#HelpDesk\Theme\css.

View Toolbar

The view toolbar is the top part of a Web view, where the logo and the Help, Log Off, and other buttons are displayed.

Summary List Toolbar

The toolbar has three parts: the top (with the Query, Sort, and Layout lists), the middle (the Ad-hoc Query Editor), and the bottom (used for bottom rounded corner images).

For the top part:

body.ToolbarBody sets the background color.

This class is also used by many dialog boxes, such as Attach File, History, and Options.

ToolbarLeft, ToolbarCenter, and ToolbarRight set the background images. ToolbarCenter also sets the font properties for the captions.

For the middle part:

body.ToolbarM sets the background color.

ToolbarMLeft, ToolbarMCenter, and ToolbarMRight set the background images. ToolbarMCenter also sets the font properties for the captions.

For the bottom part:

body.ToolbarB sets the background color.

ToolbarBLeft, ToolbarBCenter, and ToolbarBRight set the background images.

Summary List Header

headerSummaryList

HeaderSummaryListCellCenter

HeaderSummaryListCellLeft

HeaderSummaryListCellRight

headerSummaryList sets properties for the entire table. The three HeaderListSummaryCell classes are used to set background images. If you don’t want to use images, you can comment out the HeaderListSummaryCell classes and use headerSummaryList to set the background and text colors.

Summary List

The appearance of links in the Summary List are controlled by body.SummaryListBody a:link and body.SummaryListBody a:visited.

To change the shading of the rows in the list, edit these CSS classes. The two sets of CSS classes allow for rows with alternating shading.

SummaryList1

SummaryList1Hover (for Internet Explorer)

SummaryList1HoverN (for Netscape)

SummaryList2

SummaryList2Hover (for Internet Explorer)

SummaryList2HoverN (for Netscape)

Tabs

TabsLeftCornerUp

TabsBackgroundUp

TabsRightCornerUp

TabsLeftCornerDown

TabsBackgroundDown

TabsRightCornerDown

For example, you could replace the background images or use solid colors instead of images.

To customize the font used for the text on the tabs, edit TabsBackgroundDown and TabsBackroundUp.

The area to the right of tabs (where the next/previous page controls are located) can be styled with tabsBody (the background color) and tabsBorder (the bottom border), and PageNavigation (the “Page X of Y” text).

To put a dividing border between the Summary List and the tab area, use border-top with tabsBody.

Form

Each tab in a Web view is a form that contains a table. The HTML looks like this:

So, for example, to change the background color of the tabs, edit the body.RecordBody class in CensusMain.css.

To apply styles to the form element, you can use this selector in the style sheet:

Field Captions

Field captions in a Web view are formatted with the CSS classes normalfield, requiredfield, and disabledfield.

Form Elements

The CSS class applied to a form element is specified by the CSS Class field attribute in the Web View Editor. You can customize the default CSS classes or define your own and apply them to fields through the Attribute Editor.

The default CSS classes for form elements are TextBoxWidth, ComboBoxWidth, and MemoFieldWidth, InputAttachment (for the Attachments box), and InputCalendar (for date fields).

Command Bar

The command bar is the bar at the bottom of the page that contains the Issue box and the New, Save, Cancel, and Print buttons.

body.CommandBarBody sets the background color for the command bar. You can set the text color here (except for the text in the message area).

CommandBarBLeft, CommandBarBCenter, and CommandBarBRight specify the background images for the command bar.

CommandBarMsgLeft, CommandBarMsgCenter, and CommandBarMsgRight specify the background images for the message area (e.g.: “Ready. Click New to create a new issue.”) of the command bar.

CurrentRecord and CurrentRecordHover set the style for the Current Issue text box.

Branding the Dialogs

About Dialogs

Dialogs are pages that users open by clicking a button. This includes the Attachments, Reports, Revision History, Password, Options, and Contacts dialogs.

Most of the dialogs use the same style sheet as the Web view. However, the Contacts and Password dialogs use the CensusMain.css style sheet found in CensusWebVD\Admin\THEME\css.

Common Styles for All Dialogs

body.toolbarBody sets the background color for the dialog pages (except for the Reports dialog, which uses body.ReportsBody).

The box with rounded corners is a set of background images specified by these classes:

BoxTLeft, BoxTCenter, and BoxTRight

BoxMLeft, BoxMCenter, and BoxMRight

BoxBLeft, BoxBCenter, and BoxBRight

Attachments Dialog

The list of attached files is displayed in a table. HeaderSummaryListCellCenter formats the heading row (where the "File Name" and "Remove" captions are displayed).

Reports Dialog

The appearance of the tabs is controlled by the same CSS classes that apply to the tabs in a Web view (see Tabs).

The <select> element that lists the available reports uses the ReportList class.

The “Layout:” and “Viewer Type:” captions use the AdminNormalTextDarkBG class. The corresponding <select> elements do not use a CSS class, but you can use their IDs (LayoutType and ViewerType) with ID selectors in the CSS file.

Revision History Dialog

Options Dialog

Form elements (such as <input>) are in a <TD> that uses the normalfield class, but the form elements themselves have no class.

Contacts Dialog

The caption for the Display list uses the DialogLabel class, and the <select> element uses AdminComboBoxWidth.

On the input form for contact information, the captions use requiredfield and DialogLabel. The form elements all use AdminComboBoxWidth.

Password Dialog

normalfield formats the captions “Old Password”, “Password”, and “Confirm Password”.

AdminNormalTextDarkBG formats the “Password can contain a maximum of 14 characters“ message.

Branding the Logon Pages

Logon Page

The heights of some of the table cells are hard-coded in CensusWebVD\logon.asp.

The images and background colors for the box with rounded corners are set by these classes:

div.Logon-t-left, td.Logon-t-center, div.Logon-t-right

td.Logon-m-left, div.Logon-m-center, td.Logon-m-right

div.Logon-b-left, td.Logon-b-center, div.Logon-b-right

Note the mix of div and td elements. If you want to replace the images with colors and borders, set the left and right classes to the background color and use the center classes to define your border.

LogonForm positions the logon form (the Logon Name and Password text boxes).

a.LogonState1 and a.LogonState1:hover set the images used for the Logon button.

HelpState1 and HelpState1:hover set the images used for the Help button.

ValidateLogon Page

The ValidateLogon page displays the available views. With a few exceptions (documented below), this page uses the same styles as the Logon page.

The heights of some of the table cells are hard-coded in CensusWebVD\validatelogon.asp.

ExitState1 and ExitState1:hover specify the images used for the Log Off button.

div.ViewList-decor-img is used instead of div.Logon-decor-img to display the keyboard image with the orange border

div.ViewLinks positions and sizes the area used to display the list of available views. This class also adds the vertical orange bar.

ViewList-Link, ViewList-Link:link, ViewList-Link:visited, and ViewList-Link:hover format the view names, which are hyperlinks.