Tutorial: Branding and Theming of BI launch pad
In my previous tutorial I already talked about how to change the name and URL of BI launch pad. Often this is not enough and partners as well as customers would like to change the logo or even color scheme of BI launch pad. The SAP BI 4.0 SP4 release introduced a branding and theming mechanism that will be maintained over patches. Detailed documentation about how to customize BI launch pad, Cyrstal reports or OpenDocument can be found in the SAP BusinessObjects BI Customization Guide (see Web Application Customization section). For this tutorial I like to focus on BI launch pad customization only. Please note that knowledge of cascaring style sheets (css) is needed for this customization. You can make changes as small as changing the logo files or as big as changing the entire color scheme of BI launch pad, it all depends on how many styles you override.
Retrieve sample files
As this customization can be quite complex, we provide you with a sample customization as part of the installation package. The template.zip file is located in the Collaterals\CustomizationTemplate folder of your installation package, and contains the branding bundles (JAR files) to customize. This file is the starting point for customizing your web applications.
- Copy template.zip from the Collaterals\CustomizationTemplate folder of your installation package to a directory on your local drive.
- Extract the template.zip file
- Once extracted navigate to the sub-folder SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles\webapps\BOE\WEB-INF\eclipse\plugins of the extracted package
- In that folder there is a com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar bundle, which contains a sample customization. Using winrar, extract the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar bundle
- The sample files are located in web\sample folder. The sample contains sample images as well as a sample css file to override the BI launch pad style as guidance. You can customize as little or as much as you like!
- Open the customize.css file located in \web\sample\css folder using Notepad++ (or any other text editor)
Create customization files
It is recommended to start with a blank customize.css and add customized styles to the blank file using the sample as guidance rather than modifying the sample customize.css file itself.
You can customize the favicon, logo, backgrounds, styles, and more. Most of these customizations involve changing the CSS rules in the customize.css
file. All customizations must be made available in the web folder of com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar to take effect. The web folder has to have the following sub-folder structure:
\web
\css
customize.css
\images
favicon.ico
\theme
*.png, *.gif
- Under the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding folder created from the extraction of the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar bundle, create the folder structure mentioned above
- BI launch pad uses a few images as background for its UI, for this tutorial I have created a customized sub-set of these images. Download the “BI launch pad background images in light red.zip“. Extract the file and drop the images the theme folder.
- Create a new customize.css file in the css folder using Notepad++ (or any other text editor)
Customize BI launch pad logon page
The following diagram show the elements customized in this activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the sample customize.css file. Our official documentation contains more detailed diagrams if you like to customize more parts. For the cases that the color is defined as hex color, I have suggested a new color value; feel free to use any value you like.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Customize BI launch pad top part
The following diagram show the elements customized in the activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the
sample customize.css file.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Customize BI launch pad home page
The following diagram show the elements customized in the activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the
sample customize.css file.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Customize BI launch pad Universal Repository Explorer
The following diagram show the elements customized in the activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the
sample customize.css file.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Customize BI launch pad Menu
The following diagram show the elements customized in the activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the
sample customize.css file.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Customize BI launch pad Simple Dialogs
The following diagram show the elements customized in the activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the
sample customize.css file.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Customize BI launch pad Large Dialogs
The following diagram show the elements customized in the activity, for reference purposes. The numbers in the boxes refer to sections in the
sample customize.css file.
- By using the sample customize.css file and the diagram below, add the new css styles to the new customize.css file.
Testing your customizations
Before performing customizations on your production systems, it is good practice to test your customizations first on a test installation. In a default installation that uses the bundled Tomcat server, you can instantly see the effects of your changes by making temporary modifications to the webpath.InfoViewBranding folders in the Tomcat work directory:
<INSTALLDIR>\SAP BusinessObjects\tomcat\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\ This folder have the same structure as the branding resources contained in template.zip. Note: The Tomcat work directory is not permanent and your temporary changes are deleted when patching. You may need to restart tomcat and clear your browser cache to see the temporary changes.
Create the custumization bundle
-
Using Winrar open the sample com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar bundle
-
Delete the sample folder within the bundle
-
Add the your customized css and image folders and its underlying files under the web folder. Close Winrar
-
Copy the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar branding bundle in the following location
<INSTALLDIR>\SAP BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles\webapps\BOE\WEB-INF\eclipse\plugins
Deploy custimization files
In order for these changes to show in BI launch pad one has to run wdeploy.
- Stop Tomcat using the Central Configuration Manager
- Use WDeploy to redeploy the BOE.war file on Tomcat. Wdeploy is available via the Start menu.
- Wait for WDeploy to finish
- Restart Tomcat
View customization
-
Clear your Browser cache in order to ensure that the browser consumes the new styles
-
Login to BI launch pad as Administrator.
-
Browse around to view the customization
very helpful thanks for sharing.
Regards,
Sohel
Awesome Christina.
liked, rated & bookmarked. Thanks for sharing.
This is brilliant! I love the fact that SAP is opening up these options!!
Which version is supposed to be covered by these entry? 4.0 or 4.1? Text seems to refer 4.0 but links directs to a 4.1 doc. I´m a bit confused.
Thanks
it was first introduced in 4.0 SP4
I can't find the directory "webpath.OpenDocumentBranding"
Hi Thomas,
I just noticed that it should be webpath.InfoViewBranding instead of webpath.OpenDocumentBranding; if you want to brand BI launch pad, use webpath.OpenDocumentBranding for branding openDocument.
Now we don't create these folders with the install, it is created when you drop the branding jars and run wdeploy. This prevents that the folders are overridden with any patches. If you want to test the branding before you drop the branding bundles and run wdeploy then you have to create the folder yourself.
I hope this helps,
Christina
Hi Christina,
I followed the steps mentioned by you, however it still picks up the same default images for me.
Work Flow:
1. Stop Tomcat
2. Copy the Branding customization jar file to wrafile folder
3. Clear the Tomcat cache under work and cleared the webapps folder
4. Wdeployed
5. Start Tomcat
It still shows the default one.
It does show the branding folder under work and webapps "same location as above" but the changes are not reflecting.
Tried clearing the browser cache as well.
- Satish
Hi Sarish,
can you check whether wdeploy moved the branding files into the Tomcat work\webapps folder?
Also did you ensure that the branding jar file has the exact folder stucture as listed below?
\web
\css
customize.css
\images
favicon.ico
\theme
*.png, *.gif
Thanks, Christina
Yes, It does show the branding folder under work and web apps "same location as above" but the changes are not reflecting.
Also the folder structure is exactly same... I have copied it without changing..
Hi Satish,
Do your css and Images folders exist directly under webpath.InfoViewBranding\web or webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\sample. I deployed the jar file without changing. But I had to move the css and images folder from sample to one level up to make the customization work.
We're on BO 4.0 SP5. And a screen shot here.
Yes, that did the magic 🙂
I removed it from samples and placed it under web folder; it worked.
Thanks for your help !!!
yes, you have to move the content from the sample folder up, hence I asked whether you had the exact folder structure
Thanks Christina,
its work. But if i start the BI LaunchPad through the Enterprise Portal than the customizing css is not working.
I am not sure whether we tested the customization together with the portal. I'll check with the development team
What browser are you using? If you're using IE can you ensure that you are not running in comparability mode?
we are using ie9, comparability mode is disabled
Hi Christina,
Version: SAP BO SP4 14.0.4.738
I had no webpath.InfoViewBranding under C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins. So I created a folder named 'webpath.InfoViewBranding' and then copied folders from template.zip.
So now my folder path is
C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\css\cutomize.css
and
C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\images
Cleared browser temp files.But no change in effect.
How to delete Tomcat cache?Is it needed?
Please help me.
Thanks
Sandeep
The folder structure has to be exactly as follows
\web
\css
customize.css
\images
favicon.ico
\theme
*.png, *.gif
If you just copied from the template zip file then you likely have a sample folder under the web folder. Ensure the folder structure is as I stated above.
Paths are
C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\css\cutomize.css
and
C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\images\theme\
and
C:\Program Files (x86)\SAP BusinessObjects\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding\web\images\favicon.ico
No 'sample' folder.
Please look into this.
Thanks
Sandeep
Hi,
your directories seem to be correct. You may need to restart
tomcat. Also please note that we only recommend to edit these directories for
testing purposes. For your actual deployment please make sure you copy your
customized the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar
branding bundle in the following location <INSTALLDIR>\SAP
BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles\webapps\BOE\WEB-INF\eclipse\plugins
and run wdeploy. Otherwise your changes may be overridden at patch time. If you
have further problems maybe go that route.
Also make sure you got the META-INF folder.
On a side note, it may help to get faster answers from the
community by posting questions as a question in the forum rather than a comment
to the blog post.
Thanks,
Christina
Hi Christina,
I´m using BO 4.1
A folder called webpath.InfoViewBranding is not under plugins.
Is it necessary to create this folder or use the folder com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding created from the jar ?
Regards,
Stefan
Hi Christina,
thanks.
So for testing in the tomcat work dir without deploying, I have to create the folder webpath.InfoViewBranding, and not com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding
Right ?
Regards
Stefan
Yes
Hi...Great details...I am looking to add a link on the BI Launchpad logon screen...this link will open a URL where user could change the PW....Could you please help or direct me on how to acheive this.
Thanks,
Usman
Excellent....
Thanks for sharing Christina......
Excellent !!
Thanks Christina.
Is there any way to change color or create the below png files, Its very difficult to create and change the color of existing one.
combinedResources.png
layout_sprite.png
menuelements.png
sprite.png
toolbar_elements.png
Or probably we can get/download bigger png files to edit and make changes.
Inputs will be really appreciated 🙂
I generally edit them using photoshop. You can try Irfanview which is free. And you can always increase the zoom to edit the picture in a well-controlled manner.
Cheers
Mohan
Hi, I don't have much other images, I could maybe dig out the out of box blue images, but the size should be the same and they still need to be modified using a image processing tool such as photoshop or fireworks. You can also create brand new ones as long as you maintain the size of the image.
Thanks,
Christina
Very Useful, Thanks!!! 😀
thanks for sharing ..
Great guide! Thank you for writing down these steps to share 🙂
Benni
Following is what I did, we do not have the branding files as part of the regular install.. But I just wanted to test and see if the customization would work. So I Created the folder webpath.InfoViewBranding in ........\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins and made sure the structure is the same as mentioned above.
I am not able to see the changes that I made to the customize.css file. Is there any other checks that I need to do... or do I have to deploy the default jar file?
Thank you.. and always appreciate you taking the time to provide us such valuable information.
-Guru
Hi,
the branding file are not part of the default install and will not be dropped when you install. This is done in order to ensure they don't get overridden when you patch the system.
Your directory seem to be correct. You may need to restart
tomcat. Also please note that we only recommend to edit the tomcat work directories for
testing purposes. For your actual deployment please make sure you copy your
customized the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar
branding bundle in the following location <INSTALLDIR>\SAP
BusinessObjects Enterprise XI 4.0\warfiles\webapps\BOE\WEB-INF\eclipse\plugins
and run wdeploy. Otherwise your changes may be overridden at patch time. If you
have further problems maybe go that route.
On a side note, it may help to get faster answers from the
community by posting questions as a question in the forum rather than a comment
to the blog post.
Thanks,
Christina
Great tutorial! I wish it was here 6 months ago...
Great Tutorial...
thank you for sharing
Great Tutorial, thanks!!
Thanks Christina,
Good to see we finally have some detailed options of customization, since the obfuscation of code in XI and didn't really support customization well, since Crystal Enterprise.
With regards to the "support" question, would support requests from customers be rejected based on customization? What would be the easiest way to revert back?
Kind Regards,
Denis
Hi,
the customization as described is supported, and customers using this mechanism of using the branding bundles should not be rejected by support. Having said that any customization outside the branding bundles and what is documented in our official documentation may not be supported by support.
If you do want to revert back just remove the branding bundles and run wdeploy.
Regards,
Christina
For the Weblogic integration we show the entire BI launch pad in a frame, so yes it should be available for Weblogic as well.
Thanks for the wonderful document. Is there a way to add another drop down in the BILaunchpadjust below the authentication drop down and populate with values ?
Will Do Christina Thanks
Excellent Tutorial, Thank you!
Very Good Document
Thanks!
very useful document, thanks.
Thanks a lot Christina....Nicely explained to all of us. Good one.
Thanks for sharing.
🙂
Regards,
Krishna Chaitanya.
Hi Christina
I applied the same sturcture you have given for template.zip file and copied that zip file under C:\SAPCustomTool\packages\dunit\product.businessobjects64.oemzips-4.0-core-nu
Created a new OEMZips folder and pasted that zip file .deployed the file using customization.exe now i exceuted the setup file under output folder , but the themes which are in template were not affected in BI lauchpad 🙁 , could you please suggest me what to do ?
Hi Christina,
is that the same way for BO 4.1?
Regards,
Stefan
Yes
Hi Christina,
Great post! Its nice to raise awareness of such great customization options for the BI Platform.
-Brian
Thanks
wow. very good information.
Thanks a lot.
Thank you for this. I have done a Hands-On workshop on this at SAP TechEd Amsterdam and was told you can also customise the CMC which is going to be useful for some of our customers to easily differentiate Dev / Test / Prod environments and avoid silly mistakes!
Aaahhh that's a shame. That's what we were told during the hands-on session.
Thanks for replying.
Thanks Christina Obry
Really a great doc , I have been looking for this some times back but did not find than time...
At least it would be a good reference going forward..
Keep up the excellent work..
Thank you Christina. Is the custom style sheet an all or nothing change, i.e., can I only add the style changes I want, (logo, banner) and keep the default styles by not adding anything else or is it such that once I start down this path I'll be restyling all of Launchpad?
Thx
patw
Can we have more than one set of these files to go with a multi-tenant setup? If there was a $Tenant_Template$ variable for choosing among several sets of InfoViewBranding sub-folders it would be awesome.
Hi Christina!
I am working with BO 4.0 SP7.
I followed the steps in the guide (http://help.sap.com/businessobject/product_guides/sbo41/en/sbo41_bi_customization_en.pdf), but unfortunately did not work.
I followed the steps to retrieve sample files.
I created the customization files.
I created the custumization bundle.
Finally I deploy files custimization (but unsuccessfully).
Please see the evidence of my implementation:
https://drive.google.com/folderview?id=0B5Zu_tLQU_rJQTBxcXZ1YXpMUjg&usp=sharing
Could you help me?
I can't access that share.Make sure that the folder structure in the bundle is the correct one. Also it's best to post as a new discussion rather than a comment on a blog post. That way others can benefit from it too
Can somebody pls provide the template.zip file, didn't find anywhere in collaterals or DUNIT folders.
thanks,
Vish
Hi Raghuwansh,
If you have files pertaining to installation of SAP Business Objects Platform, unzip the installer.
After you unpack find "template.zip", see:
C:\Users\Administrator\Desktop\51046794\DATA_UNITS\BusinessObjectsServer_win\Collaterals\CustomizationTemplate
If you do not have the executable files on it, follow these steps to download the SAP Marketplace site:
1. https://websmp203.sap-ag.de/support
2. software Downloads
3. SAP Software Download Center
4. Installations and Upgrades
5. A - Z Index (Installations and Upgrades - B)
6. SBOP BI platform (former SBOP Enterprise)
7. SBOP BI PLATFORM (ENTERPRISE)
8. And then select your version 4.0 or 4.1
I hope I have helped you.
Best regards,
Carrilho
thanks Tiago for the information above.
We are on BI 4.1 SP1
after downloading the zip file and extracting it, i am not able to find any other folder in collaterals. there is only one folder "Docs" in it.
thanks,
Vish
Hi Vish,
You must download the server version.
For example, "PLAT SBOP BI 4.1 SP2 SERVER WIN 64B" (Download objects: 51047190_1, 51047190_2, 51047190_3 and 51047190_4).
See the screenshot:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B5Zu_tLQU_rJcWtYZHNBZE05Mkk/edit?usp=sharing
Screen Shot 2013-12-03 at 19.17.16.png - Google Drive
Note: If you need, is available from the 11/27/2013 the SP02 for download.
SBOP BI 4.1 SP2 PLAT 64B SERVER WIN 1 of 4
SBOP BI 4.1 SP2 PLAT SERVER WIN 64B 2 of 4
SBOP BI 4.1 SP2 PLAT SERVER WIN 64B 3 of 4
SBOP BI 4.1 SP2 PLAT SERVER WIN 64B 4 of 4
I hope this helps.
Best regards,
Carrilho
it will take a while for wdepoy to run. turning off tomcat prior running wdeploy helps. If it continues to hang maybe create a support ticket for someone to actually look at your system (I can't do that over SCN 🙂 )
This is a very helpful article. I think I read through the document 5 or 6 times to ensure that I was on the right track and was able to put into effect my desired color changes so that my users know they are logged into our test environment rather than production.
Thanks!
Thanks! Glad you found it helpful and were successful with your implementation 🙂
Hi Christina,
Thanks for sharing useful information about Customization.
I have an issue keeping logo on BI Launch Pad Logon Page.
After adding new Logo it is working when I was Accessing BI Launch Pad from server.
But I cannot see the logo if I can access BI launchpad from other machine.
Please let me know if I am missing anything in configuration.
Thanks,
Kumar
Hi Christina,
Great article on the branding and theming of BI launch pad. I am in the process of doing this and I am pretty new in Administration as most of my experience is in development. I looked at the Collateral folder and I was not able to find the customization subfolder or the template.zip file.
Any ideas on where this file would be located. I am using BO 4.0
Thanks
Singaram
Hi Singaram,
which version of SAP BI 4.0 are you on? It is only supported for SP4 and above.
Thanks,
Christina
Hello Christina,
I have upgraded to 4.1 SP2 from 4.0 SP4.
I tried to customise BI logon pad using sap note 1586824 - BI 4.0 - How to customize and add company logos to BI Launch Pad / Logon Page , but it didn't help me ..
I have restarted Tomcat couple of times too 🙂
Any suggestion please.
Regards,
Dharmendra Kumar
Hi Dharmendra,
You need to make sure that the custom images are in the web\images\theme folder and also it's been properly referred to in the customize.css file.
Have a look at the BI Customization Guide (http://help.sap.com/businessobject/product_guides/sbo41/en/sbo41sp1_bi_customization_en.pdf)
In particular Chapter 4 "Web Application Customization" will be most relevant for you.
Thanks,
Derrick
Hello Derrick,
Thank you for your reply.
I'm wondering, where can i find "template.zip file " .
Can not find template.zip file .
I checked my installation directory D:\<> SAPBO ... \ ..4.0 but could not find any such files.
Regards,
Dharmendra Kumar.
Hi Dharmendra,
You can find the template.zip in \Collaterals\Tools\CustomizationTemplate\template.zip from your installation package.
Thanks,
Derrick
Hello Derrick,
I'm not sure..
All I see under Collaterals folder are Addon & Doc .
I did a quick search in local drive in server but don't find template.zip.
Strange .. raised a message with SAP but they declined saying they can not support custimozation 🙁
Regards,
Dharmendra Kumar
Hi Derrick,
My issues for solved.
I got required template.zip file from installation S/w base for 4.1
Thank you.
Regards,
Dharmendra Kumar
Excellent article!
When I attempted to do this I ran into some difficulty. Having followed all of the steps I was unable to see any changes in BI Launchpad. We have English and French locales installed. Once I updated the resources in "<tomcat_work_dir>\catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoView_lang.en" then my changes appeared (I added the "css" directory and "customize.css" under the "webpath.InfoView_lang.en" folder.)
I tried the same steps repackaging the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoView_lang.en.jar and redeployed, but that doesn't seem to work - in fact, it jacked the English UI up and defaulted to French.
I was going to try the same for com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoView.jar, but I thought I'd reach out first to see if I'm barking up the wrong tree.
Any thoughts or suggestions?? We are on BI4 SP4. Any assistance is appreciated!
Regards,
--Ezra
Hi Ezra,
Do you use wdeploy to deploy your customization? It's recommended to always use wdeploy to deploy your customizations. I am suspecting it's likely that your updates to the bundles does not get picked up in tomcat. (e.g. if you go to your tomcat/work directory you might find that the customization files are not updated.)
Thanks,
Derrick
Yes, I used WDeploy to push the updated jar file. My tomcat/work directory structure looks like:
<tomcat_workdir>\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins...
\webpath.InfoViewBranding
\META-INF
\web
\css
customize.css (my custom css file)
\images
\webpath.InfoView_lang.en
\META-INF
\web
\css
customize.css (same custom css file -added this manually after running WDeploy)
\help
\WEB-INF
\webpath.InfoView_lang.fr
\META-INF
\web
\css
customize.css (same custom css file -added this manually after running WDeploy)
\help
\WEB-INF
So, although "webpath.InfoViewBranding" folder was successfully deployed to the tomcat work directory (using WDeploy), my changes weren't picked up. However, after manually adding the same 'customize.css' file to the '\webpath.InfoView_lang.en\web\css' and '\webpath.InfoView_lang.fr\web\css' folders, the changes appeared.
Right now I'm assuming this has something to do with the multi-lingual deployment we have in place, but I'm taking all thoughts/hints/suggestions!
Thanks,
--Ezra
Hi Christina
Very helpful. Is it documented anywhere how to change the label "BI launch pad" on the actual tab of the browser that relates to the BI Launch Pad window? When I customise the bilaunchpad.properties for app.name and app.name.short, it displays on the browser tab for the logon page, but not once logged on (still displays "BI launch pad", and I can't find where this is referenced).
Thanks in anticipation.
Hi Glenn,
The app.name value should be what's displayed on the browser tab once you logged in. You can check the \warfiles\webapps\BOE\WEBI-INF\config\custom\ folder in your tomcat directory to see if the changes have been picked up.
Thanks,
Derrick
Christina,
Thanks for the great tutorial. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to get it to work. We're currently on BO 4.0 SP6. I've followed the instructions verbatim. I've deployed the BOE.war file using WDeploy and verified that exact folder structure exists under <BOE Install>\Tomcat6\webapps\BOE\WEB-INF\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding (we did not have an InfoViewBranding folder before I completed the tutorial). I verified that the new, custom images, etc were under this directory. I've cleared the Tomcat cache, cleared browser cache, redeployed numerous times but can't seem to get the customizations to take effect.
As a test, I located the "webpath.InfoView" folder in the Tomcat directory,
<BOE Install>\Tomcat6\work\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoView\web\images, and I changed a few image files. Those changed took effect on the BI Launchpad login screen.
I've tried posting my issue on the support page, but everyone keeps referencing your tutorial and suggesting my folder structure is incorrect or WDeploy did not work. But as far as I can tell everything is per the instructions.
So I'm confused as to what I'm doing wrong. Should I be altering the "webpath.InfoView" jar instead of the "webpath.InfoViewBranding" jar? Or do I need to change a setting elsewhere to get BO to look at the "webpath.InfoViewBranding" folder?
Thanks in advance for your help,
Jason
Hi Jason,
You do not need to change the "webpath.InfoView" jar nor change a setting to get BO to look at the "webpath.InfoViewBranding" folder.
You mentioned the customization works if you manaully apply the changes in the tomcat/work directory.
Have you compared the "working" version with the "not-working" version that you got via wdeploy? Are there any differences between the folder structure?
Best,
Derrick
Hey Derrick,
Thanks for the reply.
I get that you should not need to change the "webpath.InfoView" jar.
<You mentioned the customization works if you manaully apply the changes in the tomcat/work directory.> No, I mentioned that the only way I am able to see any sort of change is if I do make changes to the "webpath.InfoView" jar.
I've checked files/folder structures time & time again and don't see anything that varies from the tutorial. I've cleared caches (browser, Tomcat), restarted Tomcat, restarted the entire server. I've tried making temporary changes to the work directory, but nothing works. The tutorial, and subsequent solutions in the comments, are pretty descriptive, so I'm just not sure what I'm missing.
Can anyone tell me how can i customize SAP Crystal Report Server with my own logos,reducing the product size,showing my logos in the installation process.Is it possible?
Hi Arun,
There's a section in the customization guide (http://help.sap.com/businessobject/product_guides/sbo41/en/sbo41sp1_bi_customization_en.pdf) on Crystal Report 2011 Customization that might be useful for you.
Best,
Derrick
I followed the steps exactly how it is mentioned in the doc..and I am able to customize the installer, start menu links, add-remove program name, launchpad url, product name.
But, the favicon, css and logo are not having any effect. I checked the <tomcat_workdir>\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoViewBranding folder and the folder structure there is same as suggested here and the contents are also as expected.
Once I copied the css and images into <tomcat_workdir>\Catalina\localhost\BOE\eclipse\plugins\webpath.InfoView, the customization works.
Not sure why it is not working without manually changing the folder. It should come with the installation I suppose.
I am using BO 4.1 SP2.
Please advise if I am doing anything wrong.
Thanks,
Arijit
Very helpful. Thanks for sharing.
Regards,
Abhijit
Very usefull
Hi Christina.
Is There a chance to change the default font color in BI Launchpad.
The standard colors seems to be Dark Gray and Black and we would like to use some lighter ones (white, or light gray).
Thank You in advance.
Albino.
Hi Christina,
thanks for the great tutorial.
I have one question, which is actually quite important:
How can I change the color of the standard-menubar inside the BI launch pad top part???
It´s the dark-blue menu. I have to change the text color in black. Inside the sample-file they change the icon for the 2nd item inside the helpmenu, but how can I change, for example, the title color of the helpmenu bar??
Thanks for your help!
Martin
Thank you very much for your help, this tutorial helped me a lot.
José Gómez
I have the same issue as others. Im on 4.1. Followed the instructions perfectly. After deploying BOE I can see webpath.InfoViewBranding folder now and every everything in structure is way it should be but changes dont show on luanchpad. Restarted Tomcat serveral times, deleted and recreated localhost folder, cleared my own browser cache. Everything I can think of but its not using webpath.InfoViewBranding folder. Any other ideas?
\webpath.InfoViewBranding
\META-INF
\web
\css
customize.css
\images
Alex,
I finally figured out the problem, at least what was keeping my branding from working, and it sounds like you may be experiencing the same thing. It had to do with the jar command to repackage the com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar file in the SAP Business Objects BI Customization Guide. The command they tell you to use is:
jar cf com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar web META-INF
This command creates a new (blank) MANIFEST.MF file in the META-INF directory. I use the following command instead:
jar cfm com.businessobjects.webpath.InfoViewBranding.jar MANIFEST.MF web
NOTE: I moved the MANIFEST.MF file out of the META-INF folder and had it at the same level as the web folder just to make typing the command easier. It will create a META-INF folder and include the MANIFEST.MF file.
After finding the blank MANIFEST.MF file, I used this Java tutorial on JAR files to figure out what was causing the issue: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/deployment/jar/index.html
Specifically, the details of the command I used above to package the manifest file is located here: http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/deployment/jar/modman.html
Hope this helps,
Jason
Jason, I cant thank you enough for posting this resolution. I opened up my manifest.MF and sure enough it was blank. I didnt even think to check that. Performed your steps of repackaging the way you said and then redeployed and bam! All good.
Thanks a lot Jason!
Glad to help. This one had me scratching my head for quite a while, so hopefully this will save some other folks the time & frustration as well.
very helpful for sharing! 🙂
i want to show sth. in chinese,but it show messy code, so please help me. thanks advanced!
I have installed BI 4.1 SP3. I have unzipped the template.zip found in the ...\Collaterals\CustomizationTemplate install folder. The customize.css template doesn't have a sample section for the "1.0 SAP BusinessObjects banner text". It starts the BI Launch pad section with 1.1.
Can someone post the .css syntax for the 1.0 SAP BusinessObjects banner text
I found the answer to my question. In 4.1 SP3 the SAP Banner text is not managed in the customize.css but rather the BIlaunchpad.properties.
It is the "app.custom.product.name=" switch.
The default is:
app.custom.product.name=SAP BusinessObjects
Hi Christina,
I would like to add a hyperlink and custom message in BI launch pad home page.
Is there any way this is possible.
I have already added a hyperlink and custom message in BI launch pad login page by editing logon.jsp file
Do we have access to jsp files for other pages as well?
Regards
HH
Very helpful, excellent!! Thanks....
Hi,
I have moved to new responsibilities within SAP a year ago. I am blocking new comments to this thread, please post questions to the BI Platform forum to allow the community to help further.
Thanks,
Christina