DotNetNuke Skinning Whitepaper (container creation section)

Creation of containers

According to earlier ideas, containers are also a skin definition that can be applied to content modules. containers, like skin, are precisely defined for their appearance, but the setting of the two is different.

The only additional limitation than skin is when creating a container when the behavior control must be contained in the skin of the container. The behavioral control is a new feature of DotNetNuke, which acts as a role in connecting content module functionality to the Portal framework. The behavior control is essentially a user interface control that allows the functionality of the content module to manifest itself. Its main functions include: the ability to manage the location of modules in the Content column, the ability to edit the settings of the module. Also has the ability to customize functionality for specific modules, allowing users to edit content and navigate to other controls. There are many such behavior controls in the DotNetNuke. The default behavior control is the Solpartactions control, which pops up a drop-down menu when your mouse moves to the upper-left corner of the default container. This control is certainly appropriate for a newer version of the browser, but because the lower version of the browser is not able to support this pop-up feature, we also adopted a dropdownactions control, he can display in the lower version of the browser Drop-down box.

Although skins and containers are individually created, packaged, and configured, they need to be consciously combined. Of course, this can be done using the upload mechanism and apply them to the Web site's user interface. Such an operation is just a simple process, your user interface will also have a large interval, because everyone knows that the column in the skin is still visible. Column-level settings can only be set when the skin designer designs the skin, including using custom attributes in the column to add functionality to the column. You can use the container type, the container name, and the address of the container to define the containers that will be used in all modules. To make them work properly, these special containers must be placed in a special location, otherwise the default container will be displayed.

<Objects>

<Object>
<Token>[CONTENTPANE:1]</Token>
<Settings>
<Setting>
<Name>ID</Name>
<Value>LeftPane</Value>
</Setting>
<Setting>
<Name>ContainerType</Name>
<Value>G</Value>
</Setting>
<Setting>
<Name>ContainerName</Name>
<Value>DNN</Value>
</Setting>
<Setting>
<Name>ContainrSrc</Name>
<Value>standard.ascx</Value>
</Setting>
</Settings>
</Object>
</Objects>

Prior to version 2.0, DotNetNuke had some limited module container capabilities that allowed managers to use HTML to provide custom borders or outlines for content modules. The concept of this container has many problems, such as the provision of graphics stored in the Site upload folder, each request must analyze the HTML to combine them together, and performance is completely static performance. However, despite these limitations, there are many container packages that are created and published. To manage and maintain these containers, a third-party plugin used to place container pictures in their own subfolder and provide a selection mechanism is released. The good news is that it is now time to convert these earliest containers into the new DotNetNuke skin system with just a few minor modifications. (Please refer to Appendix C for more details)