Koala Skin Dev discussion

For discussing issues on the KoalaSkin.
See also the KoalaSkinTodoList

You can be mailed on changes on this topics (no more than once a day) by the nice free service at changedetection.com Of course, feel also free to mail me!

There is also a mailing list at koalaskin@koalaPLEASENOSPAM.ilog.fr

Note: For spam prevention, you must be subscribed first to these lists to post on them. Note that you can set options on your account then not to retreive emails, even if you subscribe.

There is a discussion mailing list, subscribe to koalaskin@koalaPLEASENOSPAM.ilog.fr, go to: http://koala.ilog.fr/mailman/listinfo/koalaskin, but I think now it is not really useful now, since we have changedetection.com, koalaskin-announce, the twikiirc

If you only want to have a mail when a new version is issued, subscribe to http://koala.ilog.fr/mailman/listinfo/koalaskin-announce ( recommended! )

This page discusses the current version of the skin, v2.x, for the stable TWiki release of 01 Feb 2003. You can also see the old discussions

• For discussions during year 2004 (v 2.13 to 2.14) see archive KoalaSkinDevV3
• for discussions during year 2003 (v 2.0 to v2.12), see an archived copy of this page in KoalaSkinDevV2
• for v1.x of this skin (for the stable TWiki release 01 Dec 2001), see an archived copy of this page in KoalaSkinDevV1
• before this skin was offically uploaded, in the Codev Web at KoalaSkin.

-- ColasNahaboo - 15 Jan 2004

Versions 3.x supports the Cairo (Sep 2004) and Beijing (Feb 2003) releases.

3.0 12 Jan 2005 Cairo support

• • new PRINTCSS twiki var
  • you must add a * Set PRINTCSS = to your site global prefs, in TWikiPreferences
  • new NOSHOW option
  • bin/koalaskin-generate config: new lib var
  • Beijing: you must add a * Set BROADCASTMESSAGE = to your site global prefs, in TWikiPreferences Cairo users do not need it.
  • the topic list is now TWiki.KoalaSkinWebList, not Main.WebList anymore. The generate script will rename the topic on the first run
  • fix for WikiWords in web descriptions by Benoit Hamet (see 22 Dec 2004 entry in TWiki:Plugins/KoalaSkinDev )
  • patch to apply #1 not needed anymore
  • various fixes for Cairo, one by Benoit Hamet
  • everything should be functional, but with the same looks of the previous KoalaSkin. We will incorporate pattern skin enhancements in future releases.

3.1 04 Feb 2005 Fixes

• • THEMEINHERIT option was not working properly, removed in favor of using KSTHEME in THEME= values to explicitely indicate inheritance of themes. So if you have in your definitions: KSTHEME=x and in webs things as THEMEINHERIT THEME=y, you should change to THEME=SUPER,y to keep the same behavior.
  • NAVBAR support removed
  • corrections to this documentation: WebList -> KoalaSkinWebList, removed offsite generation
  • search in left column now searches both in titles and body
  • fix for Cairo braindead behavior of leaving the topic locked on quietsave

Discussions

Could package the skin with the standard table with screenshot so that the TWikiSkinBrowser and the SkinPackage directory can pick up the skin correctly? Use the NewSkinTemplate. To make it easy here is the 600x130 screenshot:

-- PeterThoeny - 04 Feb 2005

I found a bugs in trying to edit or preview with cairo and KS 3.1 on calls to getRenderedVersion or encodeSpecialChars.

Here is my suggestion for a patch on savemulti :

--- /usr/lib/cgi-bin/twiki/savemulti.orig   2005-02-16 00:12:35.000000000 +0100
+++ /usr/lib/cgi-bin/twiki/savemulti   2005-02-23 12:29:29.000000000 +0100
@@ -156,7 +156,7 @@
       return;
     }
     
-    $text = &TWiki::decodeSpecialChars( $text );
+    $text = &TWiki::Render::decodeSpecialChars( $text );
     $text =~ s/ {3}/\t/go;
 
     my $meta = "";
@@ -283,7 +283,7 @@
     ## ForCairo: $ptext = &TWiki::takeOutVerbatim( $ptext, \@verbatim );
     $ptext =~ s/ {3}/\t/go;
     $ptext = &TWiki::handleCommonTags( $ptext, $topic );
-    $ptext = &TWiki::getRenderedVersion( $ptext );
+    $ptext = &TWiki::Render::getRenderedVersion( $ptext );
 
     # do not allow click on link before save:
     $ptext =~ s@(href=".*?")@$1 target="_blank"@goi;
@@ -292,10 +292,10 @@
 
     $tmpl = &TWiki::handleCommonTags( $tmpl, $topic );
     $tmpl = &TWiki::handleMetaTags( $webName, $topic, $tmpl, $meta );
-    $tmpl = &TWiki::getRenderedVersion( $tmpl );
+    $tmpl = &TWiki::Render::getRenderedVersion( $tmpl );
     $tmpl =~ s/%TEXT%/$ptext/go;
     
-    $text = &TWiki::encodeSpecialChars( $text );
+    $text = &TWiki::Render::encodeSpecialChars( $text );
 
     $tmpl =~ s/%HIDDENTEXT%/$text/go;
     $tmpl =~ s/%FORMFIELDS%/$formFields/go;

I hope it's correct, since I have a "specific" install of twiki (Debian package instead of regular tarball)...

-- OlivierBerger - 15 Feb 2005

There seems to be also a problem in the NAVBAR support being dropped. I think that KSNONAVBAR and KSNAVBAR were removed, but the %NAVBARx% variables remain in the templates.

-- OlivierBerger - 23 Feb 2005

Olivier: there is a problem, as with Cairo, KS do not use savemulti anymore, but directly uses "save". If KS is using savemulti, something is wrong...

-- ColasNahaboo - 23 Feb 2005

OK... it looks like indeed it doesn't use savemulti anymore... Maybe it used it since I hadn't regenerated the templates for the webs. Maybe I hadn't followed the upgrade path in the right way.

Now it works. Sorry for that.

May I suggest that savemulti be removed from the distribution, then ?

-- OlivierBerger - 24 Feb 2005

I've struck a problem trying to install on Mandrake 10.1.

The koalaskin-generate script fails with
sed: -e expression #1, char 33: unterminated `s' command

The fix was to change line 1826 from:

sed -e 's/ /=/g' -e "s/$ctrlm//g" -e 's/^=[*] [[][[][%]ATTACHURL[%].*//' \

to

sed -e 's/ /=/g' -e "s/$ctrlm//g" -e 's/^=[*] \[\[[%]ATTACHURL[%].*//' \

This is using GNU sed version 4.1.1.

-- DeanCording - 24 Mar 2005

I Have some issue with XHTML content of some pages. So This is a "small patch" (patch_template_xhtml.diff) which (at least) let WebSiteMap XHTML compliant (the w3c validator seems happy).

I guess there is some more work to do to get all Koalaskin ok, but that's a beginning :).

-- BenoitHamet - 04 May 2005

In exchange for help with my question below re: the VerbatimHorizontalScrollBar, I will offer up this little trick that I've used :

It is a simple mod to the /bin/koalaskin-generate script, which makes it so that the Group Changes link will only appear in the left buttons box if subwebs actually exist.

So in other words, if a web does not have sub webs --- then the Group Changes link will not appear. If the current web is a subweb (or if it has subwebs) then the Group Changes link will appear.

THE BOTTOM LINE OF THIS CODE :

   # $1=web $2=group $3=subwebs $4=templatesdir $5=templatesfile $6=searchgroup
   # $7=sourcetemplatefile $8=nweb
   expand_vars () {
     if test "$1" = "$2"; then #we are in a group

WAS CHANGED TO THIS CODE :

     if test "$3" ; then # subgroups exist

-- KeithHelfrich - 04 Jul 2005

Now, for my question ...

Could someone help me with instructions for how to retro-fit the VerbatimHorizontalScrollBar into KoalaSkin with CSS ?

Thanks,

-- KeithHelfrich - 04 Jul 2005

Like Olivier point in a previous comment ks_config, ks_leftbar-css2.koala.tmpl, ks_leftbar.koala.tmpl, ks_noleftbar.koala.tmpl (in the templates subdir) still have 'NAVBAR' calls.

I'm using ks_noleftbar.koala.tmpl so I've removed the call. Hope this is the correct "fix".

Also is there a way to center the subweb tabs below the first row of tabs or below the first level "empty TAB"? On my setup (I've upgrade from KoalaSkin 2.x to 3.1) they appear too much to the left.

Regards,

-- RodrigoCurado - 06 Jul 2005

To handle the %NAVBARH call, I've simply placed the following into TWikiPreferences :

• NAVBARH to blank for KoalaSkin
  • Set NAVBARH =

-- KeithHelfrich - 25 Jul 2005

Hi Colas, Do you intend to update this for DakarRelease? Will it continue to use the sh scripts? Thanks.

-- MartinCleaver - 27 Sep 2005

Colas, could you update the Skin package with the standard format based on the NewSkinTemplate, especially with the Skin Info table that has the screenshot. That will show the skin properly in the TWikiSkinBrowser and the SkinPackage directory.

BTW, except for the KoalaSkin, I obsoleted all skins that do not have a standard screenshot (those skins have not been updated for more than 2 years anyway.)

-- PeterThoeny - 16 Mar 2006

Hello everyone, long time since I'm out of the TWiki loop. I just wanted to say that I love the KoalaSkin.

I would like to upgrade to upgrade to DakarRelease but will wait for the KoalaSkin to be ready.

Colas, since there hasn't been much action on this page recently, is it still your plan to support the KoalaSkin and keep current with the latest TWiki release (even if lagging a bit behind) ?

LOVE LOVE LOVE the KoalaSkin. Thanks for everything.

-- KeithHelfrich - 02 Jun 2006

I've attached a KoalaSkin template to SectionalEditPluginDev. To use :

1. install and customize settings for SectionalEditPlugin
2. save editsection.koala.tmpl to your ../templates dir
3. run ../bin/generate

-- KeithHelfrich - 04 Jul 2006

This topic is so quiet, I get the feeling that I may be the only person using the KoalaSkin

Two questions (for Colas or anyone) :

1. I've tried but can't get the VerbatimHorizontalScrollBar working with the KoalaSkin. Any ideas ?
2. Is there any reason why the KoalaSkin would not work after an upgrade to DakarRelease ?

-- KeithHelfrich - 30 Jul 2006

1. Mmm nice CSS hack. Should be simple to add to KoalaSkin, will try to integrate it for next release.
2. KoalaSkin do not yet support Dakar. Actually, since we really use heavily TWiki at ILOG (our 20.000 wikis topics get ~500 edits per working day) we were waiting for Dakar to stabilize before switching to it. I guess Dakar is now stable enough to switch, however.

-- ColasNahaboo - 31 Jul 2006

Hi Colas,

Will templates in the next version of the KoalaSkin allow for easy integration of the SmartEditAddOn ? I hope so, because I am very excited about it !! Thanks so much.

-- KeithHelfrich - 10 Aug 2006

I have uploaded 3.2, which is a collection of bug fixes, to "clean things" before starting work on dakar integration (and later smartedit & wysiwyg editors). 3.2 still do not work on dakar.

• 3.2 18 Aug 2006 Fixes
  • fix: left margin search box wasnt working (redirected to the WebSearch page) in the default theme
  • fix: search for titles always searched the web group
  • New per-web variable COLORBG to set the page background per web. Can also be spelled BGCOLOR for html likeness. e.g.: COLORBG=white
  • printable view now include forms, at their web-sepcific position (top/bottom left/right) the print skin is thus now distributed as templates/view.koalaprint.tmpl and expansed in each web
  • skin description metadata for twiki.org gallery provided by Soraya Arias
  • some mention of NAVBAR in some templates removed
  • for theme writers: new functions: _KSLEFTBOX_link, clean_variant
  • ks_lastchanges.sh was outputting tons of "grep: writing output: Broken pipe"

-- ColasNahaboo - 28 Aug 2006

Colas, thanks for adding a skin info section to the skin topic. Possibly move it to the bottom.

I added a 600x130 image to the skin topic so that the skin gets listed properly in the SkinPackage topic. Feel free to take this into the next skin release.

For consistency, coud you package the skin using file names KoalaSkin.zip and KoalaSkin.tgz?

-- PeterThoeny - 29 Aug 2006

Hi Colas, I've just upgraded to the latest 3.2 version of the KoalaSkin. A couple of notes about my upgrade :

Since I had previously modified the following templates, I simply re-used my modified version of those templates from the older release after the upgrade to 3.2. This seems OK since it appears you did not make any changes to them. If you did (or plan to) modify these templates, would you let me know ?

• ks_topbuttons.koala.tmpl
• ks_otherindexes.koala.tmpl
• edit.koala.tmpl
• editsection.koala.tmpl (see SectionalEditPluginDev)
• view.koala.tmpl

If anybody would be interested in my modifications, please just say so. Then I would fill in the KoalaSkinTemplateMod details.

-- KeithHelfrich - 17 Oct 2006

Hi Colas,

I've come back to refractor and organize all of my questions and feature requests of late :

Questions

1. Is there another TWiki with more active KoalaSkin discussion that I could participate in ?
2. How can I modify the koalaskin-generate script disable the automatic creation of the WebSiteMap_{WEBNAME}.txt files in my TWiki web ?
   • I have a number of hidden webs and the creation of a WebSiteMap_{WEBNAME}.txt gives them away
   • Answer: remove function calls for generate_sitemaps and generate_groupmaps from section main () of koalaskin-generate
   • Suggestion: modify these functions so that they will only generate site maps for non-hidden webs
3. How can I customize the size of verbatim text (and text enclosed in equal signs like this) ?
   • those font sizes are currently too small (very difficult to read)
4. What is the progress towards supporting DakarRelease ?
   • I'm beginning to grow eager for an upgrade
5. could somebody please Quality Control the code in my template work from 02 Jun 2006 in SectionalEditPluginDev ?
6. Does the KoalaSkin support the use of TWikiForms ?
   • I have reverted to the original KoalaSkin templates, and this problem still occurs :
     • After choosing to add an existing Form from the edit template, the user is sent directly to http://domain/twiki/bin/oops/Web/TopicName/template=oopsnoformdef
     • It can also be seen that a META:FORM tag has not been added to the MetaData
     • To add the META:FORM tag manually does not quite work, either.
   • updated: i've switched over to the PatternSkin via ?set_session_variable=SKIN=gnu&clear_session_variable=TEST and the same problem still occurs with the TWikiForms. So I don't think this is a KoalaSkin problem, afterall.
     • It probably has something to do with my local installation ...

Feature Requests

Would KoalaSkin support be possible for the following :

1. DiffWordByWordAddOn
2. VerbatimHorizontalScrollBar
3. SmartEditAddOn
4. BlogPlugin (see the conversation starting on 07 Dec 2006 in BlogUpRing)
5. SynchroEdit
6. SectionalEditPlugin (See templates attached to SectionalEditPluginDev.
7. TagMePlugin (an attractive and sensible location for adding new tags %TAGME{ tpaction="" tag="" }%

-- KeithHelfrich - 11 Dec 2006

Supporting the TagMePlugin

FOUR steps are listed below as bullets. Here's a look at the results. Please feel free to take this into the next release. I first tried to add the tag-me stuff into the left bar, as an additional template include beneath the search. However, this flunked the internet explorer test, mostly because the TagMePlugin code seems to have been designed with a horizontal bias (meaning, it wants to be laid out on the page horizontally). Placing it vertically into the left bar just didn't work out.

Steps:

• attached tag_icon.gif to the TagMePlugin topic
• made these changes to TagMePlugin.pm to accomplish the following :
  1. use the new tag_icon.gif as the image for "tagging" a page
  2. use the old tag_addnew.gif (plus sign) as the image for creating new tags

200,201c200,201
<         $text .= '<input type="image" src="' . $attachUrl . '/tag_addnew.gif" name="add" alt="Add" '
<                . 'value="Select tag and add to topic" title="Select tag and add to topic" />, ';
---
>         $text .= '<input type="image" src="' . $attachUrl . '/tag_icon.gif" name="add" alt="Add" '
>                . 'value="Select tag and add to topic" title="Select tag and add to topic" /> ';
204c204
<            . "from=$web.$topic#AddNewTag\">create new tag</a>";
---
>            . "from=$web.$topic#AddNewTag\"><img src=\"$attachUrl/tag_addnew.gif\" alt=\"Create New Tag\" border=\"0\" /></a>";

• made these changes to view.koala.tmpl to accomplish the following :
  • see screenshot
  • notice: the attached template also includes other mods:
    • the javascript open window function that was found in the koalaskin edit template
    • a couple of links to help pages in the %MAINWEB% (UsingSmilies and UsingIcons)

19c31,32
< <tr><td class="topicTableOutline"><!--  Title  -->
---
> <tr><td class="topicTableOutline" align="right"><a href="%SCRIPTURL%/view/%TWIKIWEB%/TagMeViewAllTags"><font color="white" size="-1">Tags:</font></a></td></tr><!--  Title  -->
> <tr><td class="topicTableOutline">
24a38,40
>     <td align="right" valign=top class="topicItemCell">
>     </a>%TAGME{ tpaction="%URLPARAM{tpaction}%" tag="%URLPARAM{tag}%" }%
>     </td>

• finally, ran koalaskin-generate to generate templates for all webs

-- KeithHelfrich - 17 Dec 2006

Some feedback on this: After using them for some time, I'm very happy with the appearance & location of these TagMePlugin modifications.

-- KeithHelfrich - 06 Jan 2007

Favicons

Reporting a fix that I just made to the koalaskin-generate script for KoalaSkin. I found that attaching a favicon.ico file to the WebHome topic of a web did not correctly adjust the templates for that web.

Line 809 of koalaskin-generate was corrected as follows and the script works as advertised now :

809c809
<     favicon_sed='s|%FAVICON%|<link rel="SHORTCUT ICON" href="%PUBURLPATH%/$1/$webhome/favicon.ico">|'
---
>     favicon_sed='s|%FAVICON%|<link rel="SHORTCUT ICON" href="%PUBURLPATH%/%WEB%/WebHome/favicon.ico">|'

-- KeithHelfrich - 19 Dec 2006

More work with the favicons shows that:

• extracurricular pages like more topic actions and attach do not use the favicon that was attached to Web.WebHome
  • they seem to be using %WIKILOGOIMG% or possibly an older version of favicon that was attached to KoalaSkinWebList
  • since I have used the same icon in both place, I can't tell which is which
  • but it is clear that these pages are not using the favicon that was attached to Web.WebHome

Discussions cont ...

Now that EdinburghRelease is available, I am officially begging for a KoalaSkin that supports TWiki 4.0+

Colas, back on Jul 31, 2006 I was relieved to hear that the KoalaSkin will still be supported. But now it is six months later and the skin maintainers haven't made any more posts since then. Could you give us an update ?

-- KeithHelfrich - 20 Jan 2007

Would anyone happen to have suggestions as to how I might tweak TWiki.pm in v4.1.2 to work with the SPACEDTOPICP.patch that KoalaSkin requires?

-- EdwardSandstig - 26 Mar 2007

Hi Edward, are you using the KoalaSkin on TWiki version 4.x successfully ? The skin package has not been updated since January, 2005 when it was made to support CairoRelease. Now that the Codev community is working on a CodeName for the GeorgetownRelease (almost 18 months later), I think it is safe to say that this skin is no longer being maintained or supported.

Colas, can we please get any indication at all about your plans to maintain this skin ? Thank you.

-- KeithHelfrich - 02 May 2007

Sorry, I tried to reply before but TWiki.org was so slow that the save aborted in timeout

Although TWiki is the backbone of our intranet (with 33,000 pages), we are still based on Cairo, which explains the current paradoxal situation (a stable skin for a thriving wiki site). I should be able to upgrade the skin this summer I think, as we plan to move our Intranet to Dakar this fall. The work that I have to do is to understand the internals of Dakar first, I did not had a sufficiently long stress-free free time to achieve this up to now

PS: I like my software like my wines: it must rest 3 years before beginning to be drinkable :-). And for the linux people here, yes I run Debian stable

PS#2: Dakar breaks some of our user pages, this is why we didnt migrate yet. This is not a rant, I am in favor of enhancing things, even with incompatible changes. It is just that upgrading a living big site is not something you can plan to do in some hours.

-- ColasNahaboo - 17 May 2007

After some looking around, I think that I may not continue maintaining KoalaSkin anymore. KoalaSkin was done for 3 things: [1] easier use [2] packaging useful patches [3] managing 100+ webs

But now, nice and well maintain skins like Natskin provide [1], the TWiki engine enhancements [2]. I will try first to see if we can use Natskin with some custom "mix-ins" to provide [3] and customize it for our use in ILOG.

I will post here my findings, but I guess it is safe to say that KoalaSkin will be replaced by the NatSkin + a mixin to manage 100+ webs

-- ColasNahaboo - 10 Aug 2007

Hi Colas,

Funny you should mention. My CairoRelease TWikiSite is still at Cairo exactly because I'm on KoalaSkin there and was waiting for an upgrade. But so much time had gone by I was just getting ready to post and suggest that I was going to abandon KoalaSkin for NatSkin.

Maybe we can share some tips & tricks with each other in MigratingFromKoalaSkinToNatSkin.

Thanks for the great Koala .. at the time it was developed, it was the best thing around !!

-- KeithHelfrich - 10 Aug 2007

Finally, we chose to develop a full skin from scratch for ILOG intranet. We had usability people gave specifications of what they wanted, followed by designers working on the looks. It was too hard to bend pattern or nat to do what we needed to do. I think we will be able to release the skin later, but if will be quite ILOG-specific (for instance, we will not use the TWiki search but mnogosearch). On my personal community sites, I will use pattern for now (for its support of the WYSIWYG editor), despite its slowness, and I will try to create a super-fast, super-simple, non customizable skin from scratch for my public site.

I guess that if one day a "son of Koala" skin is to be made, it should try to use the same principles: compile highly runtime-efficient TWiki templates from centralized descriptions, but I guess in a standard template engine such as http://www.kuwata-lab.com/tenjin/

-- ColasNahaboo - 26 Feb 2008

Let me know if you need a ILOG theme for NatSkin.

-- MichaelDaum - 27 Feb 2008