Hosting themes outside the dashboard

This feature is designed to be used by sites that want to take control of theme configuration. A common use case would be having a hosted location for themes, which means that the dashboard will be configured with the predefined theme for all users. To support this, a new variable called PI_STYLES_EXTERNAL_THEME_PATH has been created.

Please consider the following points when hosting a theme outside the dashboard:

• If an external theme path has not been specified, the default theme for the dashboard will be theme shown in the PI_STYLES field. Please remember that you can also set different themes for individual users in the Users, Configuration screen and users will also be able to choose their own themes on the User account page (accessed by clicking their name on the More Options icon at the top right of the Dashboard). Please refer to this section in pi Documentation for further details.

• If an external theme path has been specified

  • the theme path becomes the specified network path

  • the CSS Styles tab on the Configuration screen will be removed (network files are read only)

  • users will not be able to choose their own theme on the User account page and admin will not be able to set different themes for different users in the User, Configuration screen.

The following points apply when using the system variable PI_STYLES_EXTERNAL_THEME_PATH :

• When access to the external theme fails, the system will revert to using the default system theme specified in the PI_STYLES field.

• When access to the external theme is successful, the system will start to use the new theme immediately.

You can set the themes to come from a remote site. This would make them read-only which means you'd have to edit them on a separate dashboard and then upload them to that remote repository.

This is done via editing the "PI_STYLES_EXTERNAL_THEME_PATH" variable setting (as per our variables documentation) in the Settings screen of Dashboard Configuration: