Branding folders

Creating Shareable Custom Branding folders (2.8+)

Create and deploy your own branding folder to change installation appearance and options

By default, all Omniscope installations, including free Viewers, are installed without a folder in the installation directory named "branding". In the absence of such a folder with specific contents (see below), the default Visokio screens and branding are displayed each time Omniscope install or opens. The branding folder on one specific reference installation can be customised to contain various custom images and text settings that, if present, take precedence over the default Omniscope settings.

Licensing permitting, Omniscope permits power users to create/test on their own installations, then share (or remotely deploy in a Bundled Installer) copies of their own branding folders, enabling them to change appearance and features available in other installations that install or includes their branding folder.

Beginning with version 2.8, branding folders can be deployed and periodically updated as installable .ILF files either on their own (to modify existing installations), or as part of a Bundled Installer that creates new, re-branded installations from a single click on the executable.

Download a sample bundling package as a starting point

To create a custom branding folder, first choose a reference machine installation and download this sample branding folder as a starting point:

Sample default branding folder (.ZIP)

Examples of all the elements that can be rebranded on full Omniscope installs are available in this download. Add your branding to the images as necessary (some images are size sensitive) then edit the config.properties file appropriately as documented in the example file itself. 

If you have a bundler version  of Omniscope installed on the reference machine, you can also download and click on a sample .ILF branding package to have Omniscope install it automatically:

Bundler default branding package (.ILF)

The location of the branding folder once installed will depend on the version of operating system on the refernce machine, and whether Omniscope has been installed on that machine for All User accounts, or only the Current User account:

Windows OS:  Omniscope installed for all users (default): 

  • XP: C:\Program Files\Visokio Omniscope\branding
  • Vista/Win7/Win8 (32-bit): C:\Program Files\Visokio Omniscope\branding 
  • Vista/Win7/Win8 (64-bit): C:\Program Files (x86)\Visokio Omniscope\branding 
If Omniscope is installed for current user only, or if current user installs by clicking on .ILF branding package, the folder will be here:
  • XP: C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Local Settings\Application Data\Visokio Omniscope app\branding 
  • Vista/Win7/Win8: C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Visokio Omniscope app\branding
Mac OS: On Mac, right-click Omniscope and "Show package contents", then drop the "branding" folder in Contents/Resources/Java).   

Editing Branding Folder package contents 

The branding folder contains sub-folders and files that can be used to determine the behavior of all installations having the branding folder installed in the required location. Sub-folders include:

Category & Continuous DataColourPresets: These folders contain XML files that define the coloring menu options visible in the Omniscope menu under:

Style > Data Colours >  {Categories} and also {Continuous}.

Deleting one or more of these XML files will eliminate them from the Omniscope menu, and adding customised colour pallettes will add new, bundler-specific pallette options to the Omniscope menus. You can use tools available inside Omniscope to create and export customised colour pallattes in XML format ready to be copied into these sub-folders to add them to the menus available in the rebranded installations.

File library sub-folder and files: This sub-folder optionally contains at least one 'welcome' IOK file configured by the brander/bundler intended to open from the re-brander's desktop shortcut icon placed on the users' desktops by a Bundled Installer. A specified 'welcome' IOK file is usually configured to act as a starting point or 'index' with heavily styled Omniscope Opening and Closing screens, Web and Content Views (usually containing links to all the files in the File library sub-folder), Help screens and other network/web content links to provide Bundled installation users with an overview and next steps to take once they have installed Omniscope for the first time. Any number of files can be included in the File library sub-folder and can be linked to from links within the specified 'welcome' IOK file.

Images sub-folder and files: Report IOK file templates often contain many types of images which are not part of the data set, but are used throughout the file, and therefore need to be available for the creation of new files.  Standard versions of company logos, background images, Blank View images, banner ad images, etc. can all be distributed (so that they are always available to report authors) by saving the latest copies in the Images sub-folder of the branding folder, such that they become part of the exportable, shareable branding .ILF, and through that, part of all the bundled installers featuring that particular verion of the branding ILF.

Themes: This sub-folder contains the custom XML files that determine which pre-defined Application Style options are visible from Omniscope under:

Style > Application Styles .

The visible style list will also include any user-specific custom application styles to be added to the Omniscpe menu, for example corporate styles to be shared with all corporate users.  Additional Application Style files can also be shared on a user-by-user basis by exporting the modified styles as .ILF files and sending them to the users who need them. 

Application display images: The various start-up, welcome screen and other branding image files in the top level of the branding folder are documented within the folder itself using text files with the same name as each image file.  All of these image files can be replaced with custom images of the same size (in some cases), or of any size (in other cases) to create a re-branded installed version of the Omniscope.

 

LayoutModes XML file

This file should contain either the default, or the Style > Edit Style Presets custom settings. Use Tools > Export in the Edit Modes dialogue to save a copy of the customised settengs as an XML file.  Share this XML  file with others either by sending it to them for import, or by renaming the customised XML file to overwrite the default 'LayoutModes.xml' and saving it in the branding folder as shown above. This will ensure that all installations sharing the branding folder will dsisplay the customised presets, ensuring that chaging between Modes will not change any branding-specific styling or colour pallettes that have been established as standard.

Editing the branding folder config properties text file

Within the branding folder, many aspects of the installed application behavior can be customised by following the instructions inside the 'config' properties text file. Each option is documented within the 'config' properties file itself. You can comment/uncomment the changed 'config' properties text file using # characters. An example of the settings available in this file is shown here.

Corporate environment and bundled installers install Omniscope for all user accounts on the machine, rather than for each individual user account. If you are working on a Windows machine with a version later than Vista, you will need to work on files in the branding folder from an editable location such as My Documents, then drag the edited versions with Vista+ Windows UAC confirmation into the program branding folder when you want to see the results. This is only true if Omniscope has been installed for all users, as it will be for bundled installs by default. If you are working from a current user installation, you can edit the files in the branding folder directly. In Windows XP, you can edit the file directly in the program folder. 

To preview your results, install Omniscope normally and put the work-in-progress branding folder inside your Omniscope program folder, or click on a Branding ILF exported from a reference installation, then start Omniscope. Deleting the branding folder will return an installation to the default settings.

Some Advanced Re-branding Options 

(see full documentation of  the branding folder installation config.properties file here)

Disable Free trial - You can disable free trial prompts on start-up and from the Omniscope Help menu for custom installs by adding the following line in the config.properties file: 

DisableFreeTrial=true

Disable automatic update check - You can change the default Omniscope setting to always check for the latest updates by adding the following line:

CHECK_UPDATES_AUTOMATICALLY=false

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Please note that further customisations may be available other than those specified in this example of the config.properties file - contact us for more information.