CentOS Web Visual Style
People working in this area have the following challenges:
- Creating a common visual presentation along the web applications we use.
- Creating an environment where different applications' source code can be updated without breaking the common visual presentation.
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1. Introduction
The CentOS Web Visual Style Guide is a tool.
This tool is part of CentOS "Corporate Visual Identity Manual" proposition, which is based on a monolithic corporate visual identity structure. In a monolithic corporate visual identity structure, organization has one name and one visual style in all its manifestations (Olins (1989).
CentOS web manifestation (anything involving HTML standards) should be considered here. (Ex. Portals, Wikis, Forums, Blogs, Bug Tracker).
People customizing CentOS Web Environment can use this guide as reference each time they need to solve a visual customization problem. If the solution to a particular problem don't exist in this guide, please add your problem here, and the possible solutions you've found. If you haven't found a solution, add your problem anyway, surely someone will find a solution for it.
With this guide we are trying to unify as much CSS definitions as possible, creating a common CSS definition for all web applications we use and specific CSS definitions in those cases where it is absolutely needed. Specific CSS definitions will extend CentOS common CSS definitions.
2. Recommendations
CentOS "Web Visual Style" should be strictly based on the following standards:
CentOS "Web Visual Style" should be adaptable enough to be propagated, with strict uniformity and visual coherence, to each component inside "CentOS Web Environment".
CentOS "Web Visual Style", CentOS "Distribution Visual Style", and CentOS "Promotion Visual Style" should be based on the same artistic motif and there is no possibilities or flexibilities on a monolithic corporate visual identity structure to break that uniformity and coherence in the organization. If you note that something like that is happening, please tell us ... that's something that needs to be immediately fixed.
CentOS "Web Visual Style" should be able of being updated when a new "CentOS Visual Style" be adopted. Maybe through a set of background images[1].
- [1] For example, it could be created a div#page-header element and define a background image called header-bg.jpg there, with the current and approved CentOS artistic motif. When the artistic motif changes, changing the visual style on web applications would be a matter of updating that header-bg.jpg image to the new artistic motif.
There are some style definitions that remain constant or rarely change[2] in CentOS "Web Visual Style".
- [2] For example, font-family, font-size, paragraph inline-height, html background, and body margin are styles definitions that remain constant generally.
CentOS "Web Visual Style" should make the navigation among all related applications on it predictable and highly accessible. No matter in which application you are, it should exist a direct link to other applications.
CentOS "Web Visual Style" should be maintainable through time. When new versions for those applications used inside CentOS "Web Environment" be released, and considered stable enough to be on production, there must be a way to update the web applications' source code without breaking their common visual style and stability.
3. Implementations
Based on recommendations, the following implementations are available:
Default : CentOS default web visual style.
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Specific web applications' CSS definition will extend CentOS common CSS definitions and care will be taken to avoid overlapping CentOS common CSS definitions in specific CSS definitions. The following section describes this customization process for each application:
Do you have a different implementation ? Document it below:
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