OBIEE11g Multi Skin and Style Deployment

Before you read any further, start with reading the Oracle white paper :

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/middleware/bi/customizing-oracle-biee-11g-176387.pdf

I don’t like doing any customisation within the weblogic server. First of all the paths are always long: d:\obiee11g\instances\instance1\bifoundation\OracleBIPresentationServicesComponent\coreapplication_obips1. Second, it’s very easy to loose you work when doing a reinstall….

Let’s start with create a new folder called OBIEE_LAF (OBIEE Look and Feel).

In this example i’m going to make 3 different Skins and Styles for 3 different companies (A, B and C). I made a copy from the original S_ & SK_blafp:

Keep the name lower case and without spaces!!

Next we have to tell the server that it is a application directory. Copy the WEB-INF folder from <<OBIEE_HOME>>\instances\instancen\bifoundation\OracleBIPresentationServicesComponent\coreapplication_obips1\analyticsRes to your LAF Folder:

Log in to the console > deployments and press the lock & edit button

Next press the install button:

Select the LAF folder:

Select install this deployment as a library

Deploy it to a bi server

Check I will make the deployment accessible from the following location:

Press Finish

Press activate changes

Check if it’s started:

Let’s check if it is reachable:

companya

companyb

companyc

Let’s tell the INSTANCECONFIG.XML what to do:

 

<!-- My Custom Stuff -->

<URL>
<CustomerResourcePhysicalPath>D:\OBIEE_LAF</CustomerResourcePhysicalPath>
<!-- CustomerResourcePhysicalPath is a tag that specifies the actual target directory name -->
<CustomerResourceVirtualPath>/OBIEE_LAF</CustomerResourceVirtualPath>
<!-- CustomerResourceVirtualPath provides the URLPrefix that will be added for sourcing all the files -->
<!-- If we don’t give this tag, BI EE will automatically add analyticsRes (System target directory) -->
</URL>
<UI>
<DefaultStyle>companya</DefaultStyle>
<!-- Without the S_ -->
<DefaultSkin>companya</DefaultSkin>
<!-- Without the SK_ -->
</UI>
</ServerInstance>

Till Next Time