About QlikView Layout Themes
Theme Basics
A QlikView layout theme is a set of formatting properties that can be applied to a whole QlikView layout or to parts thereof. Theme files are coded in xml and normally kept in a special QlikView theme folder under Windows' Application Data folder for the active user.
Themes can significantly reduce time and effort needed to make a QlikView layout good-looking and consistent. They can also be used to enforce a certain graphical style within a company etc.
Theme Topology
A QlikView theme file consists of individual sections for each type of layout object (document, sheet and all different types of sheet objects). Each of these sections has three sub-sections, one for object type specific properties, one for border/caption properties and one for printer setting properties (only for printable object types). Each section and sub-section can be created or replaced separately using the Theme Maker Wizard, without affecting other sections in the theme file.
A theme section is created as follows:
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Format a specific object according to your wishes
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Use the Theme Maker Wizard to extract selected properties from that object and insert them into a theme file
General Purpose Themes
General purpose themes are themes which have defined sections for all different object types. There are a number of such themes provided with the QlikView installation package.
If you want to create such a theme yourself you must:
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Format Document Properties to your liking
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Format the Sheet Properties of one sheet to your liking
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Create (if necessary) and format one sheet object of each type to your liking. Caption/Border properties typically only need to be formatted for once one sheet object type which usually uses caption (list boxes, charts etc) and once for one sheet object type which normally goes without caption (text object, button etc).
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Run the Theme Maker Wizard creating a new theme and insert properties from the first of the formatted entities listed above (order doesn't matter).
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Run the Theme Maker Wizard repeatedly, once for every remaining formatted entity listed above.
Specific Purpose Themes
It is possible to create themes for specific uses. Depending on the purpose these may only need to define a small sub-set of the available theme sections and sub-sections. As an example, you may define a theme which sets only chart objects to a given size and position on the sheet. In order to do that you need to define a theme with one single property from the caption/border group only for charts, i.e. one single sub-section.
Applying Themes in the Layout
QlikView layout themes can be applied either manually at any given time or automatically every time a new layout object is created. Themes can be applied to
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individual sheet objects
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a group of sheet objects
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a sheet
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the whole document
Applying a Theme to Individual Objects
Do as follows:
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Activate the sheet object by clicking on it.
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Open the Properties dialog for the sheet object from the context menu.
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Go to the Layout page
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Click on the Apply Theme... button
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Select a theme in the browser dialog that opens
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Click OK
All properties in the theme which are applicable to the selected sheet object will now be applied. If you want to apply a theme to a group of sheet objects, you must first make them all active by means of Shift+clicking or rectangle selection (draw a rectangle with the left mouse button pressed to select all objects within the rectangle).
Applying a Theme to a Sheet
Do as follows:
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Activate the sheet by clicking on its tab.
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Open the Sheet Properties dialog from the Settings menu.
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Go to the General page
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Click on the Apply Theme... button
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Select a theme in the browser dialog that opens
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Click OK
All properties in the theme which are applicable to the selected sheet will now be applied. Additionally the theme will also be applied to all sheet objects on the sheet.
Applying a Theme to a Whole Document
Do as follows:
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Open the document or activate it.
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Open the Document Properties dialog from the Settings menu.
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Go to the Layout page
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Click on the Apply Theme... button
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Select a theme in the browser dialog that opens
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Click OK
All properties in the theme which are applicable to the document will now be applied. Additionally the theme will also be applied to all sheets and all sheet objects in the document.
