Module Overview
Welcome to Modify/Create View, Screen and Menu/Tabs
This module presents the types of configuration that can be done at the screen, application and view level. Areas of the application and screens are defined and their configuration is explored for the employee applications. The module also examines the role of view templates and introduces the View Wizard, used to build new views. Finally, view administration is covered.
This module will attempt to accomplish:
Discuss Views
Describe the configuration steps needed to configure Views
Describe the configuration steps needed to configure Applications and Screens
Describe how to associate a View with a Template
We will begin this module with a discussion about the Container Page. The container page is a page that defines the structure of the application. This page can contain the common UI components like screen bars, view bars, logos, and so on. This page can be used to define the HTML Frame definition document for the application. All views and pages (optionally) are shown within the context of the container page.
The picture shown above is an example of the container page for the employee application
The container page should be specified in the Container Web Page property of the Application Object. The container web page property defines the page template within which all views, pages or applets will be displayed. It is used by the Siebel Web Engine.
In the Web Page Layout Container Page, you find the following elements:
The banner frame, which resides on the top of the page
The screen bar, which is generated beneath these as a table
The view bar, which is loaded into the left-hand portion of the page
The content frame, which contains the views
These sections will be discussed further in the following slides
Once the container page is loaded, with screen and view names displayed, the screen and view names function as hyperlinks.
When a screen name is clicked, the template for the default view for that screen is obtained, and the view is generated and displayed.
When a view name is clicked in the view bar, the view template, that is referenced in the view's object definition, is loaded.
This slide breaks out components of the banner frame. The Banner Frame Template is defined in the template file CCFrameBanner.swt
The banner frame contains Application-level menus which consists of the File, Edit, View, and Help buttons. Although it is important to note that the functionality provided by each button in the application-level menu depends on the application and the configuration you are using the general functionality for the application level menus is as follows:
The File menu provides access to communication features, such as correspondence, email, fax, and page; record features, such as save and print; and synchronization and logout.
The Edit menu provides access to record and query features.
The View menu. Provides access to the Site Map, reports, user preferences, columns displayed, and advanced sort.
Finally, the Help menu provides access to Online Help, technical support information, and other help features.
The branding area is located in the upper right corner of the application window, and it shows the Siebel Systems logo. Clicking on the Siebel logo accesses the Siebel Web site.
The example above details how to specify the caption and order of appearance of menu items in Siebel Tools. What you must do is navigate to the Application Object in the Object Explorer window. The Menu property of the application object depicts the Menu object definition that will be used by the application. This menu must be defined in the Menu Object in the Object Explorer window.
Now, once you have established that the value that defines the Menu property of the applications object list exists as a Menu object, you can navigate to the Menu object in the object explorer window and select that menu name.
From here you can proceed to select the Menu Item object which will list all the menu items that you should see in the Siebel Application Level Menu. Each Menu Item has a list of properties.
The Caption property specifies the text displayed in the menu.
The Position property Identifies the ordinal position of the menu item. The top level positions are 1, 2, 3, and so on. The dot notation separates the ancestors of that menu item.
A further explanation of the properties that you can modify for the menu can be found in the Object Types Reference in Siebel Bookshelf.
You can put additional images in the branding area such as the company logo. In order to do that you must open the CCFrameBanner.swt template file which is located in the WEBTEMPL file in the application drive. By opening this .SWT file and modifying the image source tag to include the picture you want it to include you can change the image in the banner frame.
You will need to create a file with the image you wish to display and save it to a directory. In order to change the image, change the file and file location information contained in the CCFrameBanner file. You can also modify the background color and border of the banner frame in the same way.
Now we will move onto the Screenbar frame where we will see that the components of the frame have been broken out. The Screenbar frame template is defined in CCFrameScreen Bar.swt template file.
The screenbar frame defines the tab jump buttons and the screen tabs. You will know which screen tab is the active one as it is a different color from the other screen tabs.
The tab jump buttons make the screen tabs scroll sideways so that you can see and activate screen tabs that do not fit on the initial page. The best way to define what a screen tab is would be to understand that the application is organized into screens.
Each screen covers a broad topic.
You access a screen by clicking the related screen tab, such as Opportunities, Calendar, or Accounts. To access a screen, click the corresponding tab. The screen appears and the tab changes color.
The example above details how to specify the screen tabs for an application. What you must do is navigate to the Application Object in the Object Explorer window.
Select the application for which you want to modify and navigate to the Page Tab object. Here you can see all the screens that can be navigated to for each tab in a particular application. Each Page Tab has a list of properties.
The Screen property depicts the screen to be exposed through a page tab.
The Text property specifies the text displayed on the page tab.
The Inactive property defines if the page tab is visible. If the Inactive property is checked, the page tab will not be visible in the application. The sequence property specifies the order of the page tab for an application.
A further explanation of the properties that you can modify for the menu can be found in the Object Types Reference in Siebel Bookshelf.
Now let’s move on to the toolbar frame. The toolbar shown above appears beneath the screen tabs, and displays frequently used tools such as the Show drop-down list, the History drop-down list, the Favorites drop-down list, and the search button.
The Show drop-down list displays the names of filters—such as My Accounts, All Accounts, and My Team’s Accounts—which determine what data you see in a screen or a view. The Show drop-down list also acts as a toggle to a different kind of view, such as an Explorer view.
Next, the History drop-down list stores the most recent views you have displayed, allowing you to navigate back to any of them. It is updated every time you move to a new view.
The Customer Dashboard provides employees with persistent access to customer data, such as contact name, phone number and interaction history. This data remains in the same location in the screen at the top, as long as the session is active and the dashboard is not closed.
The Favorites drop-down list provides access to your saved queries and the predefined queries established by your organization. From the Favorites drop-down list, you select a saved query, and the data matching the defined criteria is automatically displayed.
The search button shows a pair of binoculars. This button is located directly to the right of the Favorites drop-down list. Click this button to activate the Search Center.
The Search Center allows you to search for and find records within the database.
The example above details configuration of the application toolbar using Siebel Tools. What you must do is navigate to the Toolbar Item Object in the Object Explorer window. Select the Toolbar you wish to modify and select the Toolbar Item object.
For each toolbar in the application, you create a Toolbar object definition in the Object List Editor. This provides a named toolbar that the user can activate or deactivate in Siebel applications, and to which icons (Toolbar Item object definitions) can be associated or removed.
Typical toolbar functionality for most applications is implemented using HTML toolbars. In an HTML toolbar, the buttons are static images, which may be dimmed to indicate unavailability, but otherwise are not manipulated by program logic on the browser.
This slide details configuration of menu text and viewbar text using Siebel Tools. A Screen View object definition associates a view with the screen view's parent screen object definition. This is how views are included in screens. A screen is a collection or group of related views:
The screen represents a logical grouping of views pertaining to one business function.
All the views in a screen usually map to a single business object. You access screens through the Screens menu or the tabs in the Tab bar.
The menu and tab that provide access to a screen are defined as part of an Application object definition—one or both may exist for a given screen.
Screen definitions specify the default view that appears when a tab is clicked.
Screens have a single child object type that is Screen View.
To define a Screen:
From the Object Explorer, select Screen. The Object List Editor opens.
Choose Edit > New Record to add a new Screen object definition.
Set the following properties for the new Screen record:
Name property. (Required.) Name of the screen. All references to a screen are done through its name.
Default View property. View that will be used when the user clicks on a page tab for a Screen.
NOTE: A view must be added to the screen before it can be specified as a default.
To define a Screen View:
From the Object Explorer, select the Screen object type. The Object List Editor opens.
Choose Edit > New Record to add a new screen object definition.
Set the following properties for the new Screen View object:
Menu Text property. This is the text that is displayed in the submenu of the Screens menu bar selection.
Viewbar Text property. This is the text that will appear in the view bar for this view.
Sequence property. This is the order that the view will appear in the submenu for the screen.
Now you can also configure the startup text in the splash screen by editing the parameter in the .CFG file. The parameter you must change is the ApplicationSplashText parameter and any text you enter here will be seen on the splash screen for mobile web clients.
There is one important note to make: the specification in the .cfg file affects only the Mobile Web client. For the Web client, startup text is specified as a parameter on the Object Manager.
Now let’s focus our discussion on views. A view is a collection of applets that appear at the same time on the same screen. A view can be thought of as a single window’s worth of data forms (applets).
Generally, a Siebel application window displays one view at any one time. The currently active view is changed by selecting a different view from the View bar or from a menu sub option in the Screens menu. A view can reference a single business object at any one time.
View templates are associated with a view through the View Web Template object definition. A view template primarily contains placeholders for applets as specified by the <swe:applet> tag. The mapping of specific applets to these placeholders is done visually through the View Web layout editor.
Each applet tag acts as a placeholder for an applet’s location in the view template. This same view template can be used to show different views by mapping the view’s applets to these placeholders. Although each view template contains multiple applet tags, typically not all applet tags are mapped. You must however make sure to map at least one applet tag within a frame to an Applet in the repository otherwise empty frames will occur.
Each applet in the view has an ID. Placeholder IDs are discussed in upcoming slides
Applets in a view can be displayed in 3 different ways.
Relate the applets in a Peer:Peer manner which displays the applets side by side.
Relate the applets in a Parent:Child format. Here as you can see in the diagram there is a parent applet at the top of the view and directly beneath it a child applet appears.
You can relate the applets in a Parent-Child-Grandchild format. Here you have a parent and child applet like the previous format however the hierarchy goes one step further to include a grandchild applet. The grandchild applet is related to the child applet in the same way that the child applet is related to the parent applet
The best way to select a view template for a view is to find an existing view in the application that has the desired applet layout that you wish to replicate.
Once you know the view name you can navigate to the View Object in the Object explorers window and select the view that you wish to replicate. From here you can select the View Web Template object.
Each record in the view web templates object has a property called the Web Template which contains the web template name. This is the name of the view that you wish to replicate.
You create new views by using the New View Wizard or by defining views in the view object in the Object List Editor. It is much simpler and more accurate to create views using the View Wizard.
In this course we have chosen to create objects using a wizard where available instead of manually as it is a much quicker process to create an object using a wizard. In addition, a wizard makes sure that you don’t leave out steps when creating objects. We will discuss the steps to creating a view using a view wizard in the next few slides.
Now that we have described views and view templates, we will explain how to create a view template using the View Wizard. The View Wizard helps you define all the correct properties and automatically creates child objects, such as applets, based on the information you enter. The View Wizard creates a view and assigns the applets.
In order To create a new view using the View Wizard:
Choose File >New Object from the Siebel Tools main menu. The New Object Wizard dialog box appears.
Click the General tab, and then double-click the View icon. The New View page of the View Wizard appears. The New View page of the View wizard is the first screen that you are prompted with after selecting the View Wizard and it is displayed above. This screen is very similar to the List Applet Wizard and Form Applet Wizard General pages as it allows you to enter the project that you want the view to be part of and business object whose data the view will display. Only locked projects appear in the picklist. This screen is also where you would enter the name of the new view. The view name must be a unique name that has not already been used by another view in the system.
The last thing that you can specify in this screen is the display title for the new view. This is the name to appear in the user interface and may be left blank if no title is desired.
Now the next screen in the View Wizard is the View Web Layout – Select Template page. This screen of the wizard associates the web template with the new view you are creating.
The presentation of the view is determined by the Siebel Web Template. This section asks you to select a web template for the view and once you have done that, it associates the template with the view. Associating a template and an view in Tools lets the program know which template to use for the view. The box to the right of the page is a visual display of the layout of the web template, as you scroll through the list you can visually see what the web template looks like.
Once you have selected the appropriate web template in this screen, you can press ‘Next’ to be taken to the next step in the View Wizard
In the Finish page you will need to review your selections, and then Click Finish. Once you have pressed the finish button, Siebel will proceed to create your View definition.
Once the view definition has been created, the View Web Template (Base)-Layout window appears.
Siebel automatically opens the Layout View Editor page once the Wizard has finished creating the View Definition. If necessary, you can drag and drop applets from the Applets Window to the sectors in the Layout View Editor.
You edit the Web layout of a view in the Web View Editor. The Web View Editor allows you to edit the mapping between applets in the view and placeholders in the template.
In order to add an applet to the Web layout of the view you can drag an applet from the Applets window and drop it onto an applet placeholder in the template. The Applets window shows all applets based on business components in the business object of the view. When an applet is mapped to a placeholder, the applet is displayed in the position it would appear at runtime.
Once you are ready to preview the view design you can Right-click on your Web Template-Layout and select Preview. The preview screen simulates what the view would look like in the run-time environment by removing unmapped placeholders. This preview is not intended to be a 100 percent accurate representation of the eventual HTML output—it is intended to give you a rough idea about the structure and look of the generated output. The picture on this slide is a representation of a view preview.
The View Web Template Item defines applets to be mapped to place holders in a Web Template. They contain the name of the applet as well as a unique identifier for a placeholder in the template. The placeholder to which a View Web Template Item is mapped determines the position of the applet within the template. View Web Template Item objects are automatically created when you drag and drop applets onto a Web template using the Web Applet Layout Editor.
One thing that you should note is that the default Applet Mode for applets in a new view is Base. You should view this property in the View Web Template Item for each applet and set the Applet Mode appropriately.
The thread bar is a navigational tool for the user. It provides the means to navigate from view to view among the views previously visited in the current screen.
The fourth step to creating a view requires you to edit the view definition to set the display text for the thread bar. The Thread Title property is the text used in the thread to identify the view. For example, in most of the views displaying Accounts (such as Account List view and Account Detail - Contacts view), the Thread Title is Account:
In order to set the Thread Title property you need to navigate to the Views Object in the Object Explorer and select the view for which you want to set the Thread Title property for. From here, you can tab across to the Thread Title property and set it accordingly.
Once you have completed your view definition, you will need to assign the view to a screen. You would do this by selecting the screen that you want to add the view to and adding a new screen view definition.
What you need to do is navigate to the Screens object in the Object Explorer and select the appropriate screen. From here navigate to screen views and create a new record. You will need to enter the name of the view in the view property.
The Menu Text property is the text displayed in the submenu of the Screens menu bar selection, you will need to populate this with an appropriate text.
The Viewbar Text property is the text that will appear in the view bar for this view and again you will need to populate this with an appropriate text value.
Now you must note that views must be administered in the client application to make them available to users.
This is the sixth step in the process to creating a new view.
What you must first do is register the view. You need to do this in the Siebel Application.
You must launch the Siebel Application and go to the View Menu and select the Site Map option.
This will take you to the site map where you can navigate to any screen you wish. Select the Application Administration option and then select Views beneath the Application Administration heading. Here you will be able to create a new view record by pressing the new button or typing CTRL + N. You can create a new record and in the View Name field copy the exact view name of the view you are creating.
Now having created your view, you will want people to have access to it. This is the final step in the process. You must do this by assigning the view to various responsibilities.
This has to also be done in the Siebel Application and is accessed by going to the Site Map from the view menu and selecting Application Administration again.
From here you must select the responsibilities option and you will be taken to a view with various different responsibilities.
From here you should select the responsibilities that you want your view to be accessed by and add the view to each one. Again, the view name must be the identical name of the view that you have created.
Now that you have completed this module, you should be able to:
Discuss Views
Describe the configuration steps needed to configure Views
Describe the configuration steps needed to configure Applications and Screens
Describe how to associate a View with a Template
