MB2-712 Certification: Customization and Configuration in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016 – Themes

I am publishing a series of posts to serve as a revision aid for anyone preparing for the MB2-712 certification. (Customization and Configuration in Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2016). This post will look at themes.

Themes allow you to create a custom look to your CRM solution. I often find that changing the colours to fit in with an organizations corporate branding and adding the company logo creates an interface users find inviting.

The themes option is available in the customization area of settings.

When you first load the themes option you will see that you only have a default option. You could change this! But leaving it unaltered and using the clone option to create a copy is probably a better option. That way we can revert back to the default if required.

Clicking clone with a theme selected will create a copy.

You can now open the copy and amend it.

Name

You don’t have to change the name but it probably makes sense to give you theme a sensible name.

Logo

The logo field will initially be blank. Leaving this field blank will continue to show the default Microsoft Dynamics CRM logo. If you wish to change the logo you will need an image file that is 400 x 50 pixels.

By way of a demo I have quickly created a horrible looking logo. I have simply created an image using “Paint” and then loaded it as a web resource.

Back in themes I selected my web resource as the logo. Then I saved my theme and selected the publish theme option. You always need to publish the themes to make them take effect. Finally, below you can see my updated theme with a “lovely” new logo.

Tip:
A theme doesn’t take effect until it is published. You can only have one default theme. And the default theme is the currently published theme. Meaning several themes can be defined but only one is active at any moment in time.

Tip: Themes cannot be included in your solution. Meaning they are not portable between organisations.

Logo Tooltip

Logo Tooltip lets you change the logo tooltip.

Navigation Bar Colour

Changes the navigation bar colour. Note, with all the colours you enter the hex colour code value. So yello is #FFFF00.

Navigation Bar Shelf Colour

The “Shelf” is shown in yellow below.

Header Colour

The header colour is the colour of heading text in CRM. See below that mine is pink! (This colour is also used for tab names on CRM forms.)

Global Link Colour

Changing my global link colour to pink effects all hyperlinks in the system.

Selected Link Effect

This colour is used when selecting links, say in a sub grid. As shown with my pink bar below.

Hover Link Effect

As you hover over links in CRM their colour changes. Below you can see that just hovering over an account in this list has turned it yellow.

Process Control Color

You can control the colour of the business process flow bar using themes. Below you can see that I have made mine a very “effective” yellow colour.

Default Entity Colour

This option changes the default entity icons in the navigation. See how mine are pink!

Default Custom Entity Colour

Changes the colour of custom entities.

Control Shade and Control Border

These two options work together!

See below how the shading and border around the currently selected field have changed to yellow and pink.

Themes are a pretty simple concept, but even so, as you revise you’re the MB2-712 exam don’t forget to get some hands-on experience of them. J