Customizing or Creating New

You can customize through the web, but on the file system, the way to customize or create components for your theme is to wire up new ones.

Through the Web

Just as for Skins and Layers, it is possible to customize the templates used by components through the Zope Management Interface.

• Site Setup > Zope Management Interface > portal_view_customizations

You will need to know the name of your component (plone.presentation for instance). The Elements section of this manual will help if the name isn't obvious. You can only rewrite the template, which might be limiting.

On the File System

You can achieve much more if you are building your own theme product on the file system, and in this case the approach is slightly different.

Rather than overwrite a component (as you could for skins), it is far easier to create your own version. This involves some rewiring or new wiring in your own .zcml file, but is actually simpler than it sounds.

Here's an example of the presentation viewlet - as it is used by Plone:

<browser:viewlet
      name="plone.presentation"
      for="Products.ATContentTypes.interface.IATDocument"
      manager="plone.app.layout.viewlets.interfaces.IAboveContentBody"
      class=".presentation.PresentationViewlet"
      permission="zope2.View"
      />

Imagine, for your purposes, you need to use a new class to get this viewlet as you want. In your own configure.zcml file, give it a new name and wire in your own class.

<browser:viewlet
      name="[your namespace].[your presentation viewlet]"
      for="Products.ATContentTypes.interface.IATDocument"
      manager="plone.app.layout.viewlets.interfaces.IAboveContentBody"
      class=".[your viewlet module].[your viewlet class]"
      permission="zope2.View"
      />

• Remember that the dot in front of your class namespace indicates that it can be found in the same directory as this configure.zcml file.
• If you're not sure where your configure.zcml file lives, consult the Where to Find What you Need page of this section.