Document Structure

This chapter describes the overall structure of the display profile documents. The underlying data format for a display profile document is XML.

The display profile format is intended to define the Desktop’s display configuration by defining provider and channel objects and their properties. Thus, a display profile is made up of some number of display profile objects. The display profile objects map directly to the XML tag that defines them. For example, the <Channel name=> XML tag defines a channel object.

In general, the document structure of a display profile document resembles the following:

<DisplayProfile>
    <Properties>...global properties...</Properties>
    <Channels>...channel definitions...</Channels>
    <Providers>...provider definitions...</Providers>
</DisplayProfile>

The hierarchical structuring of the display profile document does not define the visual layering of channel on the portal Desktop. The display profile exists only to provide property values for channels on the Desktop.

The display profile contains definitions that enable you to construct the Desktop. These definitions include providers, channels, containers, and properties. Some of these definitions create the Desktop containers—the frames, tables, and tabs that arrange the content of the Desktop—and others create channels for the Desktop via the respective providers. A display profile provider definition is a template for building channels based on that provider.

The following sections describe the display profile objects in detail.