Understanding the Desktop Design Tool

This section contains the following subsections:

• Where is the DDT Deployed?

• What is the Sandbox Organization?

• What Can You do With the DDT?

Where is the DDT Deployed?

The desktop design tool supports two deployment scenarios:

• You can work from a blank slate

• You can work from a node that already has containers and channels in it

When you work on a blank slate, the distinguished node (DN) must have the desktop service already assigned to it. Once a new node is created and the desktop service is assigned to it, you can then select the new node from the Portal Server management console and click on the Desktop Design Tool link. A tab named Untitled is created automatically in this node and you can start working on this tab.

What is the Sandbox Organization?

If the Sandbox sample is installed, a Sandbox organization is created by the installer.. Also, a desktop user sandbox is created under the Sandbox organization. sandbox is the password for the user sandbox. You can use this organization to start building the desktop. The Sandbox organization has one main tab, and under this main tab there are two sub tabs. You can start adding portlets into the layout. By logging in as user sandbox, you can view the actual desktop you built using the Desktop Design Tool.

The sandbox organization DN allows you to quickly create a new desktop in the Desktop Design Tool without the need to create a new organization and user separately.

What Can You do With the DDT?

The desktop design tool allows you to create or edit a desktop layout, then apply theme on top of it. The desktop design tool can be separated into two major areas: layout and theme. You can use the Desktop Design Tool to work on a selected DN which does not have any display profile document loaded, and create a brand new desktop from scratch. A default theme (Look & Feel) is used, and you can switch to a different theme using the Manage Theme link from the Desktop common task area.

In the desktop design tool, when a new desktop is created, the desktop type value is theme_support. In the blank slate scenario, when you create a new organization, the desktop type is default and the parent container is DefaultChannel. After you use the desktop design tool to design the new organization, the desktop type is default and the parent container is changed to DefaultJSPTabContainer.