The different NatSkinstyles (themes) are controlled using preference variables and can be set

Use the NatSkinStyleBrowserto preview the known styles and settings. Note, Note that the selection made there will only last for the current session. You need to add the respective preference variables to your home topic or the WebPreferences or the SitePreferences to make the selection persistent.

• togglesidebar: disable the sidebar for this request only.
• style=off: switch off any styles (simulating a non-css browser)
• style=reset: switch back to the user and server settings by reverting any session preferences
• switchstyle=next/prev: switch to the next/previous known style
• switchvariation=next/prev: switch to the next/previous known style variation

Example: To emulate the Kubrick style on the old BinaryBonsai (not the new K2 style) use

* Set SKINSTYLE NATSKIN_STYLE = Kubrick jazzynote * Set STYLEBORDER NATSKIN_LAYOUT = thin fixed * Set STYLEBUTTONS NATSKIN_MENU = on * Set STYLESIDEBAR NATSKIN_SIDEBAR = right * Set STYLEVARIATION NATSKIN_VARIATAION = none red * Set STYLESEARCHBOX = pos1 

There are some constraints build into the NatSkin templates that try guarantee a pleasant appearance when combining the different skin states:

Preference variables

• If the styleborder is "thin" the sidebar will be disabled for the edit, manage, rdiff, natsearch, changes and search topic actions.
• The web buttons will alternate with the sidebar so that they will not be displayed on the same side.
• If the web buttons are enabled the default SiteSideBar will disable the redundant navigation to other webs.

Defining new Themes

The NatSkin can be themed using cascading styles attached to the System.NatSkin or any other topic defined in the STYLEPATH preference variable. This variable is a list of topics that are consulted for css attachments. The default value is

  * Set STYLEPATH = %SYSTEMWEB%.NatSkin

Styles are collected in the order specified. This allows to insert style contributions that are not part of the NatSkin. For example given you uploaded NatSkin css definitions to a topic Main.NatSkinThemesContrib you can activate them by setting the STYLEPATH to

  * Set STYLEPATH = Main.NatSkinThemesContrib, %SYSTEMWEB%.NatSkin

Css files must obey the following naming scheme to be recognized

• Style.css: basic style definitions for style
• Buttons.css: WebButton definitions for style
• Border.css: definitions for style displayed using STYLEBORDER = on
• Thin.css: definitions for style displayed using STYLEBORDER = thin
• Thin.css: definitions for style displayed using STYLEBORDER = thin
• Variation.css: style variations that can be applied to any base style; this can be used to vary a base style, e.g. to add header art or change some fonts and colours

Email Obfuscation

The standard Foswiki engine tries to obfuscate email addresses by adding a phrase to the email url (like NOSPAM) to fool collecting web crawlers. But that is not adequate enough today as crawlers are aware of that. The solution to that is to remove every trace of a pattern that could be an email address from the html source code and regenerate them using javascript. Most likely, web crawlers will only parse the html and don't run a javascript interpreter beforehand. Nevertheless the obfuscation feature can be switched on and off by adding the OBFUSCATEEMAIL variable to your DefaultPreferences or SitePreferences like

  * Set OBFUSCATEEMAIL = on

Misc preference variables