Questions on individual gallery customization

Richard · September 19, 2015

A couple of questions about customizing individual galleries:

1) Am I correct that when you agree to separate a gallery for customizing, it still inherits previously applied customization from the whole site and all galleries level? However, after it has been customized individually, any future changes at the whole site or all galleries level will not apply?

2) Is there a way to identify all galleries with individual customization from within the Organizer?

Thx.

Allen · September 19, 2015

It will inherit "all galleries" and "entire site" CSS. "just This Gallery" will override any CSS from above.

2. No

Richard · September 19, 2015

1. OK, I understand CSS precedence. I was actually asking about the standard SM widget behavior. I have a few galleries that I am using for experiments and these have individually customized widgets. I later added a widget to "all galleries" but noticed that it didn't appear in some galleries. I was puzzled at first, but then it dawned on me that perhaps once you do something in "only this gallery," future changes at a more global level do not apply. If this is true, it looks like a serious long-term maintenance issue.

2. Bummer. I don't have a large site, so I suppose I can keep track offline, but it's a bit of a PITA.

leftquark · September 19, 2015

Richard wrote: »

I have a few galleries that I am using for experiments and these have individually customized widgets. I later added a widget to "all galleries" but noticed that it didn't appear in some galleries. I was puzzled at first, but then it dawned on me that perhaps once you do something in "only this gallery," future changes at a more global level do not apply.

Yes, the purpose of "Just This Gallery" is to break it away from your "All Galleries." Anything added to "All Galleries" after you made it a special one-off gallery will not be applied. If you'd rather have it take on the "All Galleries" features, you can click the "x" next to "Just this Gallery" to undo the custom one-off. It will then follow all galleries. You could, then make it "Just this Gallery" if you wanted to then add something special to it.

Allen · September 19, 2015

leftquark wrote: »

Yes, the purpose of "Just This Gallery" is to break it away from your "All Galleries." Anything added to "All Galleries" after you made it a special one-off gallery will not be applied. If you'd rather have it take on the "All Galleries" features, you can click the "x" next to "Just this Gallery" to undo the custom one-off. It will then follow all galleries. You could, then make it "Just this Gallery" if you wanted to then add something special to it.

I totally disagree with this concept. Any specific CSS for "Just This ..." should be new (specific) or
override any parent CSS. Whether a gallery or folder. "all ..." CSS should never be cancelled in bulk by
making a page "Just This ...".

It's just like an applied theme. Total theme CSS applies first before any specific overrides to a "just
This ..." page. Another question, when does theme CSS load compared to "entire site" and the "all ..."

When I look in the Edit CSS tab of Web Developer I see multiple style tabs, what order are these
styles loaded in a page? It's very important because the later loaded styles will override earlier ones.

leftquark · September 19, 2015

Allen wrote: »

I totally disagree with this concept. Any specific CSS for "Just This ..." should be new (specific) or
override any parent CSS. Whether a gallery or folder. "all ..." CSS should never be cancelled in bulk by
making a page "Just This ...".

There are definitely times when something you've applied to "all galleries" you do not want to be applied to a specific gallery. For example, maybe all of my galleries use Collage Landscape, and I add some HTML to add a "jump to top" button. But then on 1 of my galleries, I use SmugMug style, where "Jump to top" no longer is needed. I'd want a way to remove that code, which is in "All Galleries." If you did it the way you describe, there'd be no way. We'd have to build in some very complex thing that would remove certain content blocks from certain pages, which would be even more confusing to users. So we opt to do the approach that's easier to understand for most users: if it's "Just this Gallery", it loses anything from All Galleries.

Allen wrote: »

Another question, when does theme CSS load compared to "entire site" and the "all ..."

When I look in the Edit CSS tab of Web Developer I see multiple style tabs, what order are these
styles loaded in a page? It's very important because the later loaded styles will override earlier ones.

The CSS from the Advanced Theme CSS is loaded as one of the first elements (it's identified in the source code with:

id="sm-custom-skin"

CSS content blocks placed on the page are one of the last items loaded.

Allen · September 19, 2015

leftquark wrote: »

There are definitely times when something you've applied to "all galleries" you do not want to be applied to a specific gallery. For example, maybe all of my galleries use Collage Landscape, and I add some HTML to add a "jump to top" button. But then on 1 of my galleries, I use SmugMug style, where "Jump to top" no longer is needed. I'd want a way to remove that code, which is in "All Galleries." If you did it the way you describe, there'd be no way. We'd have to build in some very complex thing that would remove certain content blocks from certain pages, which would be even more confusing to users. So we opt to do the approach that's easier to understand for most users: if it's "Just this Gallery", it loses anything from All Galleries.

...

We need class names added to the body tag for each gallery style. Then we could specify on certain styles
and apply a widget only to those style galleries.

I add the "Go to Top" on specific "Just This .." pages or galleries. Mostly those with long scrolling
college content. BTW, I think these are crazy, no one is going stay all that time, load after load,
looking at all photos. I'd rather browse by thumbnails like Smugmug style and only look at photos of
interest. But that's just me.

What you are forgetting is designing all galleries or folders to look a certain way then for a few specific
pages change/add/delete something. You would lose that general design you want for all the pages.
You'd have to copy the "all galleries" CSS and add to the specific "Just This ..." CSS to keep that
general look. Does this include losing "entire site" CSS by going Custom also?

Everything should cascade down with specific overrides/additions below.

leftquark · September 19, 2015

Going Custom loses "All Gallery" customizations but retains what's in "Entire Site".

Richard · September 20, 2015

leftquark wrote: »

Going Custom loses "All Gallery" customizations but retains what's in "Entire Site".

OK, I thought I understood it, but this statement confuses me. Are you saying that going custom causes a gallery to lose all of it's all gallery settings that were applied before going custom? I assumed that it only would no longer receive new changes at the all galleries level. That's my impression of what is happening, but I wouldn't swear to it. It also seems more consistent with what you were suggesting in an earlier post in this thread.

Losing everything previous seems unduly harsh--what one would want is the individual gallery customization to override anything that conflicts with it but leave everything else alone. I know from personal experience as a programmer that resolving conflicting formatting specifications is a difficult problem. A simple approach that the end user can easily understand is usually much better than "smart" algorithms that automatically resolve conflicts by order of precedence. The latter may result in software that mystifies the user and sometimes (I confess) even the programmer.

I am perfectly content to play by whatever the rules are, as long as I understand them. Still, I think it would make life easier if there were some software support to give us a list in real time of galleries that will be excluded from the all galleries change we are trying to make. Or at least, provide a flag in the Organizer on galleries that are "on their own." It would also be a big time saver if individual gallery customizations could be applied in bulk to a user selected group of galleries. Perhaps this possible now, but if so, I haven't discovered the trick.

leftquark · September 20, 2015

I did a little testing to verify before I made any false statements ...

Making a gallery custom ("Just this Gallery") creates a copy of whatever content blocks were on the gallery (from "All Galleries"). Everything that was on the Gallery before you made it custom will still be there. Changes to "All Galleries" after the Gallery was made custom will not effect the gallery. You'd have to go into the custom gallery ("Just this Gallery") and edit its content blocks to make any changes. So yes, you're impression is correct!

Richard · September 20, 2015

:whew That's a relief. Thanks for clarifying.

BigRed · September 26, 2015

Richard wrote: »

Am I correct that when you agree to separate a gallery for customizing, it still inherits previously applied customization from the whole site and all galleries level? However, after it has been customized individually, any future changes at the whole site or all galleries level will not apply?

I understand that the answer is YES for content blocks (widgets):

leftquark wrote: »

Going Custom loses "All Gallery" customizations but retains what's in "Entire Site".
[SNIP]
Making a gallery custom ("Just this Gallery") creates a copy of whatever content blocks were on the gallery (from "All Galleries"). Everything that was on the Gallery before you made it custom will still be there. Changes to "All Galleries" after the Gallery was made custom will not effect the gallery. You'd have to go into the custom gallery ("Just this Gallery") and edit its content blocks to make any changes.

In other words... If I subsequently add/change/delete a widget on "Entire Site," then that effect WILL be reflected on "Just this Gallery." But if I subsequently add/change/delete a widget on "All Galleries," that change WON'T be reflected in "Just this Gallery" -- even if there is no conflicting widget there. And that principle applies to CSS widgets too, yes?

However, if CSS is stored in THEMES, things can get complicated -- especially if that theme isn't the site default.

leftquark wrote: »

The CSS from the Advanced Theme CSS is loaded as one of the first elements... CSS content blocks placed on the page are one of the last items loaded.

Can you be a little more specific about this? Specifically, does "Entire Site" content-block CSS get loaded before Site-Wide (default) theme CSS? Followed by theme CSS for a theme that is used only in a particular folder or gallery? Followed by "Just this..." content-block CSS?

P.S. I'm another last-minute customizer, and at the same time this thread was started, I was also puzzling over how this feature works. So the clarification was timely for me. But I can't help wondering if there are other users who assumed a different answer when they built their sites earlier. And thus may end up with future maintenance challenges. It seems like fundamental behavior that should be communicated better (added to the Help documentation).

leftquark · September 27, 2015

BigRed wrote: »

"Entire Site," then that effect WILL be reflected on "Just this Gallery." But if I subsequently add/change/delete a widget on "All Galleries," that change WON'T be reflected in "Just this Gallery" -- even if there is no conflicting widget there. And that principle applies to CSS widgets too, yes?

Yes, when you make a gallery "Just this Gallery", it will inherit anything from "Entire Site" as well as its own content blocks (Just this Page). Anything on "All Galleries" is not inherited, including CSS.

BigRed wrote: »

However, if CSS is stored in THEMES, things can get complicated -- especially if that theme isn't the site default.

If the theme is active, anything in the Theme's CSS will also get included. The Theme's CSS load's almost first, so things in CSS content blocks can overrule it.

BigRed wrote: »

Specifically, does "Entire Site" content-block CSS get loaded before Site-Wide (default) theme CSS? Followed by theme CSS for a theme that is used only in a particular folder or gallery? Followed by "Just this..." content-block CSS?

The order that User entered CSS loads is:
1. The Active Theme's CSS. *1
2. The Entire Site CSS
3. The Current Page's CSS. *2

*1 = By active, I mean whichever theme has been chosen for whatever page you're on. If you're on the Homepage, then it's the theme selected for the homepage. If you're on a gallery that is not "Just this Gallery", then whatever theme "All Galleries" uses. If you're on a gallery that is "Just this Gallery", then whatever theme was chosen for that. If you're on a Folder that isn't "Just this Folder", it will use the theme selected on "All Folders". If you're on a Page, it will use whatever theme for "Entire Site", unless otherwise specified for the page.

*2 = If you're on non-custom (Just This ...) Folders or Galleries, then whatever CSS blocks are on "All Folders" or "All Galleries." If you're on the Homepage, whatever CSS blocks are on "Homepage", etc.

BigRed · September 27, 2015

leftquark wrote: »

The order that User entered CSS loads is:
1. The Active Theme's CSS. *1
2. The Entire Site CSS
3. The Current Page's CSS. *2

*1 = By active, I mean whichever theme has been chosen for whatever page you're on. If you're on the Homepage, then it's the theme selected for the homepage. If you're on a gallery that is not "Just this Gallery", then whatever theme "All Galleries" uses. If you're on a gallery that is "Just this Gallery", then whatever theme was chosen for that. If you're on a Folder that isn't "Just this Folder", it will use the theme selected on "All Folders". If you're on a Page, it will use whatever theme for "Entire Site", unless otherwise specified for the page.

*2 = If you're on non-custom (Just This ...) Folders or Galleries, then whatever CSS blocks are on "All Folders" or "All Galleries." If you're on the Homepage, whatever CSS blocks are on "Homepage", etc.

That's a beautifully clear explanation. Much appreciated!

Questions on individual gallery customization

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