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This article applies to: ML v7, ML8

Changing the Default Skin and Previewing Alternate Skins


Synopsis
This article explains how to change the default skin customers see when going to your store, as well as how to preview other skins without changing the default Skin ID

Procedure

Changing the Default Skin

To change the default skin customer see when going to your site, you will need to change AppConfig DefaultSkinID by going to the AppConfig Parameters page in your admin site.  Set the DefaultSkinID AppConfig to the skin number you would like customers to see.  This number corresponds to the folder that the skin is installed in within your skin/skin_# directory.  For example, if your customer skin is in folder skins/skin_7, you would set the DefaultSkinID to 7.

IMPORTANT: When you view a skin, that skin ID is stored as a cookie in your browser, so every time you return to the site you will see that skin id, even if the DefaultSkinID AppConfig is set to a different value.  Remember to clear your cookies when testing to ensure the default skin is being shown.  If this is a live site and you are concerned about customers not seeing your new skin, the safest way to proceed is to rename your existing default skin folder (eg. rename skin_1 to skin_10) and put your new skin (when completed) in the folder where your old default skin was.  This way you will not have to change your default skin id at all.

Previewing Skins other than the Default Skin

If you wish to preview a skin without changing the default skin id, you can do so using a querystring parameter appended to your site's URL.  If (for example) your site is located at http://www.yourcompany.com and you wanted to preview skin 7, you could go to http://www.yourcompany.com/default.aspx?skinid=7

Once again, since this sets a cookie, you will continue to see skin 7 until you manually go to http://www.yourcompany.com/default.aspx?skinid=1

More Information
For additional information on customizing and building skins, please see our skinning tutorial: http://manual.aspdotnetstorefront.com/p-1373-skinning-tutorial.aspx