BSP - Look and Feel / Theme

Question

Good Morning All,
disclaimer: I checked the blogs, I checked the discussions, I checked the examples, I checked the doco - and couldn't find the answer to my question.
Question:
I've already seen it, but can't remember where it is, does anyone know the name of the BSP Sample/Example which comes with the WAS which has the EP6 look and feel ?
I saw it a few weeks ago and I can't find it now and I want to study the code from it to make my app have a nicer look and feel.
Note: I read Thomas's blog on - 'A developer's Journal Part VI
and although that example discussed what I am interested in I couldn't see examples in the code of creating the header bar etc, maybe it's just me, but at the moment that's what I would like to achieve and to do it by example.
So to conclude if anyone knows / can remember the name of the BSP example which has an EP6 look and feel please let me know so that I can study it for inspiration.
Thanks very much,
Milan.

Answer 1

Hallo Milan,
I think that you are doing good. It is always the best to follow a small mix of documentation reading and practical work. So let me tell you the minimum to get a first version working. Thereafter to can continue reading!
Problem: we want to implement a simple link tag (in 15 minutes!) that works like this:
<%@page language="abap"%>
<%@extension name="htmlb" prefix="htmlb"%>
<%@extension name="bcm06" prefix="bcm06"%>
<htmlb:content design="design2003">
  <htmlb:page>
      <b><bcm06:simpleLink href="http://www.sap.com">
          SAP Home Page!
      </bcm06:simpleLink></b>
  </htmlb:page>
</htmlb:content>
In SE80 we defined a new BSP library bcm06. We define a new element simpleLink. Typical handler class name will be CL_BCM06_SIMPLELINK (just the convention we use).  As body this tag can contain other HTML and also over BSP elements (we want to just render a link around all of body). We don't worry about the rest of the checkboxes. They will become interesting later on.
We activate the library. The workbench will detect that no handler class exists, and will generate all of the stuff we need. Now already the tag is full functional, and can be used on any BSP page. It just will not do anything.
What was generated? The class inheritance diagram is as follow: CL_BCM06_SIMPLELINK --> CL<b>G</b>_BCM06_SIMPLELINK --> CL_BSP_ELEMENT.
The class CL_BSP_ELEMENT is the base class, and it contains a lot of interesting functionality. None of which we worry about now. Never try to change it!
The class CL<b>G</b>_BCM06_SIMPLELINK (note that CLG<b></b>_!) is generated new each and everytime that you touch the definition of the tag. Effectively all the defined attributes are generated onto this class, so that they are already of the correct type, and that this information is always in sync. This means that all your tag defined attributes are directly attributes on your class. In our case, the defined "href" attribute (type string) is now an attribute on the CLG class.
The last class CL_BCM06_SIMPLELINK will only be generated once if it does not exist. This is the class where you work. In this class there are two methods that are interesting to you at this moment. Later you will learn about the rest.
DO_AT_BEGINNING: This method is called effectively in response to the <lib:tag> sequence. This is the code that executes before the body. This is the place where we would like to render out "<a href=...>" sequence.
DO_AT_END: This method is called effectively at the end of the tag, when the </lib:tag> is seen. The body has now already been processed and sent onto the output stream. So we only need to render "</a>".
Note that these methods are implemented empty. You <b><u>*MUST*</u></b> overwrite them, and implement them in your class. See instructions from Thomas. Source code:
<b>METHOD if_bsp_element~do_at_beginning.</b>
  DATA: html TYPE string.
  CONCATENATE `<a href="` me->href `">` INTO html.
  me->print_string( html ).
  rc = co_element_continue.
ENDMETHOD.
<b>METHOD if_bsp_element~do_at_end.</b>
  me->print_string( `</a>` ).
  rc = co_page_continue.
ENDMETHOD.
Notice that you DO NOT need that super call. The base method will always be empty (from definition, will never change). You also have a direct PRINT_STRING method in newer SPs. The return code you must set. (To tell the truth, the constants for RC have been picked so perfectly that if you forget them, it should not hurt in 85% of the cases.)
That is it. Test page. Mine worked!
Of course, we can start looking at more exotic things, like empty tags, at tags that skip their bodies if not required, processing the body, validation, etc.
But this overview was just to give you that first success feeling, and also to give you a better framework for understanding more of the documentation as you continue to read.
Recommended: read <a href="/people/brian.mckellar/blog/2004/06/11/bsp-trouble-shooting-getting-help">Getting Help</a> to see how you can quickly navigate between BSP page and a tag's definition, from where you also quickly get to the implementation class of the tag.
bye, brian
PS: Now if this is not already the first page of your weblog done