Is there a simple way to make a change to MainApplicationShell.mxml on production server

[Steve]

Hi,

I'm new to tweaking bigbluebutton.  I just want to make a quick change to MainApplicationShell.mxml and then re-compile the client.  Rather than setup a development server on my Mac (buying VMware Fusion for Mac), can I just make the changes on a linux server instance (it's live but it's not being used at the moment).  If there's a problem, I can always reload from a backup up image.  It seems this would be the easier route - just not sure how to make the change and compile with Ant on the production server.  All the instructions are written for working on a development server.  

Any guidance here would be much appreciated.

Steve

[Fred Dixon]

Hi Steve,

The instructions for setting up the development environment are the correct (and simplest) approach to making changes to the BigBlueButton client source code.

You don't have to recompile the client to make configuration changes.  See

 

   https://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton/wiki/ClientConfiguration

Regards,... Fred

-- 
BigBlueButton Developer

http://bigbluebutton.org/
http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton

BigBlueButton on twitter: @bigbluebutton

Steve

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[Mark]

Hi Fred,

Please, I would to ask information regarding your previous answer (I'm used the development mode and the vers. 0.8 of BBB).
I'm trying to understand the page you indicated (client configuration) and about it, I would to try to change the layout of the main layout of BBB client.

Considering the file : /var/www/bigbluebutton/client/conf/config.xml , and based on the wiki page, if I change the .xml, I can change the main layout , or not ?

So, I would like to explain better: If I considering the MainApplicationShell.mxml file and the process to recompile (ant + ant locales), I can to try to change the layout of main web application or only the style,colours... ?

If possible, please, you can answer this question so that you can start doing some small tests.
Also, I have noticed that the Client Configuration wiki page is considered as "...NOTE: This doc is in the process of being updated." : it's prepared about updated ?

Thanks a lot.
Regards, Mark.

[Richard Alam]

On Mon, May 13, 2013 at 8:52 AM, Mark <mark1...@gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Fred,

Please, I would to ask information regarding your previous answer (I'm used the development mode and the vers. 0.8 of BBB).
I'm trying to understand the page you indicated (client configuration) and about it, I would to try to change the layout of the main layout of BBB client.

Considering the file : /var/www/bigbluebutton/client/conf/config.xml , and based on the wiki page, if I change the .xml, I can change the main layout , or not ?

You can change the layout by editing /var/www/bigbluebutton/client/conf/layout.xml

Then to use that layout as the default, edit /var/www/bigbluebutton/client/conf/config.xml and set defaultLayout="Your_New_Layout_Name"

 

HTH,

RIchard

--
-----
BigBlueButton Developer
http://www.bigbluebutton.org
http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton

[Chad Pilkey]

Steve,
There's nothing stopping you from setting up a development environment on a production server. The advantage to a development server is that there's no critical information stored on it so if you mess something up you can just start fresh. If you only want to change the client there's very little risk in that as you can just change the nginx files at any time to point to the packaged client again.


Mark,
It's important to note that layout.xml only exists in 0.81 not 0.8. The only way to configure layout in 0.8 is by modifying the getPreferredPosition() method in each mdiWindow. The documentation for 0.8 gives the idea that you can change the layout by modifying config.xml, but most of the windows don't actually obey the position attribute in config.xml and instead have their position hard coded in.

[Steve]

Thank you Fred, and thank you Chad.

Chad, so I started to do as you said today.  I worked on my inactive production server - it's a dedicated server with the full requirements that I built from the step-by-step instructions and it works great.  I went to install the development environment as per the instructions and issued the command:

bbb-conf --setup-dev tools

The message returned was that I couldn't do this from the root.  Am I missing something?

[Mark]

Hi Chad,

Thanks for the reply. I check in the dir: /home/user/dev/bigbluebutton/bigbluebutton-client/src/org/bigbluebutton/main/views/MainCanvas.mxml and others .mxml files.
About the change the bbb web client layout, on the vers. 0.80, you suggest me to modify the MainCanvas.mxml file ? So, after the .mxml files modification, I check "ant locales" and "ant" to apply the previous modification on bbb client ?  

I have verified that the file "config.xml" that is used to change the properties (IP server, css, forms, ...) is located in the dir: /home/user/dev/bigbluebutton/bigbluebutton-client/client/conf/ . It's correct ?


Please, an information about the version 0.81: actually it's in a development mode or the 0.81 it's stable to modify, in example, layout, ecc... ?

Thanks.
Regards, Mark.

[Fred Dixon]

> Please, an information about the version 0.81: actually it's in a development mode or the 0.81 it's stable to modify, in example, layout, ecc... ?

We (the core developers) have been working working on 0.81 since we release 0.80 on June 19, 2012.  We're getting close to reaching 0.81-beta.   

Look for an upcoming post to bigbluebuton-dev when the beta is ready.

Regards,... Fred

-- 
BigBlueButton Developer

http://bigbluebutton.org/
http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton

BigBlueButton on twitter: @bigbluebutton

[Chad Pilkey]

Steve,

The development setup commands can't be run with root privileges. I'm not sure what the actual reasoning is, but you could either create a non-root user with sudo rights or try following the 0.81 client development steps here, http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton/wiki/081DevelopingBigBlueButton#Client_Development. Your results might vary though with the second option.

[Chad Pilkey]

Mark,

You don't necessarily need to change anything with MainCanvas, instead what you can do is change the window that you want to move's getPreferredPostion method. You can see the PresentationWindow version of the method here, https://github.com/bigbluebutton/bigbluebutton/blob/v0.8/bigbluebutton-client/src/org/bigbluebutton/modules/present/ui/views/PresentationWindow.mxml#L207. You could change MainCanvas.MIDDLE to MainCanvas.BOTTOM_LEFT and it would position itself differently.

You could also change the positionWindow() method in MainCanvas here, https://github.com/bigbluebutton/bigbluebutton/blob/v0.8/bigbluebutton-client/src/org/bigbluebutton/main/views/MainCanvas.mxml#L91. You could change what MainCanvas.MIDDLE actually does so that instead of taking up the full height it instead only takes up half the height.

It's important to note that this only applies to 0.8 and the layout functionality in the Flash client is completely differently in 0.81.

Chad

[Mark]

Hi Chad,

I'm checking your suggestion in the bbb vers. 0.80, about the .mxml files.

After editing (and update as your example) the file 'PresentationWindow.mxml', on the terminal I have to follow the procedure of build, with ant locales and ant to update the bbb-client or not ?

Thanks.
Regards, M.

[Fred Dixon]

Hi Mark,

Please slow down and give yourself some time to go through the documentation first and, if a component is unfamiliar to you, use Google to search for related documentation -- both in the BigBlueButton mailing list and abroad.

There's some learning involved with BigBlueButton, and there is already a wealth of information.  Also, give yourself some time to learn how a mailing list works as well -- you need to ask questions in a new thread, not hijacking existing threads.

Regards,... Fred
-- 
BigBlueButton Developer

http://bigbluebutton.org/
http://code.google.com/p/bigbluebutton

BigBlueButton on twitter: @bigbluebutton

[Mark]

Hi Fred,

I apologize for the inquiry having had little interaction with google.
Regards, M.