Skins organization in RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX

The Q2 2011 release of the RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX brings in two novelties in regard to the skins organization:

• New skins assembly is introduced (Telerik.Web.UI.Skins)
• The “skins chooser” is reworked and is much more friendly

What is Default Skin?

The default skin is declared in the web.config file of the project. This is the global site-wide skin to be used by the RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX. However it can be overwritten by each control via its Skin property or by the whole page by using the RadSkinManager.

What is Telerik.Web.UI.Skins?

The Telerik.Web.UI.Skins is an assembly that contains some new skins. The old skins are still placed in the Telerik.Web.UI assembly. In the long term we plan to extract all skins but the "Default" one from the main (Telerik.Web.UI) assembly. The main goal is to optimize the referenced assemblies, i.e. only sites that use any custom skins should reference the Telerik.Web.UI.Skins.

How to configure the skin references of a project?

Here is a screenshot of the new Project Configuration wizard:

On the first step you can choose which Skin packs (skin pack is an assembly which contains one or more skins) to be included in the project by checking/unchecking the available ones. When the skin pack selection is changed the Default skin list on the right side is refreshed accordingly.

The skin packs could be changed after the project is already created too. When starting the Project Configure Wizard the skin selection page will pop up what offers the opportunity more skin packs to be included or existing skin packs to be removed from the project.

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