--- title: "CTERA Portal Customization Guidelines" slug: "ctera-portal-customization-guidelines" updated: 2026-07-19T08:35:52Z published: 2026-07-19T08:35:52Z canonical: "kb.ctera.com/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines" --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://kb.ctera.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # CTERA Portal Customization Guidelines Portal customization is available for the following: - End user and team administration colors. - The brand colors, such as the color for the main menu items in the navigation menu, as well as action icon and button colors. - Message colors. - Layout colors. - Table grid colors. - Text colors. - The end user portal. - The end user portal for team portal administrators. - The end user portal for guest users. - Invitations. The portal global administration view cannot be customized, aside from the **Help** link. For information on customizing this link, refer to [Customizing Legal Information, About Us, Support and Help Links](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#customizing-legal-information-about-us-support-and-help-links). Reports and emails sent from the portal can be customized from within the product, as described in the portal documentation. The administrator is responsible for this customization. When customizing the CTERA Portal follow these guidelines: - Use the Palette Generator to change the portal colors. The CSS files generated can then be incorporated in the customized skin. - Customize skins.css for the end user portal and skins.admin.css for the administration portal. **Warning** Customize the skins.css and skins.admin.css files after changing the portal colors using the Palette Generator, otherwise any customizations are lost when the new skins.css and skins.admin.css files are generated by the Palette Generator. Also, only changes that are described in the procedure in [Customizing Portal Skins](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#customizing-portal-skins) can be implemented. Other changes to these files, such as changing margins, padding, size, display, etc., may work with a specific portal version, but can cause major bugs in portal upgrades. The following cannot be customized: - The css.css file. - The JS scripts. **Note** Mandatory references to js scripts are marked with a comment stating they cannot be removed. - The layout of the end user portal's user interface and the team portal's administration view. ## Customizing Portal Skins You can customize the following: - End user and team administration colors, as described in [Customizing Portal Colors](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#customizing-portal-colors). - The end user portal for team portals, team portal administrators, and for guest users. - The images, such as the logo. **Note** Customizing the logo image for email notifications must be done after every portal upgrade since the image is not included as part of the upgrade. If the image is not redone, email notifications are not sent and an error is issued with each notification. - The **Search Bar** in the *Cloud Drive* and/or *Shared With Me* folder in an end user portal. - The legal information, about us, support and help links in the login footer or user profile, as described in [Customizing Legal Information, About Us, Support and Help Links](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#customizing-legal-information-about-us-support-and-help-links). These customizations can be done at any time, before or after customizing the skin. **To customize a skin:** **Note** Apart from the files specified in this procedure, do not change any other files, for example `skinname/css/css.css`. Also, any layout changes, even minor ones like margins, padding, size, display, etc., in `skins.css` and `skins.admin.css` may work with a specific portal version, but can cause major bugs in portal upgrades. **Thus, only the changes listed in this procedure are permitted**. 1. Contact CTERA Support and request the sample skin file. This is a standard CTERA skin. 2. Change the `.skin` suffix to `.zip` and extract the files to a folder. 3. Customize the colors as described in [Customizing Portal Colors](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#customizing-portal-colors). 4. To customize the end user portal: **Note** skinname is the name of the folder where the base skin was extracted. 1. Replace skinname/endUser/css/skins.css with the skins.css file generated by customizing the portal colors. 2. Change the logo image by replacing **logo.png** in skinname/endUser/img and the css attributes as follows: **Note** The logo sizes must be able to fit the area: 200 pixels width for the logo in the user interface and 300 pixels width and 70 pixels height for the logo for public links. - For the logo in the user interface, edit the `.header .logo` element in skinname/endUser/css/skins.css`: ``` .header .logo { background: url(../img/logo.png) no-repeat center center; width: 200px; } ``` - For the logo for public links, edit the `.logo-invitation` element in `skinname/endUser/css/skins.css`: ``` body#invitation-view .navbar .logo-invitation { width: 300px; height: 70px; top: -10px; background: url(../img/logo.png) no-repeat 0 0; } ``` 3. Change background images by replacing the files in `skinname/endUser/img`: **background-small.png** – For general use. **background-medium.png** – For tablets. **background-large.png** – For desktops. **background-x-large.png** – For large desktops, 1200px and up. 4. Hide the Search Bar in either or both the *Cloud Drive* and *Shared With Me* folders, by editing `skinname/config.json`. The content of the file controls which search bars are hidden: ``` { "HideSearchInCloudDrive" : true, "HideSearchInSharedWithMe" : true } ``` where setting `HideSearchInCloudDrive` to `true` hides the search bar in the cloud drive view and setting `HideSearchInSharedWithMe` to `true` hides the search bar in the *Shared With Me* view. The default, when no parameters are specified, is false for both settings. 5. To customize the administrator portal: **Note** skinname is the name of the folder where the base skin was extracted. The logo size must be able to fit the area: 200 pixels width and 250 pixels height. 1. Replace `skinname/admin/css/skins.admin.css` with the `skins.admin.css` file generated by customizing the portal colors. 2. Change the logo image by replacing **logo.png** in `skinname/img` and the `css` attribute, by editing the `.logo` element in `skinname/admin/css/skins.admin.css`: ``` .logo { display: inline-block; width: 200px; height: 250px; background: url(../../img/logo.png) no-repeat center center; } ``` 6. After making customizations, edit **MANIFEST.MF**, and set the value of name to the name of your skin. For example: `name=myFirstSkin` 7. Select all of the files and folders under the extracted folder and compress then into a ZIP file with the name of the skin you specified in **MANIFEST.MF**. **Notes** The name of the ZIP file must be the name of the skin specified in **MANIFEST.MF**. The ZIP fle must be **created** with the name of the skin specified in **MANIFEST.MF** so you cannot use Windows default compression. Instead use a program such as WinRAR or 7zip that allows you to specify the archive name before the archive generation. 8. Change the `.zip` suffix to `.skin`. 9. As a global administrator, upload the skin file to the CTERA Portal and set it as the default skin, as described in [Managing a Skin](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#managing-a-skin). **Note** Only a global administrator can upload a skin file to a CTERA Portal. 10. Customize the legal information, about us, support and help links in the login footer or user profile, as described in [Customizing Legal Information, About Us, Support and Help Links](/v1/docs/ctera-portal-customization-guidelines#customizing-legal-information-about-us-support-and-help-links). **Note** These customizations can be done at any time, before or after customizing the skin. ### Customizing Portal Colors You use the Palette Generator to customize both the end user and team administrator colors. 8.1.x: [Managing the portal colors](/v1/docs/customizing-the-virtual-portal-look-and-feel-1#managing-the-portal-colors) 8.2.x: [Managing the portal colors](/v1/docs/customizing-the-virtual-portal-look-and-feel-2#managing-the-portal-colors) 8.3.x: [Managing the portal colors](/v1/docs/customizing-the-virtual-portal-look-and-feel-2-1) 8.4.x: [Managing the portal colors](/v1/docs/customizing-the-virtual-portal-look-and-feel-2-1-1) ### Customizing Legal Information, About Us, Support and Help Links You can customize the following links: - In the end user and team administrator **Login** page, in the footer: - The **Support** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA support page. - The **Legal Information** link. The default opens a window with the [CTERA EULA](https://www.ctera.com/eula/). - The **About Us** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA website. - In the end user portal's **MY PROFILE** option: - The profile **Help** link displays a window with options including: - **Online Help** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA online help. - **Legal Information** link. The default opens a window with the [CTERA EULA](https://www.ctera.com/eula/). - **Get Support** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA support page. - In the team administrator **MY PROFILE** option: - The **HELP** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA online help. - The **LEGAL** link. The default opens a window with the [CTERA EULA](https://www.ctera.com/eula/). - The **SUPPORT** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA support page. - In a global administrator portal's **Login** page in the footer: - The **Support** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA support page. - In the global administrator portal's **MY PROFILE** option: - The **HELP** link. The default opens a new browser window with the CTERA online help. **To customize the Legal Information, About Us and Help links:** 1. Open an SSH session to the CTERA Portal server as root. 2. Connect to the CTERA Portal CLI, by running the following command: `telnet localhost` Log in to the CTERA Portal CLI, by running the following command: `login Administration admin adminUserName` where *adminUserName* is the admin user's name. For example: `login Administration admin admin` You are prompted to enter the administrator's password. 3. Enter the administrator's password. 4. Set up portal links: - To set the **Legal Information** link, run the following command: `set /settings/defaultPortalSettings/gui/legalUrl "link"` where *link* is a link to your company's legal information page. It must be enclosed in quotation marks and it must be an HTTPS URL. - To set the **About Us**, run the following command: `set /settings/defaultPortalSettings/gui/aboutUrl "link"` where *link* is a link to your company's website. It must be enclosed in quotation marks and it must be an HTTPS URL. - To set the **Help** link for the end user portal, run the following command: `set /settings/defaultPortalSettings/gui/endUserHelpUrl "link"` where *link* is a link to the online help you wan to use. It must be enclosed in quotation marks and it must be an HTTPS URL. - To set the **Help** link for the administration view, run the following command: `set /settings/defaultPortalSettings/gui/adminHelpUrl "link"` where *link* is a link to the online help you wan to use. It must be enclosed in quotation marks and it must be an HTTPS URL. 5. Exit the CTERA Portal CLI, by running the following command: `quit` 6. Restart CTERA Portal, by running the following command: `portal-manage.sh restart` The changes are applied. **To customize the Support link:** **Note** In the global administrator view, virtual portal settings are default settings that apply to all virtual portals. Global settings can be overridden for each virtual portal from that virtual portal's administration interface. 1. Select **Settings** in the navigation pane. 2. Select **Virtual Portal**, under **SETTINGS** in the **Control Panel** content page. The **Virtual Portal Settings** window is displayed. 3. For a virtual portal, click **Override** to enable editing the settings. 4. Scroll down to the **Support** section and change the support settings as required. Where: **Support URL** – The URL to which CTERA Portal users browse for customer support. **Email Sender's Name** – The email address that is displayed in the **From** field of notifications sent to users by the virtual portal. 5. Click **SAVE**. ## Managing a Skin You can upload a default skin for all the portals in the global administrator view or for a specific team portal in the view for that portal. **To upload a skin to the portal:** 1. For all portals, in the global administration view, or for a specific virtual portal in the view for the virtual portal, select **Settings > Skins** in the navigation pane. The **SKINS** page is displayed, listing the available skins. 2. Click **Upload Skin** to upload the new skin. The **Select a skin file to upload** window is displayed. 3. Click **Upload** and browse to the skin received from CTERA support. 4. Select the skin and click **Open**. 5. Click **FINISH**. **Note** You can also download a skin from the portal to make changes. CTERA recommends only doing this in coordination with CTERA support. **To make a skin the default skin:** 1. For all portals, in the global administration view, or for a specific virtual portal in the view for the virtual portal, select **Settings > Skins** in the navigation pane. The **SKINS** page opens, displaying all the available skins. 2. Select the skin to use as the default and click **Set Default**. 3. Refresh the portal to apply the customizations. ## Advanced Login Page Customizations The following customization should be performed with the help of CTERA Support. When customizing the CTERA Portal **Login** page, it must include the "Powered by CTERA" icon, the CTERA copyright, and the following controls: | Control ID | Allowed Tags | | --- | --- | | **LoginCtrl** | div, img, button | | **ctera-ctrl** | div | You can customize the **Login** page for an end user portal by editing `skinname/endUser/login.html` where *skinname* is the name of the folder where the skin is located.