Looking for someone with CSS Stylesheet macro licensed

Question

Hello,

Only in my second week of work at a new employer, and using it here is my first time using Confluence.  Our version is 6.9.0. I think that we host our own server, i.e., we're not using the cloud product.

I'm a technical writer, so a bit frustrated with the (whee!) eight whole text styles available. Also, there's no consistent style of documentation here; it's mostly been created by engineers. Ergo, I want to have an actual stylesheet.

We don't have the CSS Stylesheet macro, and I've asked my supervisor to see about pricing. IF that's not a showstopper, I'm looking for someone who has this installed.

Does it add your CSS-defined styles to the text-styles drop-down? If not, how do you use the styles specified in the CSS?

Screenshots would be good. A short screen-sharing session would be fantastic, if both of our employers are OK with that.

Thank you,

Pat O'Connell
Montreal

Bill Bailey · Answer

You just need some extra rights to be able to modify the stylesheet at the space level. It is a fairly straightforward process. You just need to know the classes - basically all page content is a child to the class: wiki-content.

If you are concerned about messing up something, have them set up a test space and give you access there (you have a personal space, but I am not sure what all the features there are). Then you can do whatever you want to, and it can be deleted later.

Or, set up you own personal Confluence server ($10 license) to really play with it. You can install the same version as your company is running. It is a great way to learn about Confluence.

P.S. FrameMaker is still very powerful, but you don't need the same skillset to format documents and you do to create templates -- but there is a steep learning curve. However, it is still the gold standard for formatting documentation, IMHO.

Patrick O_Connell · Answer

Hi Bill,

Thank you for your reply. As to the own-server or cloud version, what's at the bottom of any page is this, which I find inconclusive:

You can modify the CSS stylesheet at both the space and global levels (see styling-confluence-with-css). Your adnin should be able to help you by giving you space admin rights, or installing a stylesheet at the global level.

Yeah, I'm reluctant to request high-level access, given that this is only my 3rd week here. I I have pinged my manager about licensing that CSS Stylesheet plugin. My employer moves a lot more quickly than many, in many ways, but he has already said that getting approval for plugins can be a painful process.

...or by writing user macros (for example, styling nice table and figure titles).

Now, it's not clear to me how you just create your own macros, and even if I have that ability... Our UX designer and I had a sit-down where we tried to use markup to just specify an inline CSS style. It didn't work. Atlassian's position seems to be that if you want to take the grease-monkey approach and go under the hood with markup to do x, you have to have bought the component that gives you the more user-friendly way of accessing x.

They could change their name to License To Print Money, Inc. Or maybe The Electronic Arts of Collaboration Software—you'll understand that one if you're a gamer.

FrameMaker - wow. Last exposure was mid-90's and it just been ported from Unix to Windows. It was obviously powerful, but not that user-friendly. I do wonder how it has changed.

Thank you for the links - both are interesting.

Cheers,
Pat O'Connell

Bill Bailey · Answer

If you are on the server version (which you can tell by scrolling to the bottom of the page and reading the version number), you don't need a plug in. You can modify the CSS stylesheet at both the space and global levels (see styling-confluence-with-css). Your adnin should be able to help you by giving you space admin rights, or installing a stylesheet at the global level.

On the number of styles, that is restricted by the editor (derived from TinyMCE), and is typical with web-based editors. You can then user other macros (such as the code macro) for code blocks, or by writing user macros (for example, styling nice table and figure titles).

I am also a tech writer and I understand the desire for more styles, but you can work around it. I do love the fact that I can control the text styling via CSS, preventing authors from each developing their own style. I created custom styles to give our documentation branding.

While I love FrameMaker, I am a huge convert to Confluence for documentation as it greatly improves collaboration and productivity, allowing an organization to get docs out faster.

FYI, although I am on an older version, you can see some examples of what you can do as far as a look and feel within Confluence Documentation+Example