UPCOMING WEBINAR: Run Research Your Way With AI Skills This article describes how to create your own custom templates that anyone in your company can find in the Company Templates section of the document gallery.
Requirements
You will need a design idea, perhaps an example PowerPoint document, and the necessary graphics, logos, and icons for your template.
Method
- On the Documents page in Displayr, click New > Document.
- In the dialog, click + (Blank document).
- Confirm the size of the Pages in the Document, which are the size of slides in PowerPoint exports via Document Settings
> Document Layout.
- At the bottom of the screen, click Page Master:
- Design your template pages in this view, using the default layouts for Title Only, Title Page, and add any new template pages as required. When the template is applied, these will be available to select when creating new pages in your documents. See How to Create a Template Document for more specifics.
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When done, click Exit Page Master at the bottom of the screen.
- Create any other components you would like to be part of the template. Anything you create in Edit mode will also be part of the template, including Pages, outputs, data, and analyses.
- You will want to take screenshots of representative pages as you go - these will be used later in the Gallery preview to show what the template looks like.
- Note that the screenshots will look their best in the Gallery if they're in a 16:9 ratio - they'll be automatically resized. The exact size of an image in the Gallery preview is 240 pixels wide and 135 pixels high.
- Go to Share > Export Data > Download Document (.QPack).
- In your Windows Explorer, select the downloaded file and rename it according to this format (note: the file name is case-sensitive):
templateName.template.QPack
The templateName part of the file name is the name that will be used in the Gallery. In the above screenshot, the file name for the second template is: Simple Lilac.template.QPack
Note: Previously, Displayr required templates to include ".widescreen" in the template name for a template to be widescreen (16:9) and otherwise defaulted to standard (4:3). Going forward, new templates will default to widescreen just like new, blank Displayr documents unless the QPack was saved in a different aspect ratio. See the FAQ for more information. - Remaining in Windows Explorer, rename any screenshots or images you want to use in the Gallery according to the following format:
templateName 1.template.png
The number in the file name indicates which image is first, which is second, and so on. If you have multiple images for a template, then the Gallery will cycle through the images in the number order that you specify in the file names. Note that there must be a space between the templateName component and the number. If you only have one image, then the file name should still include the number 1. As an example, if I had two screenshots that represented the "Simple Lilac" template, I would name them as follows:
Simple Lilac 1.template.png
Simple Lilac 2.template.png - Back in Displayr, click the initials icon (top right) and select Displayr Cloud Drive.
- Click + Upload.
- Upload the template files and the image files.
Once the upload is complete, return to the Documents page, click New > Document, and then go to the Company Templates section in the Gallery. Your templates, with the relevant images (if any), will now be there, and selecting one of them will create a new document that uses the template.
FAQ
Q: What will happen to my templates that are already named templateName.widescreen.template.QPack?
A: They will appear in the gallery as "templateName.widescreen". To fix this, rename them in the Cloud Drive to remove the ".widescreen" part of the name. Please also ensure you update any screenshots or images as well.
Q: Can I still upload custom documents that are standard (4:3) sized?
A: Yes, as long as the QPack that is saved has the document layout in standard (4:3), it will use that aspect ratio. The documents will just not be labeled in the gallery as a standard template, and will use the name you’ve given QPack when you upload it during the steps above.