Nucleus for DNN

Nucleus is a revolutionary DotNetNuke skinning framework that enables you to update your website's appearance with the same ease as you update your content.

No more static skins

The days when you purchased and applied a skin and had to live with the specific look and feel it provided are gone. Say hello to dynamic skins! Just as you maintain the content on your site with a few clicks, you can now control your skins and containers. In fact, you can create as many page skins and containers as your heart desires right in your browser.

How it works

Nucleus runs on DNN 5, installs like any other module and can be placed on any page with a compatible skin or container. It will then pick up the edit options the applied skin or container has to offer. So Nucleus alone does nothing. Nucleus is the framework. It adds to DotNetNuke the magic that allows you edit compatible skins and containers and to generate new ones.

Key Features

The best way to explore Nucleus is in a playful manner. However, there are some features that we are especially proud of so let’s talk a little about them.

 A lovable user interface

Forget the archaic user interfaces you are used to seeing when working with DNN modules. We took advantage of what the web has to offer these days and created a UI that makes you feel at home and comfortable right from the start.

Live preview

Upon changing values in the Nucleus editor with your mouse or keyboard, the appearance of your page is updated in real time. It's like a game! It's so fun that it can be addictive. But most importantly, it will help you achieve the result you want in no time.

Inspection

If you have ever used Firebug or other browser-based development consoles, you are certainly familiar with the term. Nucleus lets you inspect and select the skin section or container you want to edit with just one click.
Let’s say you want to edit the appearance of a specific container. All you have to do is fire up Nucleus, click inside that container and the Nucleus editor with the available options is displayed.

We love colors

Colors are important in web design. And as such are treated with respect in Nucleus. Version 1.0 features two color tools: Color Picker and Color Buddy.
Color Picker, like in Photoshop or any other graphics editing application, will help you select colors with your mouse. In combination with Live Preview, Color Picker will help you choose colors quickly and efficiently.
Color Buddy remembers the colors you have previously chosen in any given Nucleus editor and lets you reuse them with a simple click, therefore avoiding constant copy & paste. With a double-click in any color field, Color Buddy will list all colors currently in use in a straightforward palette.

Smart fields

All fields in Nucleus editors that take numeric CSS values, such as padding, margin, border width etc., can be updated using the arrows or the plus and minus on your keypad. That also works for multiple numeric values in a single field making shorthand CSS a breeze.

More to come

We have many features that we want to add to Nucleus, but before we do so, we need to hear from you. If you think something important is missing or you have an idea about how things can be improved, please post in our forums or send us an email. There is a good chance that your suggestion may be implemented in the next Nucleus version.

For More Reading
http://nucleus.thinkofdesign.com/