Site Object

Overview

Sites allow you to create a custom, well-tailored experience for your users that provides them with quick access to the pages, tasks, and information that they need in a professional and polished way.

This page provides you with detailed information on how to create and configure a site object. To learn more about how to use sites, see Using Sites. To learn more about how to create functional and beautiful sites, see Designing Sites and Portals.

Create a site

To create a site object:

1. In your application, go to the Build view.
2. Click NEW > Site.

3. Configure the following properties:

   Property	Description
   Name	Enter a name that follows the recommended naming standard.
   Display Name	Enter a name that will be displayed in the site navigation menu and the browser tab to identify the site.
   Description	(Optional) Enter a description of the object to display to developers only.
   Web Address Identifier	Specify a web address identifier to use as the site's URL. The identifier must be unique in the Appian environment. By default, Appian constructs this property using the Name property you entered, but you can modify the identifier as needed.

4. Click CREATE. Appian opens the site for you to further configure.

Properties

To edit the site Name and Description, click Properties in the settings menu .

Configurations

The Configurations section allows designers to modify the primary site configurations that determine how users experience the site.

The following table describes these primary site configurations.

Field	Description
Display Name	The name that is displayed in the site navigation menu and the browser tab. You can create a Static display name, or create a dynamic display name using an Expression. If you use an expression to create a display name, that expression will evaluate whenever sites in the environment that the user has access to load or refresh. To avoid your sites loading slowly, don't use long-running expressions, like queries.
Web Address	The section of the site's URL that identifies it. The web address id appears in the URL and in log files.
Show Tempo link in Navigation Menu	Option to show or hide the Tempo link in the navigation menu. You can select to always show it, never show it, or for one or more selected groups.
Show Record News	Option to show or hide the news view on records. When enabled, all records displayed in the site will include the news view. In addition, the latest news will be displayed on the summary view when viewing user records.
Show Task List on Mobile	Option to enable a mobile site task list When enabled, after a user selects the site, the Appian Mobile menu displays a Tasks list which displays all tasks assigned to the user. Appian Mobile users can access offline-enabled tasks from this list, even when they are not connected to the internet. You can choose to always show the mobile site task list, never show it, or show it only for select groups.

Pages

The pages section allows you to add, remove, modify, and organize the pages that are displayed in a site.

You can configure a combination of up to ten pages or page groups in your site's navigation bar. For more information on organizing top-level navigation items for the best user experience, see Designing Sites and Portals: Organizing pages and page groups and Mobile Considerations for guidance about mobile-first sites.

Page types

Each top-level page within a site can be configured with one of four different page types:

• Action
• Interface
• Report (task report or Tempo report)
• Record list.

Interface type pages are the only pages that can be added to page groups or use URL parameters in a!urlForSite().

Adding pages

To add and configure a site page:

1. In the Pages section, click Add Page.
2. Complete the Add Page dialog and click OK.

The following options are available when adding or modifying a page.

Field	Description
Title	The page title displayed to users in the navigation bar. This parameter is required and can be configured as a static string or as an expression.
Web Address Identifier	The section of the URL that identifies the page. It appears in the URL and in log files for network devices and servers. By default, Appian constructs this field using the Title you entered.
Width	Determines the width of the content area for the page. The width options are Narrow, Medium, Wide, and Full. Default is Wide.
Icon	The icon to display with the page title in the navigation bar. The file-o icon is selected by default. Icons display when using Helium style or when viewing the site on Appian Mobile.
Type	Indicates the type of content available on the page. The type options are Action, Interface, Record List, and Report.
Content	Specifies which design object is available on the page. In the dropdown list, select an existing object of the Type you selected. For the Interface type, instead of selecting an existing object, you can create a new one by clicking the + icon next to the selection box.
Rule Input Configuration	If the site page is type Interface, and the interface selected for Content has rule inputs that work with URL parameters, this section displays to allow you to configure rule inputs to set default values for the page. See Rule Input Configuration for more information.
Visibility	Determines which users and groups can view the page. If Only show when is selected, the page is only visible when the entered expression evaluates to true. Otherwise the page is hidden. See visibility for more information.

Rule input configuration

When you set up your site page and select Interface for the page Type, the interface you select can use rule inputs of any type. However, certain types of rule inputs can use URL parameters to set their value. Site pages that use these types of rule inputs will display Has rule input configurations under the interface name. When you edit the page, the Rule Input Configuration displays, which allows you to configure the rule inputs.

To link to site pages using URL parameters, use a!urlForSite().

For more information on using URL parameters, see Use URL Parameters for Site and Portal Navigation.

You can configure the following Rule Input Configuration properties:

Property	Description	Default
Encrypt URL parameters	Determines whether to use encrypted or plaintext URL parameters. To help keep data secure, URL parameters are encrypted by default. See Determine whether to encrypt url parameters for more information about when to use encrypted versus plaintext URL parameters.	Selected
Rule Input	The rule inputs from the selected interface. Only certain types of rule inputs that work with URL parameters will appear.	Read only
Enable in URLs	This only appears when Encrypt URL parameters is deselected. It allows you to opt in to using only the URL parameters that are safe to display in plaintext. To help keep your data secure, only enable the rule inputs that you need to use with URL parameters.	Toggled off
URL Parameter Name	The name used when constructing links to the page. You can change this if you want to rename a rule input and make sure existing links don't break, or if you just want to make the name shorter or more clear.	Rule input name
Default Value (optional)	The value to use whenever the URL doesn't provide a value. See Determine whether to use a default value for more information. The evaluated default value must be 100 characters or less. Otherwise, the default value will be ignored.	Null
Update URL when rule input values change	Determines whether to update the web address when rule input values change. For example, on page that has filters that work with URL parameters, the URL parameters in the web address will update with the selected filter value.	Selected*

*If the site object was originally created in an environment earlier than Appian 24.2, Update URL when rule input values change will be deselected by default.

Visibility

The icon displays to the right of the page or page group title if the Visibility option is set to Only show when.

Page group visibility settings take precedence over any visibility settings for pages in that group. This means if a user does not have access to the page group, they will not be able to see any pages in that group even if they have access to the individual pages themselves.

Adding page groups

Page groups allow you to create a nested menu of pages under a page group title in your site's navigation bar for an additional level of navigation. Each page group can contain up to ten pages.

Before you can start adding and configuring page groups, you must add at least one page to your site.

To add and configure a page group:

1. Click ADD PAGE GROUP.
2. Complete the Add Page Group dialog and click ADD.

The following options are available when adding or modifying a page group.

Field	Description
Title	The page group title displayed to users in the navigation bar. This parameter is required and can be configured as a static string or as an expression.
Web Address Identifier	The section of the URL that identifies the page group. It appears in the URL and in log files for network devices and servers. By default, Appian constructs this field using the Title you entered.
Visibility	Determines which users and groups can view the pages in the page group. If Only show when is selected, the page group, along with the pages in it, are only visible when the entered expression evaluates to true. Otherwise the page group and all pages in it are hidden. See visibility for more information.

Adding pages to page groups

To add and configure a page within a page group:

1. Click Add Page in the page group card.
2. Complete the Add Page dialog and click ADD.

The options for adding a page within a page group are the same as adding a single page to a site with one difference: only interface pages can be added to page groups.

Reordering pages and page groups

The order of the page and page group titles in the site object determines the order of the page titles in the navigation bar. To reorder the pages, use the and arrows.

To move a page from one group to another, delete the page from its current group, and recreate the page within the other group.

Deleting pages and page groups

To delete a page or page group, click the icon in the page or page group card. Deleting a page group will also delete all page configurations within that group. The interface objects themselves will not be deleted.

Page hierarchy diagram

Once you've added at least one page to your site, you can view the page hierarchy diagram by clicking the sitemap icon in the Pages section. This diagram is a visual representation of what powers your site and its pages, with each related object appearing as a node. For site pages that use a process model or a report, the diagram also shows the interface behind the corresponding start form or report. Double-click an object in the diagram to open it.

Navigation bar

The Navigation Bar section allows you to:

• Choose a layout for your navigation bar.
• Choose a navigation bar background color.
• Select the page highlight color.
• Add a logo with alternative text to your navigation bar.
• Choose whether or not to show the display name in the navigation bar.

There are two different layout options that determine the styling and positioning of your site's navigation bar: HEADER BAR and SIDEBAR.

For information on making design choices for your navigation bar, see Designing Sites and Portals.

Field	Description	Default	More Info
Layout	The layout determines where the navigation bar displays on the site: The HEADER BAR displays at the top of the site and offers two different style options. The SIDEBAR displays on the side of the site. Page titles display with icons.	HEADER BAR	The navigation bar layout only applies to browsers. It doesn't affect sites in Appian Mobile.
Background Color	For browsers, this is the background color of the navigation bar. For mobile, this is the color of the top and bottom navigation bars. Click TRY A DARK COLOR SCHEME to select a dark theme for your site and view the steps to apply it to your interfaces. See Using predefined dark color schemes for more information.	#46708c	-
Selected Page Highlight Color	The highlight color of the selected page in the navigation bar.	#083d5c	For header bars with Helium style, this is the underline color of the selected page. For Appian Mobile, sidebars, and header bars with Mercury style, this is the background color of the selected page.
Logo	The logo to display in the navigation bar. For header bars, the placement of the logo depends on the style: Helium style: Right side of the header bar. Mercury style: Left side of the header bar.	Appian logo	File requirements: JPG, PNG, BMP, JPEG, or GIF file type. Transparent background. Less than 100 KB.
Logo Alternative Text	Text used by screen readers to describe the logo for accessibility. You should update the default value to something that conveys the same information as the logo, such as the company or entity name or any text used in the logo.	Logo	The alternative text can be set by a logo, web address, or expression. To use either a document or web address, select Static.
Show site display name in navigation bar	This determines whether or not the Display Name of the site displays in the navigation bar. The behavior of this option depends on the selected navigation bar layout: For a header bar, this determines whether the navigation menu displays as the Display Name of the site, or the icon. For a sidebar, this determines if the site display name appears above the list of site pages. The navigation menu always displays as the icon in a sidebar layout.	Turned off	This setting only affects web browsers, not Appian Mobile.

Branding

The Branding section allows designers to customize the look and feel of a site. These configurations can be set as static or dynamic values. Check out the Branding preview to see these configurations applied to your site.

You can configure the following for each site:

• Input and button shape.
• Colors.
• Icon that appears in the browser tab or URL bar.
• A custom typeface for all sites and portals in the environment.

For further information on configuring site branding, see Designing Sites and Portals.

Field	Description	Default	More Info
Input Shape	The shape applied to all input fields, selection fields, and picker components on all pages in a site.	Squared	Options: squared and semi-rounded.
Button Shape	The shape applied to all buttons on all pages in a site. This includes all buttons for record view tabs and record actions.	Squared	Options: squared, semi-rounded, and rounded.
Accent Color	Affects the color of many elements in all site pages, such as buttons, links, active field border colors, milestone bars, and section titles.	#1d659c	Avoid grayscale colors (black, white, and gray), since these are similar to colors used for interface elements. Avoid green/red colors, since these are commonly used to indicate positive/negative values.
Loading Bar Color	The color of the bar at the top of the page that indicates when the system is processing.	The accent color	Select a loading bar color with sufficient contrast against the navigation bar color to ensure users notice it. If using a sidebar layout, select a color with sufficient contrast against the page background color used for site pages.
Favicon Image	The favicon, or favorite icon, is the icon that appears in the browser tab or URL bar.	Appian "a" icon	File requirements: ICO file. 16x16 or 32x32 pixels. Less than 100 KB.
Typeface	Displays the current typeface for all sites and portals in the environment.	Open Sans	Read-only. Administrators can configure the typeface in the Admin Console.

Configuring colors

Each color field has three color configuration options to choose from:

• Default: The default color depends on your field.
• Hex Code: Select this option to define a hex code, or choose a color using the color picker.
• Expression: Select this option to dynamically set a color defined by an expression.
  • If an expression's output is an invalid hex code, the field will show the default color.

If you select a predefined dark color scheme, the values for the navigation bar color, selected highlight color, accent color, and loading bar color are all provided for you.

For more information on sites color schemes and color configurations, see the site color scheme design guidance.

Configuring logo and favicon images

The logo and favicon fields have four configuration options to choose from:

• Default: Select this to use the Appian logo.
• Document: Select this to use an image that is stored as an Appian document.
• Web Address: Select this to use a static image hosted on a web server or a content delivery network.
• Expression: Select this to dynamically display an image defined by an expression. The expression must point to a document, output a document ID (integer), or output a text value (web address). If an expression's output is invalid, the default image will display.

Branding preview

The Branding Preview allows you to visualize the navigation bar and branding configuration options you've chosen. You can preview navigation and branding changes across different pages by using the interactive navigation bar.

Keep in mind that the Branding Preview is only intended to show a preview of the branding configurations applied to the interfaces you add as pages. It does not:

• Allow you to test the expressions, interface components, or functionality of the interfaces or site.
• Reflect how the site will appear in Appian Mobile.
• Display component plug-ins. A placeholder image with a plug icon displays in their place.

To see these configurations applied to the site, save the site object and click the link under Web Address to open the site.

Design guidance

As you edit your site you may encounter design guidance. Appian design guidance reinforces best practice design patterns that should be implemented in your objects. Guidance is calculated while editing expressions within the site or when a precedent of the site is updated.

When a recommendation or warning is triggered you'll see an indicator icon in the header (A) and next to the corresponding line in the expression editor (B).

Click on the icon in the header to learn more about the suggested guidance (C) and how it can be addressed.

If a recommendation is not applicable to your use case, you can Dismiss (D) that individual recommendation for that site. Learn more about recommendation dismissal. Warnings cannot be dismissed and should always be addressed to avoid complications when the logic in the object is executed.

Site design guidance is also visible outside of the object on the Health Dashboard.

See design guidance for the full list of possible guidance.

Save and view the site

To save and view the site:

1. In the header bar, click SAVE CHANGES.
2. In the Configurations section, under Web Address, click the link to open the site.

Considerations for configuring sites

This section provides you with guidance and tips to keep in mind while you're creating and configuring your site.

See Designing Sites and Portals for design guidelines you should follow to give your users the best user experience.

Interfaces as sites pages

Use interfaces as sites pages to create dynamic dashboards, landing pages, and custom navigation experiences for your users. For design examples and inspiration, check out our complete list of drag and drop patterns to help you craft an efficient and engaging user experience.

Only pages of type Interface can be added to page groups or use URL parameters in a!urlForSite().

Reports as sites pages

Use a report to allow the information in a sites page to be quickly accessible from the Reports tab in Tempo.

If the information in your sites page doesn't need to be accessible from the Reports tab on Tempo, use an interface for your sites page.

Reports cannot reference interfaces that use rule inputs. Instead, use local variables and queries to call and display data in the report's interface.

Records and actions as sites pages

Configuring sites to show record news can help improve the collaboration around records. Users can collaborate on existing record news entries in sites, but not create new entries. However, records can be designed to include related actions that can generate new record entries via process.

Minimum Appian Mobile version to see more than five pages

For sites with more than five pages, Appian Mobile users must be on at least version 23.2 of the app to see any page past the fifth page.

Typefaces

You can configure a custom typeface in the Admin Console. Typefaces are universally applied to all sites and portals in the environment.

See Custom Typefaces for more information.

Using predefined dark color schemes

• The predefined dark color schemes for sites include predefined colors for the navigation bar and selected highlight color.
• When you select one of the predefined dark color schemes for your site, make sure that all of your site pages are using the same color scheme. To do this:
  • In the interface for your site page, use a header content layouts with the backgroundColor parameter set to the same color scheme used for your site: Charcoal, Navy, Plum.
  • Then, put the page's contents into card layout with the style parameter of each card layout set to the same color scheme used for your site.
• Do not use dark color scheme pages and non-dark color scheme pages together in a site. If all pages in your site don't work well with the predefined dark color schemes, you can create your own custom color scheme for your site and interfaces.
• Dark color schemes shouldn't be applied to pages used on Tempo or across multiple sites with different color schemes. Dark color schemes also do not work with the News and Related Actions tabs on records, record lists, and record related actions. If your site requires any of these, we recommend using the default white background across all site pages.

Components that aren't affected by input shape rounding

Input shape rounding is not applied to the following UI elements:

• Layouts
• Display fields
• Actions
• Grids
• Charts
• Browsers
• Record banners

Using site display names in URLs and navigation menus

After you've created a site, the web address identifier (URL) won't automatically update if you edit the site display name or define it using an expression.

Site display names appear in the navigation menu. If you use an expression to create a site display name, that expression will evaluate whenever sites in the environment load or refresh in order for the site display name to appear in the navigation menu. To avoid your sites loading slowly, don't use long-running expressions, like queries.

Security

You can configure the security role map of a site to control which users can see or modify the site and its properties.

See Editing Object Security for instructions on how to modify site security.

The following table outlines the actions that can be completed for each permission level in a site's security role map.

Actions	Administrator	Editor	Viewer
View the site	Yes	Yes	Yes
View the definition	Yes	Yes	Yes
View the security	Yes	Yes	Yes
Update the definition	Yes	Yes	No
Receive email error alerts	Yes	No	No
Update the security	Yes	No	No
Delete the site	Yes	No	No

Email error alerts

When users encounter errors in a site, email alerts will be automatically sent to administrators of the site object with details about the error. Click the page name to go to the site page where the user encountered the error.

Only one email will be sent per error message every hour. To see all the instances of an error, check the design error log.

In order to access the system logs or the site object, you must be assigned to the Designer user role, which gives access to Appian Designer.

To receive email error alerts for a site, make sure:

• Outbound emails are turned on for the environment.
• You have Administrator permissions to the site object in that environment.

Permissions for viewing site contents

To access a site, a user must have at least Viewer permissions to the site object.

To view a page on a site, a user must have:

• Visibility to the site page.
• At least Viewer permissions to the interface, report, record type, or process model that is selected as the site page's content.

Default security

If default security groups are configured for your application, the default security groups pre-populate the role map when you create a site.

If default security groups are not configured for your application, you are automatically assigned Administrator permissions for any site object you create.

System administrators can always access a site object, regardless of object-level permissions.

Logging

You can monitor your site by checking out site usage and metrics in your environment's logs.

Site usage is logged in <APPIAN_HOME>/logs/audit/sites_usage.csv. See Sites Usage Audit for details.

Sites metrics are logged in <APPIAN_HOME>/logs/data-metrics/sites.csv. See Sites Metrics Log for details.

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