Big Brother pages are generated by the bbntd process. The summary pages bb.html and bb2.html are created every BBSLEEP value from etc/bbdef.cfg (default is 5 minutes). To control the look you must define the BBSKIN variable in bbdef.cfg to the skin you want to use. Then you must modify the etc/bbskin-.cfg file and the related header, footer, help and images files located in the www/skins/ directory to create your own look. By default, the skins are language-oriented but they can be defined for any type of display requirements.

Individual system reports are generated also by the bbntd process and placed in the www/html directory. The main and summary screens are saved in the www/ directory. Do not edit any of the generated HTML files as your changes will be removed at the next HTML file generation cycle.

The fastest way to change the look and feel of Big Brother is via the etc/bbskin-.cfg file. The variables in bbskin-.cfg are simply tags to the HTML FONT command, and therefore allow you to specify the font, color, and size for the following:

Title font is controlled by the MKBBTITLE variable. This is the font that machine grouping will be displayed in.

Column headers are controlled by MKBBCOLFONT. These are the headings that appear over the generated HTML tables like "conn", "cpu", etc.

System font is controlled by MKBBROWFONT. This is the font used for all the system names that appear down the left side of the BB display.

Note that you will need to stop and restart BB for these changes to take effect.

We've provided some simplified methods for making HTML changes. In particular the header and footer files located in the www/skins/{skin name}/headfoot directory are used for page generation. These files are named according to the files they control, i.e.

BB Main Display Page (bb.html)	bb_header bb_footer
BB Summary Display (bb2.html)	bb2_header bb2_footer
Individual status reports	hostsvc_header hostsvc_footer
History Pages			hist_header hist_footer	(currently unavailable)
Historical Status info		histlog_header histlog_footer (currently unavailable)

Within these files, the only change you may want to make would be to define your own stylesheets, insert images, move images around or modify text.

Finally, no matter what you do, please leave the links back to the Big Brother site - credit where credit is due! Thanks.