My Eyes! How to Create Jarring Themes Using the Theme Generator

A month ago, Guido Preite posted a new tool, the Dynamics CRM Theme Generator. I have already used this twice in a real world setting with some colleagues of mine who mainly focus on UX and design (and yes, they have some really nice Macbooks as well). The theme generator can be found at https://crmthemes.azurewebsites.net/.

I immediately fell for it as it would allow someone not versed in CRM terminology, visuals, and capabilities to create a theme for CRM and preview how it will look for different elements of user interface (which is not the case when you do the theme editing directly in CRM). Additional benefit, this someone probably knows a hell of a lot more about color theory and corporate branding than me. My design friends did not only help me with the colors but they could send me a static link afterwards, I could preview, adjust, send it back and we could quickly reach an agreement. Since the themes are exportable, the designers have now become active participants in the build process.

But enough chit chat - let us get to the most amazing feature of them all: The Random Theme button. Wow. Truly jarring color combinations like the one in the post picture can be easily created and imported to CRM. It is like the comic sans font of the CRM world. I think this is a great idea for just a quick demo of the theme capabilities or if you are a developer, for clearly marking the environment you are in as your own personal development environment. Just make sure the text rows are readable on hover and selection and you are good to go! The theme colors also transfer to USD, so make sure to test there as well.

If you use and enjoy this tool, send Guido some cred on Twitter.