Resource Type Colors

A library holds files, galleries, articles, web previews and ad groups side by side, and at a glance they all looked alike. Each type now carries its own color on the resources index, so you can tell what something is before you read its name.

Where the Color Shows

Three places on every card, all driven by the one color:

  • The top of the card is washed in it. That is the largest area of the tile, so it is what you notice from across a grid — three web previews read as a set without you reading a word.
  • The icon sits on that wash in the same color, confirming what the tint is telling you.
  • Image cards keep their thumbnail. It is inset slightly at the top and sides so a band of the color still frames it, which means a photo does not cost you the type.

The wash is deliberately light — enough to group like with like, not enough to turn the library into a color chart. It sits a little stronger in dark mode, where a faint tint would disappear.

The Default Palette

TypeDefault
Files, BundlesVanilla yellow — #c8a83c
Gallery, Video, ColorsWarm rust — #b5511f
Doc, FAQ, AppBlue — #2563eb
DiagramOlive — #4d7c0f
Web PreviewTeal — #0e7490
Design ImportPurple — #6d28d9
Ad GroupMagenta — #a81f68

Some types share a default because there are more types than there are colors that stay clearly apart at the size of a card. Sharing a default does not mean sharing a setting — each type holds its own color, so you can give Gallery its own hue and leave Video and Colors where they are.

Changing a Color

Open Add Resource. Each type in the picker has a small swatch beside its name showing its current color.

  1. Click the swatch
  2. Pick a color
  3. It saves as you pick, and the index updates

There is no separate settings screen for this. The picker is where you are already looking at the list of types, so it is where the colors live.

Putting a Color Back

Shift-click a swatch to return that type to its default. Only the type you shift-click is affected.

Who Can Change Them

Administrators only. Everyone else sees the swatches as a plain indication of what each color means, and clicking one does nothing.

Files Are the Exception

Files and bundles have a type color like everything else, and it tints the top of their card. But their icon stays colored by file extension — a PDF red, a spreadsheet green, a zip its own shade.

That is on purpose. For a file, which kind of file is more useful than that it is a file, and the extension coloring already carries that. So the type color goes behind the icon rather than replacing it, and you get both facts from one card.

White-Labeled Portals

These colors sit outside your brand palette on purpose, and changing your brand colors does not change them.

A white-labeled portal sets its own primary color, and if the type colors were derived from it they would either clash with it or collapse into it — and on a portal branded in, say, teal, the Web Preview type would stop being distinguishable at all. Keeping the two palettes separate means the type colors stay readable whatever the portal is branded in.

If a default does clash with your branding, change it — that is what the swatches are for.

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