Variants Sidebar

The Variants Sidebar is used to access and manage content variants. A variant is an alternate version of a content item, which can be used for language translations, localization, personalization and more.

The Variants Sidebar is only available when content has one or more dimensions, such as language for translations. This narrow sidebar appears on the right of the content fields. Each variant is represented by an icon, or row of icons for multi-dimensional content. If a dimension is not set for a variant, the dimension icon will display instead of a variant-specific icon. The sidebar displays all defined variants with an option to add a new variant at the end.

Hover over an existing variant to re-order (drag and drop "grip" within the sidebar), open, edit and delete.

Hide Variants Sidebar

The Variants Sidebar can be hidden by clicking the collapse option (») that appears when the mouse is hovered just to the left of the top variant icon. When hidden, only the current variant, and implied variant when applicable (see below) are displayed at the top-right of Form View. Hover over the current variant to temporarily reveal the full Variants Sidebar.

Implied Variant

If you navigate from an item with a specific variant to another item that does not have the same variant, the previous variant will be highlighted (light blue), but the icon will be faded out. A small arrow (>) will point to the default variant, and the default variant field values will display in the form. These indicate an "implied variant", which has the following impact on the Form View and Variants Sidebar.

Read-only Fields - If you attempt to edit any field, a message will display to let you know that you cannot edit the field for the implied variant, because it does not yet exist. This prevents unintended changes to a different variant. At this point you have two options:
- Select Existing Variant - Click an existing variant to edit that variant.
- Add Implied Variant - Hover over the implied variant icon and click the + option to add and edit the implied variant, which will be based on the default variant.
Add Implied Variant - Hover over the implied variant icon and click the + option to add and edit the implied variant, which will be based on the default variant. If you wish to base the implied variant on a variant other than the default variant, select the desired variant, and then add the new variant with the grey plus button after all existing variants on the Variants Sidebar.