How do I add magento frontend css to backend?

Question

I have a block, which is appearing in the backend, and is adding a css file via the usual command:

$this->getLayout()->getBlock('head')->addCss('mymodule/css/filename.css');

And this should work, except that it is only looking for the file in skin/adminhtml - and I want to include the file from skin/frontend, because that is where it currently resides.

I am overcoming this temporarily by the brute force measure of copying the file from skin/frontend/default/mymodule/css/filename.css to skin/adminhtml/default/mymodule/css/filename.css , but I would rather refer to it directly. Is there some way to make the addCss command look in frontend instead of adminhtml?

Answer 1

If it is indeed a new CSS file for a custom module, it should reside in skin/adminhtml/default/default/css/ , like any of the other distinct skin assets.

Edit based on OP comment:

Because it is your new file, you can switch the area for the core/design_package instance from adminhtml to frontend and then revert it. However, my preference or expectation would be to see a stylesheet under skin/adminhtml/default/default/ which calls

@import('../../../frontend/base/default/css/file.css');

For this use case there isn't an absolute best practice, so it's up to you.