Carnegie Mellon

Carnegie Mellon Web Portal v0.9 featuring Event Calendar and Headliners Publisher

Andrew Web GroupInfrastructure, Services, and MiddlewareComputing ServicesCarnegie Mellon University

Carnegie MellonWho is this guy?Introductions

Ryan Eberhard, Web Services Consultant• Infrastructure, Services, and Middleware• Computing Services• Recent projects: Andrew Web Publishing System, My

Andrew, Webmail, WebISO

Contact info• Partnership questions: eberhard@cmu.edu• Support questions: webmaster@andrew.cmu.edu

Carnegie MellonWelcome, early adopters!Today’s Agenda

1. Carnegie Mellon Portal

2. Event Calendar

3. Hands-on session

Break

4. Headlines Publisher

5. Hands-on session

Carnegie MellonAgendaWhat I Want to Accomplish Today

• Teach you Portal and it’s tools

• Get you early access• You benefit from early access• We benefit from feedback• Users benefit - content for Fall

•Identify partners for in-depth work• If you know what you want to do and• You have the time

Carnegie MellonBasic ConceptsPortal vs. Conventional Web Sites

Conventional web sites are static. Every user sees the same thing.

http://www.cmu.edu/http://www.cmu.edu/computing/

Some sites are dynamic.Content a function of variables.

WebmailAndrew Calendar

Portals are dynamic, but they also (i) target relationship segments and (ii) aggregate content and services from

various sources.

Let’s look at some examples

Carnegie MellonRelationship TargetingAn example

Relationship Portlets Displayed on Academics tab

CIT undeclared freshman CIT college headlinesUniverity Libraries Cameo searchEnrollment Services bookmarks

ECE sophomore + ECE department headlines+ Robotics Club bookmarks

ECE senior + Commencement headlines+ Alumni headlines

Suppose the portal has an “Academics” section...

Carnegie MellonCarnegie Mellon Web PortalCarnegie Mellon Portal Demo

http://my.cmu.edu/

Carnegie MellonCarnegie Mellon Web PortalAny Questions?

Q&A

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarIntroduction

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarMotivation

The Problem:

As your students, faculty, staff see it:Lack of a single source for information about campus

eventsExamples: Laura J, George Soros

As event providers see it:No single method for publicizing eventsChaotic mix of bboards, posters, email

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarIntroductionWe are developing a Portal tool where...

Campus events are aggregated at a single, canonical source.

Events belong to one or more calendars:• Student Affairs Calendar (default: all)• H&SS/Philosophy Lectures Calendar (default: H&SS)• GSIA Recruiting Events Calendar (default: GSIA)• Commencement Deadlines Calendar (default: graduating

students)

Users inherit these calendars by their relationship.

Users subscribe to calendars of their choosing.

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarThe Killer App of Portal

This makes a good web application:• Gather user requirements• Design an events database • Build a provider and consumer interface• Implement subscriptions, search, etc.

This is a great portal application.

Why? • Information aggregation • Interface consistency• Traffic

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarNuts and Bolts: Calendars

Event Calendar manages a set of calendars

More examples:

• Official University Calendar (Enrollment)• Chemistry Symposia (MCS Chemistry)• CIT Homecoming (CIT General)

Calendars contain events.

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarNuts and Bolts: Events

Events have a name, description, date, time, fee, etc.

Events belong to a category:Academic Calendar/Holidays

Conferences/Meetings

Off-Campus

Alumni Events Faculty/Staff Events

Religious Events

Athletics Lectures/Readings Social/Dances/Mixers

Concerts/Performances/Exhibitions

Movies/TV/Radio Student Events

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarNuts and Bolts: Events

More about events:

• Can be recurring• RSVP information• Contact information• Interface icons

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarNuts and Bolts: Subscriptions

From your user’s perspective:

• Default subscriptions• Self-selected subscriptions• Filter by event type

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarA partnership

We develop and maintain the tool

We drive traffic to your calendars:• Mandatory “My Events” portlet on Home tab• Initial portal motivators:

• Magnet applications• Default home page in Clusters• Aggregating web applications• Events• Headlines (part two)

Your part: Use the tool, send us feedback, and request calendars. Populate them with events.

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarDemonstration

Disclaimers:

Pre-production tool ahead

Search, browse by type, navigational trailsother features not implemented.

Recurring event creation is slow.

If you get lost, click “Start Over”

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarHands-on Session

Hands-On Session(30-60 minutes)

Please raise your hand if you get an error.

http://my.cmu.edu/

Carnegie MellonEvent CalendarFeedback

Discussion

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsOverview

Conceptual review:

• Portals vs. Web sites

• Tempting to think about brochure-like pages in Portal

• Portal content targets user segments

• Portal content served in portlets on a certain tab

Carnegie MellonContent management options Overview

Content management options:

• Bookmarks (easy)

• Bboards (easy)

• RSS or XML file (medium)

• JDBC result (hard)

• Headlines publisher (easy)

Carnegie MellonContent management options Option: Bookmarks Portlet

You provide us a location in portal, a relationship target, and a list of URLs

Example: Academics tab Students only “Enrollment Resources” portlet

Live example: http://my.cmu.edu/

Enrollment Resources

On-Line Registration (OLR)Student Information On-Line (SIO)Course Information On-Line (CIO)Graduation On-Line (GOL)Academic Audit On-LineFaculty Course Evaluations (FCE)

Carnegie MellonContent management options Option: Bboard Portlet

You provide us a bboard, location in portal, and a relationship target.

Example: official.job-postings cmu.career-center.hss cmu.misc.market

Live example: http://my.cmu.edu/

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsOption: RSS or XML file (advanced)

You provide a 0.9x RSS file or a XML file and XSLT stylesheet

Example #1: “WRCT Daily Schedule” Reads http://wrct.org/daily.xml, does transform

Example #2: Slashdot, a popular technology news feed Reads http://slashdot.org/slashdot.rdf Live example: http://my.cmu.edu/

Carnegie Mellon

Content management options Option: JDBC Result

JDBC: A platform-neutral interface between databases and Java.

The JDBC API encapsulates common database operations:• Running queries (SELECT, INSERT)• Formatting results (GROUP BY, ORDER BY)

Example: Biology News departmental news database

Interested? Contact us.

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

Today you will gain access to Headlines Publisher, a lightweight content management system.

Strengths:• Simple and straightforward• Nice consumer interface• Free (bundled with Portal)

Weaknesses:• Cumbersome provider interface• Plain text only• Cannot export headlines• No room to grow

Bottom-line: We expect to out-grow Headlines Publisher soon, but your content will be ported!

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

YourGroup Headlines Publisher

Push (as provider): - News - Headlines - Press releases - Documents

YourGroup Headlines

Pull (as consumer): - Based on identity - Based on preferences

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

Three headline options:

1. Upload File (text or html)

2. Create Card (pointer to file)

3. Manual Input (text or html directly)

Each lets you target your content by relationship:

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

Relationship Targets

Relationship Types today

EveryoneStudentsFacultyStaffStudents or FacultyFaculty or Staff

Relationship Types tomorrow

Academic majorsAlumni“Let’s talk”

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

Option #1: Upload File (bad)

You upload a HTML or text file into a content database

Problematic:• Local links break• Local images break• http/https problem• Not recommended

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

Option #2: Create Card (bad)

You add a pointer to a file on some other web server

E.g. a course description:http://www.cmu.edu/bio/education/courses/03121.html

Same problems:• Local links break• Local images break• http/https problem• Not recommended

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHeadlines publisher

Option #3: Manual Input (good!)

Input or paste text

Looks good

Preferred!• Local reference problem avoided.• Browser remains in portal.• Nice interface

http://my.cmu.edu/

Carnegie MellonContent management optionsHands-on Session

Hands-On Session(30-60 minutes)

Please raise your hand if you get an error.

Carnegie MellonCarnegie Mellon PortalThe Road Ahead

Partners wanted!

Please contact:Doug Blair (blair@cmu.edu)

Ryan Eberhard (eberhard@cmu.edu)