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Jasig Newsletter - March 2009

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1 Upcoming Events

1.1 Jasig UK (April 22, 2009)
1.2 Open Repositories 2009 - Atlanta, Georgia (May 18-21, 2009)
1.3 Portal 2009 - Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (June 2-5, 2009)

2 Jasig Project Updates

2.1 Central Authentication Service (CAS)
2.1.1 Jasig CAS Server 3.3.x
2.1.2 Jasig CAS Server 4.x
2.1.3 CAS Clients
2.1.4 Conference Updates
2.1.5 OpenRegistry Updates
2.1.6 Unicon Cooperative Support
2.2 uPortal
2.2.1 uPortal 3.0.3 Release
2.2.2 uPortal 3.1.0 Release
2.2.3 uPortal Spring Conference Review
2.2.4 Join the Merry Band

3 Around Jasig

3.1 Jasig Project Incubation
3.2 OpenEAI Project and Emory University Announce Training for OpenEAI Deployment and Administration
3.3 Jasig Widgets Portlet Project

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1 Upcoming Events

1.1 Jasig UK (April 22, 2009)

The next meeting of JASIG UK is scheduled for Wednesday, 22 April, 2009. This one-day event will be held at the National Science Learning Centre in York (http://www.sciencelearningcentres.org.uk/WebPortal.aspx?page=2).

If you are planning to join us in York, please sign up on the participants page: http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/JSG/22+April+09+participants. (Send me an email if you need a UserID on the Jasig wiki.)

We are still using the wiki to collect potential topics for this meeting. Ideas and offers of presentations can be added to the agenda page (http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/JSG/22+April+09+agenda).

Please note that attendance is free of charge. If you are able to attend, you would be most welcome!

Jonathan Markow, Executive Director, Jasig

1.2 Open Repositories 2009 - Atlanta, Georgia (May 18-21, 2009)

"The 4th annual international Open Repositories Conference will be held May 18th - 21st, 2009 at the Georgia Institute of Technology Hotel and Conference Center and Global Learning Conference Center at Technology Square in Atlanta, Georgia. The conference will be hosted by the Georgia Tech Library and Information Center."

Source: https://or09.library.gatech.edu/

1.3 Portal 2009 - Gettysburg, Pennsylvania (June 2-5, 2009)

"The featured keynote speaker at Portal2009 is Richard N. Katz, Vice President of EDUCAUSE, and author, co-author, or editor of dozens of books, monographs and articles on a variety of higher education, management, and technology topics. His book, Web Portals and Higher Education: Technologies to Make IT Personal, published in 2002 is still considered one of the definitive sources on portals in higher education. We expect portal 2009 to be the best conference to date, so get your presentation proposals in to share your portal stories with your colleagues from higher education institutions from around the globe.

The theme for the conference, portal2009: users uses usability, is meant to reflect the idea that portals have many definitions, and the different portals have different audiences (users), tools (uses) and interfaces (usability). The more everyone knows about the differences, the more people can continue to evolve their institution's portal into a more useful commodity."

Source: http://cnav.gettysburg.edu/portal/portal09/index.cfm

2 Jasig Project Updates

2.1 Central Authentication Service (CAS)

2.1.1 Jasig CAS Server 3.3.x

Work continues on the upcoming 3.3.2 release. There are a few minor LDAP issues to continue working out, including collaboration with the PersonDirectory team for a required fix.

2.1.2 Jasig CAS Server 4.x

The Jasig CAS Server 4 is coming along. Development continues on the wizard for adding a service, such that a user can either supply a SAML Meta Data URL, or enter the information about a service through a wizard interface. This information will be saved to a database that the CAS server can later use to control access to the server. One this work is completed, work can continue on the SAML2 integration efforts. Javadocs and reports can be found here:

http://developer.jasig.org/projects/cas4/

In addition, Jasig CAS has applied for the Google Summer of Code. Stay tuned to see if we actually become accepted!

2.1.3 CAS Clients

Work continues on minor updates to the Jasig CAS Client for Java. Sandbox development on a new .NET client, similar to the Java client, has begun. This effort is being lead by Princeton University and Virginia Tech.

2.1.4 Conference Updates

If you missed out on the recent Jasig Conference, you missed out on some excellent presentations on CAS4, CAS4 & Federation, a seminar on CAS3, and High Availability CAS. Most of those presentations are available online: http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/x/7QleAQ

2.1.5 OpenRegistry Updates

Development continues on the OpenRegistry project. The team is currently working on the second use case: "Add A Person". Revisions to the data model continue, and the most recent revisions can be found here:

http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/OR/Data+Model

In addition, there were interesting conversations at the Jasig Conference involving integration efforts with OpenRegistry and other open source tools such as Grouper.

To find out more, or join the mailing list, check out the Wiki space: http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/OR/Home

2.1.6 Unicon Cooperative Support

Unicon announced its Cooperative Support Program for CAS. See the link below for the full announcement. http://www.unicon.net/node/1185

2.2 uPortal

2.2.1 uPortal 3.0.3 Release

Jasig is proud to announce the General Audience release of uPortal 3.0.3 GA This release is the result feedback from the significant interest and use of the previous 3.0 releases.

Full release notes are available along with a uPortal 3.0 release overview on the 3.0.3 Release page on the Jasig wiki.

This release includes the following new features and fixes:

Bug

  • UP-2043 - uPortal-3.0.0 does not unzip to uPortal-3.0.0 folder
  • UP-2165 - NPE when adding a channel without a category defined such as portal/userpreferences/dlm and layout-sitemap
  • UP-2221 - Enhance Channel export to include user-level subscription authorizations
  • UP-2222 - Stats monitor page does not work - throws multiple errors
  • UP-2263 - Session lost when user-agent does not accept cookies
  • UP-2281 - Build should only check for tomcat.home for tasks it is needed
  • UP-2296 - LoginServlet generates two Set-Cookie headers for JSESSIONID
  • UP-2298 - Multithreaded rendering of a portlet fails
  • UP-2303 - Transient portlet entities are persisted

Improvement

  • UP-2289 - Correct old references to CError
  • UP-2299 - Clear cached user attribues at logout
  • UP-2300 - Add isMemberOf support to IXalanAuthorizationHelper
  • UP-2304 - Add ServletContextListener for starting JMX server on known ports

Source and Quick Start downloads are available on the uPortal Downloads page.

This release is ready for general use. If you do find any issues please file them in the Jasig Issue Tracker.

I want to thank everyone who contributed to the development both directly and in-directly. Having this developer community available for both code and design insight has been invaluable.

Eric Dalquist (University of Wisconsin-Madison), uPortal 3 Release Engineer,

2.2.2 uPortal 3.1.0 Release

Jasig is proud to announce the general audience release of uPortal 3.1.0. uPortal 3.1 is the recommended version with which to start a new uPortal deployment.

This release includes nearly 260 bug fixes, improvements and new features since uPortal 3.0. Among them are the following:

  • Portal statistics are saved to a database, paving the way for future reporting efforts. Statistics now stored include logins, page render times, layout customization, portlet render times, logins by group, module usage, and others. (Thanks to University of Wisconsin - Madison for this contribution.)
  • New Identity and Attribute Swapper administrative portlets are provided (also thanks to University of Wisconsin - Madison). These are particularly useful for portal administrators and developers doing trouble-shooting and testing. Credentials are not circumvented.
  • A new DLM Fragment Admin Portlet allows for easy switching to fragments. A drop-down list of fragment owners is presented, permitting authorized users to switch to another owner. Delegation of layout administration is made available to portal administrators through this feature (Thanks to Drew Wills and Unicon).
  • Finer-grained permissions have been added to allow delegation of channel management. Portal administrators may now create categories of channels and delegate permission to others to manage them. (Thanks to Chris Doyle and The Johns Hopkins University).
  • Portal pages load faster through implementation of long term cache headers and GZIP filtering for static portal content (Thanks to Jen Bourey and Unicon).
  • The Fluid Reorderer has been implemented as the engine for drag-and-drop layout customization. Thanks are due to numerous Jasig and Fluid developers who have made this happen, bringing UI accessibility to uPortal's drag and drop capabilities.
  • uPortal 3.1 now features the Fluid Skinning System, a completely modular, open source CSS framework, for the default uPortal skin (Thanks to Gary Thompson and Unicon).
  • The portal has switched to a completely div-based XHTML theme from a mix of tables and divs (Thanks again to Gary Thompson and Unicon).

Special thanks to the Fluid Project (www.fluidproject.org), Unicon (www.unicon.net), and the many developers who contributed features, patches, bug reports, and testing for this release.

Important Upgrading Note

uPortal 3.1.0 has had database changes that are incompatible with the 3.0 and 2.x releases. Upgrading to uPortal 3.1.0 will require using the crn-export scripts in your current install and then the crn-import scripts in your new uPortal 3.1.0 install. Pointing a uPortal 3.1.0 release at an older database will very likely not work and could cause database corruption. Upgrading instructions are included in the uPortal Manual

Downloads are available from: http://www.jasig.org/uportal/download/uportal-310
Release notes are available at: http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/UPC/3.1.0
uPortal 3.1 Manual: http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/UPM31

Eric Dalquist (University of Wisconsin-Madison), uPortal 3 Release Engineer

2.2.3 uPortal Spring Conference Review

The numerous uPortal sessions and seminars were well received and attended at the recent 2009 Jasig Spring Conference. There was particular interest in the new Fluid/uPortal integration and uPortal 3.1 features.

2.2.4 Join the Merry Band

We recently created a page in our wiki listing smaller development projects that are great starting points for people interested in doing uPortal framework development. Maybe you have noticed that the core uPortal developers are very enthusiastic about what they do and seem to be having a lot of fun. Have you thought about wanting to contribute to the effort but were intimidated or didn't know where to begin? Check out our list of what we call Mentorable Projects. If you take one on, one of the uPortal core developers will be there to get you started and help you through the process. It is a great way to get started with someone by your side. You, too, can share in the accolades of the community!

3 Around Jasig

3.1 Jasig Incubation

I'm happy to announce that Jasig has now launched the process for accepting proposals for incubation. The goal of Jasig Project Incubation is to work with new or existing software projects to become officially sponsored Jasig Projects. The incubation working group has defined a process (see incubation process wiki) for accomplishing this goal and now have several proposals for portlets and new work under consideration. The Incubation Working Group (IWG) welcomes all to participate in the discussion of the incubating candidates. If you are interested, please join the incubation mailing list

Currently incubating projects are tracked on the incubation jira: http://www.ja-sig.org/issues/secure/BrowseProject.jspa?id=10190. The current list includes:

  • Announcements Portlet, Erik Olsson, Incubating Project
  • Bookmarks Portlet, Eric Dalquist, Incubating Project
  • Calendar Portlet, Jen Bourey, Incubating Project
  • ERP Integration, Aaron Fuleki, Pending Review
  • Facebook Connect Portlet, Erik Olsson, Incubating Project
  • Functional Tests Portlet, Eric Dalquist, Incubating Project
  • OpenRegistry, Benn Oshrin, Incubating Project
  • Weather Portlet, Dustin Schultz, Incubating Project
  • Web Proxy Portlet, Eric Dalquist, Incubating Project
  • esup-helpdesk, Pascal Aubry, Incubating Project

We look forward to your feedback, contributions and collaboration.

Susan Bramhall (Yale University), Incubation Working Group Chair

3.2 OpenEAI Project and Emory University Announce Training for OpenEAI Deployment and Administration

OpenEAI Enterprise Application Integration Training to be Held in April 2009 at Emory in Atlanta, Georgia

The OpenEAI Software Foundation, a non-profit corporation organized to develop and promote open source enterprise application integration, announced that Emory University and Emory Healthcare (Emory) will host OpenEAI training seminars in April 2009. The OpenEAI Deployment and Administration training will be held April 27-29, 2009 from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM EDT. The training session will take place in the Emory Healthcare Auditorium on the fourth floor of the North Decatur Building at 1784 North Decatur Road, NE in Atlanta, Georgia.

For complete details and to register for this event, visit: https://www.regonline.com/openeai-development or https://www.regonline.com/openeai-administration

The training is free of charge. A donation of $50 per person is suggested to help cover printing costs for training materials. Reservations for accommodations can be made by contacting the Emory Conference Center Hotel or one of the other area hotels listed at: http://www.emory.edu/home/about/visiting/hotels.html

The OpenEAI Deployment & Administration Training will cover the following topics:

  • OpenEAI Overview
  • Core EAI Services
  • OpenEAI Examples Setup
  • OpenEAI Examples Working Tour
  • Selecting Message Transports
  • Using a JMS Provider
  • Working with HTTP/HTTPS and SOAP
  • Working with XML Messages
  • OpenEAI Request Message Proxy Service
  • OpenEAI Synchronization Message Routing Service
  • OpenEAI Message Logging Service
  • Topics of Local Interest & Flex Time

For a detailed course description visit: http://www.invivoit.com/live/training/OpenEaiAdministration.pdf

3.3 Jasig Widgets Portlet Project

As a result of some recent conversation in IRC, I've started a new portlet project in the Jasig sandbox. This project is intended to be a collection of small, general utility portlets.

So far I've added the following:

  • Search (google-powered)
  • Maps (google-powered with toggleable traffic info)
  • Tabbed RSS (google-powered, allows users to search for and add new feeds)
  • Small monthly view (jQuery UI)
  • Stocks (Yahoo data and news combined w/ the google feed reader)
  • Dictionary / Thesaurus (data from http://services.aonaware.com/DictService/DictService.asmx, which is collected from dict.org servers)
  • Language translation (google-powered)

Screenshots: http://www.unicon.net/node/1194

Of course, these portlets all have numerous rough edges and need some UE attention and javascript cleanup. I'm hoping that having something in svn might get us started and open some dialog about what other utility portlets we'd like to have, as well as whether certain portlets might be better powered by alternate data sources. It has already been suggested that it would be preferable for the dictionary portlet to have an available local data source.

I'm hoping that this project can ultimately become both an example of best practices for Ajax portlet development for uPortal and a source of some better default content for the uPortal distribution. I'm also hoping that this set of portlets can continue to be a collaborative effort; input, suggestions, and development help are all very much welcome!

Anyone interested in joining the discussion should subscribe to the portlet-dev email list. http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/JSG/portlet-dev

Contributed by: Jen Bourey (Unicon, Inc.)

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Jasig Newsletter - March 2009

Archives available in the JASIG wiki at: http://www.ja-sig.org/wiki/display/JSG/Newsletter

If your institution or company has items of interest to the Jasig membership, please submit them via email to newsletter at jasig dot org.

The next issue of the monthly Jasig Newsletter will be published on or about April 20th, 2009. Articles for that edition of the newsletter should be submitted no later than Friday, April 17th, 2009. Thanks!

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