uP101 Layout management and Content Provision
An element of the uP101 pre-conference seminar
This page is not intended to be a general documentation of uPortal configuration. It is the specific ramblings that will be presented at the JA-SIG Vancouver uPortal 101 pre-conference seminar.
The uPortal 101 project was set up to use the Distributed Layout Manager (DLM) from the start but this is not the way that uPortal 2.5 is packaged. When you download uPortal 2.5 it will be configured to run the Aggregated Layout Manager. Many sites have deployed portals using Aggregated Layout Manager but the future uPortal direction is to use DLM so we recommend new installations start with it.
The instructions for making this conversion are detailed in the DLM Administration Guide. This online guide contains very thorough documentation for using DLM.
You can see how DLM works by looking at the dlm.xml, notice each fragment has an owner and an audience and a precedence. TO see how DLM merges personal changes with pushed content walk through these steps:
Login as student / student
You will see three tabs:
- Real Entertainment - pushed by DLM
- Useful News - also pushed by DLM
- Main Student Tab - really the user's personal tab in this case.
Make these changes:
- Add a new channel to the left column of the "Useful News" tab using the preferences channel.
- Logoff.
login to news-lo / news-lo
You will see just the Useful News tab.
In preferences you have additional options if you select the tab or other component. These options will determine what users can do to the pushed content.
- Remove the salon.com channel.
- Rename the tab.
- Logoff.
Login as student / student
The "Useful News" tab now has the new name and is missing Salon.com but student's new channel is still there.
Login to news-lo / news-lo
- In the Preferences channel select the left column
- Adjust the restrictions to not allow "Add Channels"
Login as student / student
The new channel added to the left column is gone.
Cool!