eXo Platform is a full-featured application for users to have many experiences in building and deploying transactional websites, authoring web and social content, creating gadgets and dashboards with reliable capabilities of collaboration and knowledge.
This chapter covers the following topics:
Glossary provides terms which are commonly used in eXo Platform applications.
eXo Platform 3.5 interface introduces the default page of eXo Platform 3.5, and ways to enter the sample portals built in eXo Platform 3.5 before using functions.
Manage accounts gives you how to register new accounts, sign in and out, change account settings, and retrieve your account and password.
Manage language includes procedures on how to change the display language permanently and for another users.
Note
Some accounts will not include all features stated in this guide due to limitations of user role. Check with your administrator to assure which features are enabled for your account or ask for more appropriate rights.
This section provides a number of terms that you will encounter when implementing eXo Platform.
Portal is a key web-based environment for aggregating and personalizing information via specific portlets with an interactive and consistent look and feel. Users and administrators are able to integrate information, people and processes via a web-based user interface. This framework enables aggregation of enterprise content and business applications with flexible management and personalization options.
Portlet is a pluggable component in a portal through which users can access some specific information, including supports, updates, or mini-applications. The portlet produces fragments of a markup code that are aggregated into a portal page. Typically, a portal page is displayed as a non-overlapping portlet windows collection, where each portlet window displays a portlet. Content generated by a portlet can be customized, depending on the configuration set by each user. Portlets can be divided into two following types:
Functional portlets which support all functions of a portal. They are built into the portal and accessed via toolbar links when the portal-related tasks are performed.
Interface portlets which constitute the eXo Platform interface as front-end components of the portal.
Navigation is a node (so-called menus) containing hyperlinks to other parts of a portal. The default navigation menus in eXo Platform are located in the Administration bar with 3 navigation types:
My Sites: This navigation links to separate sites of the parent portal. Each site has only one navigation and it is automatically generated when the site is created. This functionality allows different sites to individually control some portal-related aspects, such as portlets, while maintaining other content standardized with the parent portal.
My Groups: The content of this navigation varies for each user, depending on the type of logged-in account.
If you are logged in as a user account, this navigation holds personal links set up by yourself.
If you are logged in as a manager account, this navigation contains links to pages for registered users and administrative tasks and personal links.
If you are logged in as an administrator account, the navigation adds further management capabilities, such as Internationalization and community management.
Dashboard: This navigation contains links and portlets (or gadgets) selected by yourself. This user navigation is created automatically when your account registration is successful. This navigation only can be deleted when you are removed.
Desktop: This typical application of eXo Platform not only takes advantages of normal portals but also is developed with many outstanding features. This navigation allows users to organize pages in the "icons" form.
Edit: This navigation type only appears in the Administration bar when you logged in as an administrator. This navigation contains links to add new pages to a portal, to edit a page or to change the portal's layout and navigation.
Gadget is a mini web application running on a platform that a user can integrate and customize in the website.
eXo Platform offers two access modes by default:
Public mode is for guest users (visitors) who are not registered. In this mode, you are not required to sign in, but limited to public pages in the portal. After being registered successfully, you can use the private mode, but must contact the Portal administrators to get more rights or the group manager to become the member and gain the access to the group.
Private mode is for registered users who will apply their usernames and passwords to sign in. This mode supports users in taking many actions, such as creating private pages, editing or deleting them, "borrowing" pages from others by creating hyperlinks, changing languages to their individual needs, managing private information.
Permission settings control actions of a user within the portal and are set by the portal administrators.
Permission types define what a user can do within the portal.
Access permission enables users to utilize portal contents, such as signing in, viewing contents, rearranging portlets. This permission can be set for multiple member groups.
Edit permission enables users to change portal contents (changing portal or page information, deleting a portal/page). The edit permission is set for only one group at one time.
Permission levels specify where the users' permission types can be applied in the portal.
Portal: The permission at the portal level includes actions permitted in all pages within the portal. Users with the access permission can view (but not edit) all the pages within the portal. Meanwhile, users with the edit permission at the portal level can change any page in the portal.
Page: The permission at the page level restricts users to several particular pages. Users are only able to see and/or edit pages they have been given access to, depending on each permission type assigned to them.
Portlet: The permission at the portlet level enables users to create a page through dragging and dropping portlets into a page. Some portlets are only used for administrators, while some are for regular users. Thus, administrators need to set proper access permissions for each specific group. Permission types and levels can be effectively implemented to control who can do and what can be performed within the portal.
Repository is a locus where contents or digital data are maintained. Users can access without traveling across a network.
Workspace is a term used by several software vendors for applications that allow users to exchange and organize files over Internet. A content repository is composed of a number of workspaces. In eXo Platform, the content repository consists of more than one workspace. The "repository" contains multiple workspaces, including system, backup and collaboration workspaces.
System workspace: It is used to reserve "system folders".
Backup workspace: The backup process depends on the published content timestamps, each published document has a duration during which it can be published. Also, when it exceeds the timestamps, it will be automatically archived to the backup database. This workspace is almost used with the Workflow-based content publication lifecycle.
Collaboration workspace: It allows users to validate and manage documents. This is the central place to store and edit contents and media.
Drive may be defined as a shortcut in the content repository. It enables administrators to limit visibility of each workspace for groups of users. It is also a simple way to hide the complexity of the content storage by showing only the structure that is helpful for business users.
In details, a drive consists of:
A configured path where the user will start when browsing the drive.
A set of allowed views that will allow the user to limit the available actions, such as editing or creating content while being in the drive.
A set of permissions which limits the access and view of the drive to a specified number of people.
A set of options to describe the behavior of the drive when the users browse it.
Node is an abstract unit used to build linked data structures, such as linked lists and trees, and computer-based representation of graphs. Nodes contain data and/or links to another nodes. Links between nodes are often implemented by pointers or references.
Also, a node can be defined as a logical placeholder for data. It is a memory block which contains some data units, and optionally a reference to some other data. By linking one node with other interlinked nodes, very large and complex data structure can be formed.
Versioning means that at any given time the node's state can be saved for possible future recovery and the action of saving called 'check-in'. A workspace may contain both versionable and non-versionable nodes. A node is versionable if it has been assigned a mixin type mixin: versionable; otherwise, it is a non-versionable node. A version exists as a part of a version history graph that describes the predecessor/successor relations among versions of a particular versionable node.
The software versioning is the process of assigning either unique version names or unique version numbers to unique states of computer software. Within a given version number category (major, minor), these numbers are generally specified by increasing the order that corresponds to new developments in the software. At a fine-grained level, the revision control is often used for keeping track of incrementally different versions of electronic information, whether or not this information is actually computer software.
WebDAV stands for Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning. It is a set of extensions to the Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) which allows users to collaboratively edit and manage files on remote World Wide Web servers.
The protocol was to make the Web a readable and writable medium. It provides users with the functionality to create, change and move documents on a remote server (typically a web server or "web share"). This is useful for, among other things, authoring the documents which a web server serves, but can also be used for general web-based file storage that can be accessed from anywhere.
The "Podcast" term is a combination of iPod and Broadcast. In eXo Platform, podcast is an audio file which you can download and listen to on your device, such as a computer, or a MP3 player.
File plan is a type of document for planning the primary records management. Although file plans can differ across organizations, their typical functions are to:
Describe types of items which are acknowledged to be records.
Describe what broader category of records to which the items belong.
Indicate where records are stored.
Describe the retention periods for records.
Delineate who is responsible for managing the various types of records.
After starting eXo Platform 3.5 successfully, ask your administrator for the proper link to run eXo Platform, for example http://localhost:8080/portal/default/. After pasting this link into one browser, you will be directed to the default page of eXo Platform 3.5.
Here, you have an overview of eXo Platform through default contents displayed in this page. With eXo Platform, you can do almost everything, especially building social intranets and websites. From the default interface of eXo Platform 3.5, you are provided with two sample portals of a fictitious company named "ACME" where you can discover key features and customizability of eXo Platform. Therefore, before doing any actions, you first need to go to either of the provided portals (ACME website or ACME social intranet) by clicking one of the following links:
At the top of the default page's body:
Or, at the bottom of default page's body:
Note
All actions or your registered information will be auto-synchronized between these sample portals.
As a guest user, you can visit eXo Platform but are limited to many contents and applications. To access more contents or perform some actions in various applications, you first need to register by yourself and contact the portal administrator to gain certain permissions.
Click Register on the top of the portal if you are in the ACME sample site.
If you are in the ACME Social intranet, click Register at the bottom of the portal.
The Create New Account page appears as below:
Field Description Asterisk (*) This mark next to each field indicates that it is required to input values in this field. Username The name used to log in. Only alpha, digit, underscore, dash and dot characters are allowed with its length from 3 to 30 characters. Password The authentication string which must be between 6 and 30 characters, including spaces. Confirm Password Retype the password above. Values in both Password and Confirm Password fields must be the same. First Name The user's first name which must start with a character. Its length must be between 1 and 45 characters. Last Name The user's last name which must start with a character. Its length must be between 1 and 45 characters. Email Address The user's email address that must be in the correct form, such as username@abc.com.Text Validation The text to verify your registration. Fill values into fields.
Click Subscribe to accept your new account or Reset to clear all your entered values. If your registration is not successful, there will be warning messages which indicate invalid fields.
After adding a new account, you should contact your administrator to get appropriate permissions for your account.
Click
to check if your entered username already exists or not.
Note
Be sure you enter your email address carefully. Should you forget your username or password, you can recover it from this email address.
To enter the portal in the private mode, you just need to use your registered account. In eXo Platform 3.5, you can sign in the portal via two ways:
Click directly the default user accounts at the lower of screen right in the welcome page or after entering your selected page.
Or, after entering your selected portal, for example ACME website, click one of the default users at the bottom of body as below.
Click the Login link to open the Sign in form.
Input your registered Username and Password in the Sign in form.
Select the Remember My Login checkbox for the first time if you want to automatically return to this portal without signing in again. This feature enables you to be automatically authenticated to avoid doing an explicit authentication when you access the portal.
Click Sign in to submit the form, or Discard to quit.
Note
After selecting Remember My Login, if you do not sign out when you leave the portal, you will be automatically authenticated for your next visit.
To change your account information, hover your cursor over the account name at the top right corner of the site and click My Account from the drop-down menu.
The Account Profiles form appears.
Change your profile information
Select the Account Profiles tab.
Change your First Name, Last Name, Email. Your Username cannot be changed.
Click Save to submit your changes.
Change your password
Select the Change Password tab to go to the following form.
Input your current password to identify that you are the owner of this account.
Input your new password which must have at least 6 characters.
Re-enter your password in the Confirm New Password field.
Click Save to accept your changes.
Note
If the default accounts' passwords have been changed, you can no longer sign in the portal by clicking the default accounts directly as stated in the first way.
In case you forget your account or password, you can recover your username or password as follows:
Click the 'Forgot your Username/Password?' link beneath the Password field when signing in.
There will be two options for you to select.
Select the appropriate option and click Next.
You will be prompted to provide identification information, depending on your choice.
If you select the Forgot My Password option, you will be prompted for your username.
If you select the Forgot My Username option, you will be prompted for your email address.
Enter your Username/Email in the form above.
Click Send to submit your entered values.
After you have submitted the form, an email will be sent to your email address with the requested information, either your username or password.
If you forget your password, you will be sent a temporary password. Your original password will not be valid after this email is sent. You will be directed to a page to update your password for your next log-in.
In eXo Platform, the priority order of the display language decreases to the arrow direction from left to right:
User's language --> Cookies' language --> Session's language --> Browser's language --> Portal's language
It means that the language set by the user will be at the highest level, and the portal's language at the lowest level.
Accordingly, you should pay attention to this order when selecting your preferred display language.
Note
At present, eXo Platform only supports two languages: English and French.
eXo Platform supports 3 ways to change the display language permanently.
The first way
1. Hover your cursor over My Sites on the Administration bar and select your desired site where you want to change the display language. The currently selected site is marked with 
.
You will be directed to your selected site.
2. Hover your cursor over Edit, then select Site --> Layout from the drop-down menu.
Your selected site will be displayed in the Edit mode.
3. Click 
in the Edit Inline Composer form. The Site Settings form appears:
4. Change the display language of your site by selecting another language from the Locale field in the Portal Settings tab.
5. Click Save, then click 
to save all changes.
The second way
1. Hover your cursor over 
, then select Portal --> Sites.
The list of all existing portals will be displayed as below.
2. Select Edit Layout corresponding to the portal/site you want to edit.
The selected portal will be displayed as in the Edit mode.
3. Change the display language that is similar as steps in the first way (Steps 3, 4 and 5).
The third way
This way is only used to set the display language for yourself, not for displaying the language of portal.
1. Hover your cursor over your account name at the top right corner of the site, then select Change Language from the drop-down menu.
The Interface Language Settings form will be displayed with the list of all supported languages. The currently used language is marked with 
.
2. Select another one by clicking the name of that language.
3. Click Apply and wait for a few seconds to take effect.
Note
The display language will be maintained permanently until you change another display language.
By this way, you can change not only your display language but also the display language of another users if you have the right to access the Organization portlet.
1. Hover your cursor over , then select Users --> Group and Roles from the drop-down menu to open the User Management form.
2. Click 
corresponding to the user with the display language you want to change. 3. Select the User Profile sub-tab, then change the display language for this user from the Language field.
4. Click Save to accept your changes.