Blackboard Building Blocks

Portal Modules and Module Types

Tom Joyce, Product Manager, Product Development Friday, April 24, 2020

Road Map  What are Portals?

 Module Types  Creating Modules  API

What are Portals?

 Portal = Entry point  Customizable for the user  Can unite several sources of information and present them in one central place  Sites can customize the Portal for a specific type of user or market  Good portals are “sticky”

Example of a “sticky” Portal

Blackboard Portal Components Tab Layout Contents Module Module Edit Minimize Delete

Module Types  Code for the Module  Every Module has an associated Type  One or more JSP pages

Pre Built Module Types  Include HTML  Include URL  RSS Channel

Module Type JSP Pages  View – What gets displayed when the module is rendered  Admin – Edit Global properties  Edit – User customizable properties

View  Rendered Inline  No HTML Header or Body Tags

Edit Calls the edit page

Edit

Admin Admin Page for Global Configuration

Admin

Creating Module Types  JSP is easiest  Tags Provided for Edit and Admin Pages – modulePersonalizationPage – modulePersonalizationReceipt – moduleAdminPage – ModuleAdminReceipt

Portal API  Java  Class: CustomData  In package blackboard.portal.external

 Javadoc available in SDK

Portal API  To get the CustomData for a module, use getModuleData(context) CustomData data = CustomData.getModuleData(pageContext); String text = data.getValue(“body.lunchMenu”); String text = data.getValue(“body.type”);

Portal API  Can also save module global properties CustomData data = CustomData.getModuleData(pageContext); String text = data.setValue(“body.lunchMenu”, “Roast Turkey”); String text = data.setValue(“body.type”,”Entrée”); data.save();

Portal API  Similar Methods exist to set user specific data CustomData data = CustomData.getModulePersonalizationData(pageContext ); String text = data.setValue(“userpref.display”, “ALL”); data.save();

Packaging the Module Type  Put it in a System Extension Package  JSPs in /module directory module view.jsp edit.jsp admin.jsp

Creating a Module  Can specify a module type already in the system or in the same installation package  Many modules can be created using the Bb supplied types  Could leverage types that become available in the community  Entries in bb-manifest.xml file: – module – channel

Creating a Module  Module is packaged a standard Integration Agent Package  bb-manifest.xml

– module – channel

Specifying a Module  Module Manifest Entry: Sample channel module. This module accesses the RSS channel installed with this plug-in. smpl-gamenews

Specifying a Module  Channel Manifest Entry (Module Def): Sample channel module. This module accesses the RSS channel installed with this plug-in. smpl-gamenews

Specifying a Module  Channel Manifest Entry (Channel Def):

Specifying a Module  Can also optionally specify Portal Roles

Demonstration!

Thank You

Demos to Follow >