WebSphere Portal v6 New Features
- Document Manager
- Faster response time
- First page preview option provides a view of document content before opening the document.
- Long lists of files or search results paginated for easier navigation.
- WCM authoring portlet
- Easier navigation.
- Improved search and filtering options.
- Collaborative authoring referential integrity features that prevent the creation of broken links in Web content when moving or deleting items.
- Web Content Management authoring template
- Content item forms customizable using authoring templates
- Custom help for content item forms
- Each field and element displayed within a content item form, can be specified in an authoring template.
- Web Content Management menu
- Paging element added to menu designs to add navigational tools to a menu.
- New distributed portal server capabilities
- Multiple database domains for one portal server installation
- Specify different database domains for storing Portal Resources.
- Attribute-base administration enhancements
- Customize the layout of a page for individual users.
- Show or hide pages and portlets based on dynamic characteristics determined at runtime.
- Drag-and-drop feature for changing placement of individual portlets on a page
- Portlet Palette
- Add portlets using drag-and-drop
- People Finder portlet available on a palette. Retains all functionality even while fully updated for compatibility with the JSR 168 standard.
- Domino and Extended Products Portlets
- Available from the Domino Integration page.
- Lotus Notes View portlet features a configuration mode for selection of portlet type, an improved user interface with enhanced paging and column management, and WSRP compatibility.
- The My Lotus QuickPlaces portlet allows users to create IBM Lotus QuickPlace s, as well as request that an administrator create them. Users can also see a view of all their own tasks in all Lotus QuickPlace on the server.
- The Lotus Document Viewer portlet displays information stored in a Notes database on a IBM Lotus Domino server that is set up to work with WebSphere Portal. Lotus Document Viewer allows users to work with documents from Lotus Notes View and My Lotus QuickPlaces directly on the portal page, without opening a separate browser window.
- The Domino Web Access portlet uses a redirect database to help automatically locate a user's source Notes mail database for the Mail, Calendar, and To Do functional areas of the portlet.
- The Sametime Contact List portlet allows the user to sort the list of contacts. Both this and the Who Is Here portlet are updated to use the status icons from the latest release of Lotus Sametime.
- Common Personal Information manager (PIM) portlets
- The Common Mail and Common Calendar portlets are available from the Messaging page, and their performance has been enhanced.
- The Common Mail portlet features additional reply options, message export, enhanced performance for Microsoft Exchange Mail, and when the back-end server is Lotus Domino, a find option.
- The Common Calendar portlet features rich text editing and attachments, a Group Calendar, and support for Microsoft Exchange Calendar.
- Templates and workflow for composite applications
- Templates provide application assembly features without the need for programming code.
The business components that constitute a composite application can be portal resources, J2EE resources, or other resources, for example, Eclipse plug-ins.
- Templates define the properties of composite applications belonging to a particular category and the components that are deployed on each page of an application.
From templates, users can create multiple applications that share a common definition. Templates that users create and customize are listed in the Application Template Library. Access to templates is controlled by role types that are assigned in Resource Permissions.
- Composite applications created from templates are listed in the application catalog. Each application includes one or more components that users work with. Applications can be customized and saved as templates. Access to composite applications is controlled by role types that are assigned in Resource Permissions and refined by membership roles assigned to application users.
- Workflow for composite applications is offered as a technical preview. A workflow within a composite application captures and automates business process a provides task management integrated with related content for application users. Workflow portlets include Team Tasks, Workflow List, Current Task, Task Details, Workflow History, and Related Content.
- Policies for managing portal resources
- Use the Resource Policies portlet to use policies to manage portal resources:
- users
- groups
- applications
- client types
- page themes
A policy is a collection of settings that influence the behavior of a portal resource and the experience that users will have when working with the resource. Policies simplify the management of portal resources because the policy settings for a resource can control the behavior of the resource for a class of users. Policies improve both the administration and the use of portal resources.
- Policies are grouped according to the types of resources that apply the policies. Administrators can refine the main policies that are provided for portal resources by creating child policies that inherit or override the policy settings of the parent policy.
- Policies for particular types of portal resources are defined by rule-based business logic that uses conditional expressions. When you work with policy rules and conditions, you use the Personalization rule editor and rule selector.
- New pages for an updated look
- The Welcome page helps you become more familiar with the user interface features.
Access major areas of the site, such as Administration, Web Content Management, and Personalization.
- The My Work page provides you with access to business portlets as well as other areas of the site.
- The Getting Started page provides quick tips that can help you start using the portal. Also, helpful links to other resources are provided.
- Multiple options for site navigation
Main menu Accessible from any location within the site. Access major areas of the site. Quick Links Access major areas of the site. Accessible from any location within the site. URL mapping Create site URLs that are meaningful to users. Users can navigate to areas by typing the familiar URLs in the address bar of a Web browser. Breadcrumbs Display a horizontal navigation which indicates a user's position as a level within the site. We can customize the number of levels that display.
- New menus for pages and portlets
- A drop-down menu that provides access to common tasks for a page or portlet.
- Identical portals can be set up in multiple sites
- Keep the production system up while running maintenance on the User Database.
- End users can customize their user data.
- Themes and skins have been redesigned for greater usability and easier customization. The changes include the following:
Theme policy We can define and assign theme policies to pages to control how a theme renders. Theme code Theme code has been simplified for faster loading and easier customization. New CSS Classes New classes in Themes and Skins CSS files make theme and skin customization much easier. Color Palettes Use a color palette to change the color of a site area. DocType The "strict" doctype is used in the default theme ("http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd").
- Business Component APIs have been added for building business components that integrate with the collaborative infrastructure.
Implement these interfaces in the collaborative application component Java class.
Compensation interface Declare whether the component requires compensation calls. DisplayInfo interface Get information about a component that is shown to a user. Externalizable interface Save the state of a component into an application XML. Lifecycle interface Notify the collaborative component whenever an instance of the component is created or destroyed. This allows the component to create resources needed while the component is active as well as destroy those resources when they are no longer needed. Membership interface Allows a collaborative component to define its own roles and notifies a collaborative component instance whenever members are added to or removed from its roles. Templatable interface Let a collaborative component save information in an application template and to recreate it from a template.
- IBM WebSphere Portlet Factory
Eclipse-based development tool that provides a way to build portlets without coding.
- Portal User Interface
Page metadata Set page parameters Show and hide page rules Use attribute based administration to apply rules that determine when pages and portlets are visible. Find out if rules are currently in use on a portlet or page.
Used to customize layout of a page for individual users. Show or hide pages and portlets based on dynamic characteristics determined at runtime and governed by rules set on the portlet or page.