Common Functionality
Describe the common functionality provided by any Community Web Portal for searching a collection, browsing the results, managing the content etc.
Search
Search is the most important functionality in the gCube system.
You can perform different kind of searches, depending on the results you want to have and how generic or specific your search wants to be. The different kinds are: Combined Search, Simple Search, Quick Search, Google Search, Collections browsing and Generic Search. Each one of them will be described below.
In order to perform a Combined Search, a Simple Search, or a Collections Browsing, you first have to select collections. For this purpose you have to use the Select Collections portlet.
Independently of the search type all results are displayed by the Results portlet.
Select Collections
By using this portlet, you can select the desired collections in order to browse or search them.
The collections are presented in a tree hierarchy. The first level of nodes represent a collection group. In the following image, f.i. Arts and Huminities is a collection group. On the left of each checkbox, there is either a cross or a dash icon. If there is a cross icon, it means that there are other collections inside this group of collections (like e-Prints). So, if you click on it, you can see the underlying collections. On the other hand, if there is dash icon, it means that the node is expaned and you already see the inner collections (like Arts and Huminities). So, if you click on it, you can hide them.
In order to select/deselect a collection, you have to click on its name or checkbox. Additionally, you can select a group of collections simply by selecting the group of collections the belong to. As you can see below, if you select the Arts and Humimities collection group, then all the collections that belong to this group are selected.
Moreover, you can see a description of the collection, if you click on (more) link. Then a pop up window appears containing a description of the corresponding collection as you can see bellow.
Finally, you can select the xml schema on which you want to perform the query. In the drop down list appear only the common schemeta of the selected collections.
Combined Search
In Combined Search you have to select the collections you want to search in at the left panel. Then in the right panel you select the Combined Search header and you can type as many keywords as you like. You can select the fields where each one of the keywords should exist in. Depending on the common schema of the selected collections and the indexes that the back-end supports there are choices like title, language, creator, description and 'Terms' (which means that you want to search for this keyword everywhere inside the selected collections).
You can add a new condition by pressing the Add Condition button.
If you have more than one condition, you can select whether you want to search for results matching all conditions or for results matching any condition. You can do this by selecting one of the below radio buttons. The default choice is: match any condition
You can delete any of the conditions by pressing the "X" button or you can clean the whole form by pressing the Reset button. Notice here that if there is only one condition and try to delete it a warning message will appear and the condition will not be deleted.
Simple Search
In Simple search you can search for the keywords you type at the text area, in the collections you have selected on the left panel. When you use the simple search, a full text search is performed, which means that the keywords you have typed are being searched inside all fields of the selected collections.
Collections Browsing
In Collections Browsing search you can browse all the contents of the collections you have selected on the left panel. You can choose by which element the results will be sorted. Depending on the collection's schema, different elements can be selected for sorting.
Quick Search
Using Quick Search you can perform a generic search in the gCube system. No selection of collections is required in order to search using this feature. The system automatically identifies the most appropriate collections to search, taking into account the terms specified by the user.
You can also perform a Google search, whose results are displayed in the Results portal. Due to google's restrictions the system returns at most 10 results.
Generic Search
Generic Search allows users to type their query in the DILIGENT query language. In order the user to submit a valid query, he/she must be well aware of both the syntax of the query and the current status of the infrastructure. He/she must know the IDs of the content and also the existence or not of several types of indexes.
This is the reason the user is provided with an XML that contains all this information.
Then the user has only to type his/her query and submit it to the system. After that he/she can redirect to the results page in order to browse the results.
Information about the syntax of the query language can be found here
Result Browsing
This portlets aims to provide with common navigational functionality through the results. In addition a set of action can be performed on each result record, like accessing metadata, add annotations, saving or viewing the content, etc.
Common Browsing Activities
You can navigate throughout the results by using the links: first, previous and next. These links correspondingly get the first, previous or next 10 results.
For each result, you can see a set of information, retrieved from object's metadata. The record's presentaiotn form is user configurable. You can select the prefered layout for results, by using the User Profile Editing portlet. Additionally, a thumbnail (small representation of the content) appears at the right part of each result record.
Moreover, you can perform a set actions on each result:
- View Content: It opens a popup window that contains, and displays the content.
- Save Content: Forces browser to ask to save the content in you local disk.
- Manage Annotations: You can add /remove / edit annotations for this object.
- View Metadata: You can view record's metadata.
- Edit Metadata: You can edit record's metadata.
The Basket
The Basket is thought of as a personal user area, dependent on which DL s/he is being using . The user can save its own preferred results by dragging them on it.
It is even possible to drag images in the basket (if they are retrieved results).
Indeed in the results page it is possible to drag whether records or images.
Once you have chosen your results you have the possibility to make them persistent by giving the basket a name and saving it on the server. The possibility is also thought of using saved results in the report generation and courses management.
You can always load your saved basket using the dropdown list placed on the top of the Basket.
By accessing the File menu besides the dropdown list it is possible to save the basket, to clean it or delete it. Be aware that the delete command will phisically remove your saved basket from the server without any possibility to have it back.
Once you have your chosen items in the basket it is possible to access to all the actions you had in the results record page such as accessing metadata, add annotations, save or view the content. If the item is an image you can access to a small preview of it.
Annotations
Annotations’ management is performed by the Annotation Portlet. This is a graphical user interface which provides an easy and sufficient way to annotate gCube informtion objects. Annotation Portlet can be invoked by selecting the “Add annotation” action among the actions associated with any item displayed in the Results portlet.
Then the user is moved to the generic annotation portlet where s/he is able to see the title, the mimetype, the content of the selected object as well as its generic annotations sorted by their creation date.
Depending on the mimetype of the annotated object, the visualization of its content may differ.
In most cases, the content is displayed in a specified part of the portlet.
For a zip file, its entries are displayed and the user is able to download any of them.
Tiff images are transformed into a displayable format (png); video files are available only for download and the visualization of pdf files depends on the behaviour of the browser (normally a plug-in is required).
On the other hand, the annotations are shown up as a list where their title, their creation/ modification date and the author’s name are posted up. The user is able to select which annotations (comments or associations) s/he wants to see just by clicking on the available checkboxes. The content of the annotations is shown below this list. In the case of associations, the title of the associated object as well as a link to its content is displayed.
The user may perform three operations. He can add an annotation by clicking on the “Add Annotation” button and afterwards by filling in the title and text field, in the case of text annotations, or by filling in the title field and selecting an object existing in the basket as an associated object in the case of associations. S/he may also delete or edit an annotation.
If anchored annotations are supported for the annotated object the user can choose to be moved to the appropriate portlet by clicking on the “Go to anchored mode” button. Three portlets for anchored annotations are provided, namely, cover images, text and video files.
In image annotation portlet a user is able to add an annotation to a specific part of the image file. The user selects a space fragment which can be a rectangular area or a specific point (with a pin) and then he fills in the title and text fields. Then the space fragments are shown on the image and by clicking on one of them the content of the annotation is displayed.
In text annotation portlet there is the capability of adding an annotation on a selected text fragment of the file. The selection of the text fragment is done in a very user friendly way as the user has only to choose the part of the text file with his mouse. The text fragments are shown with a different background in order to be distinguishable and by clicking on one of them the content of the annotation is displayed.
In video annotation portlet (still under construction) a user is able to select a time fragment which means a part of the video file that is defined by its starting and ending moment. Video annotation portlet has although some requirements as it needs Java Media Framework installed on the user’s computer.
Metadata Management
View and Edit metadata are the two functionalities that gCube offers to its users concerning the Metadata Management. These are described below.
Metadata Viewing
The Metadata Viewing Portlet is a graphical user interface that displays the metadata which are associated with a specific information object. This interface displays the object’s metadata in a graphical way which depends on their schema.
Furthermore the portlet provides each user with the ability to change the way the metadata are displayed. If a user wants to manage the layout of the metadata viewing portlet, s/he may choose one layout of the available. This selection can be done in the user profile editing portlet.
Metadata Editing
Metadata’s editing is performed by Metadata Editing Portlet. This is a graphical user interface which can be invoked by selecting to edit the metadata of an object in Results portlet. Depending on the schema of the metadata different editors can be displayed. There are two visual editors for dc and eiDB schemas and a generic one for the rest. However, for some collections, it is forbidden to change the metadata, something that is stated on screen with a relevant message.
The visual metadata editors provide an easy and user friendly way of editing the metadata. Adding, deleting and editing elements can be performed by clicking on the appropriate buttons and filling in text fields. When the desired changes are completed, the user has to apply the changes he has done by clicking on the “Save Changes” button.
The generic editor provides two options. The first one is to edit the bare xml in a text editor and the second one is to upload an xml file as metadata. However, these options require the user to have sufficient knowledge of XML.
User Profile Management
The User Profile Management in gCube provides the functionality to the end-user to view and/or edit his/her profile. It also provides the functionality to the system's administrator to manage the users' profiles.
User Profile Editing
The User Profile Editing portlet can be accessed by all users that have a portal account. Each user has his/her own profile and he/she can view and/or edit its content through this portlet. By editing its profile's contents the user can change the language he/she prefers to search with within the selected collections in the Search portlet. Furthermore, he/she can also select the preferred presentation and metadata xslts, in order to view the results and the metadata the way he/she likes. In order to apply the changes the user has to press the Save profile button.
Profile Administration
The Profile Administration portlet can be accessed only by the portal's administrator. Using this portlet, the administrator can create and/or delete a user profile by typing the user's username. The Administrator is also responsible by uploading the Default User Profile on the DIS as a generic resource. This can be done through this portlet. The Default User Profile should be a valid XML document.
