[Using Sakai] Twenty-First Century Interactions on Sakai?

Wed Oct 17 07:30:13 PDT 2012

Hi Marshall,

My response is long overdue and may not be all that useful at this point,
but perhaps for future semesters it may help.  I'm piggy-backing on what
Mr. Algaze suggested regarding the use of Resources and web pages.

I really like Lesson Builder, too.  But as an instructor with some web
design knowledge, I've done a lot of work in Sakai CLE using HTML pages
stored in Resources to present learning modules of information.  A "lite
demonstration" of some pages that load into the main frame of CLE can be
seen in my ePortfolio
here<https://scholar.vt.edu/access/content/user/adevans/Public/DVDPortfolio/Samples/samples/training/track_d/Introduction/homepage.html>.

If you have comfort in creating and using web pages, you can either choose
to create files directly within the CLE or by using a 3rd Party software
(such as *Dreamweaver* or another easy-favorite of faculty,
*SoftChalk<http://softchalk.com/>
*) and using WebDAV to upload the files.  I've used both, but I prefer to
use Dreamweaver and to upload the files.  SoftChalk is great to create
Flash-based quizzes, animations, etc. though!  They even have a cloud
offering, now.  But I like doing it with DW, because I like the control and
I can use relative urls for linking the pages together, saving me trouble
in the long run when I copy courses from semester-to-semester.

I'm not going to say it's an easy process to do it this way, but it's not
impossible and often results in the outcomes I desire.  However, there are
caveats: you need to know something about web design (for Dreamweaver), you
should know something about creating learning modules of content (for
SoftChalk or equivalent), and you should be willing to spend a lot of time
doing both of these as the initial creation can be quite time-consuming.
 That said, subsequent changes and adjustments are far less painful and you
always have an "original" copy sitting on your computer (or in the cloud if
you wish) for whenever you wish to reuse the content.

One more thing to note.  If you want to use JavaScript, oftentimes this can
be accomplished by checking an option within the Resources area that houses
said script.  At least in rSmart Sakai CLE 2.8 under Resources >
"Folder_Name" > Actions > Edit Details > "User-uploaded HTML may contain
dangerous scripts. To override default behavior and allow unrestricted
HTML, check this box."  This little thing has allowed for me to run php RSS
feeds, (most) .js files, and other items I probably should not be able to
enjoy.

If you're interested in looking into using Resources to house web pages (or
the pages from something like SoftChalk <http://softchalk.com/>), I've
included some handouts from when I was working at Virginia Tech to help
explain what I'm talking about.

Best of luck,

Amber D. Marcu
Academic Technology Consultant, rSmart
amarcu at rsmart.com  |  (530) 426-2372

On Fri, Aug 24, 2012 at 5:30 PM, Algaze, Louis Contractor, eDataTech <
ljalgaze at nps.edu> wrote:

> Marshall,
>
> Have you explored using web pages within the Resources area and putting a
> Web Content link in the left navigation to specified page(s)?  Although
> the Rich Text Editor strips out all <head> content you can embed
> javascript calls into the <body> of a page by using a standard script call:
>
> <script type="text/javascript" id="templateScript"src="full or relative
> path to .js file"></script>
>
> Once that is there you should be able to go crazy with using that
> javascript.
>
> If you do not plan to modify any of the pages with the rich text editor
> you can use your favorite html editor and upload pages or an entire site
> using the WebDav (Upload/download multiple items) feature.
>
> All of this should be able to be performed Out of the Box, with no special
> configuration to the best of my knowledge.
>
> Louis
>
>
> On 8/24/12 12:02 PM, "Marshall Feldman" <marsh at uri.edu> wrote:
>
> >Thanks to Sam, Matt, and David who quickly answered my query.
> >Unfortunately, I am "just" a faculty member and, like most faculty
> >members, do not have access to the config package and all that. If I
> >were to suggest changing the overall University-wide configuration, the
> >administration would probably appoint a committee, which would recommend
> >hiring a consultant, which would require a budget augmentation, which
> >would take about 4 years to tell me they can't support the change.
> >(Sorry, this cynicism is well-earned.)
> >
> >One of my colleagues showed me a way around this that should work. So
> >I'm going to give it a try first.
> >
> >     Marsh Feldman
> >
> >
> >On 8/24/12 1:21 PM, Sam Ottenhoff wrote:
> >>> ... On a
> >>> regular web page using a jQuery plugin this is almost trivial. You
> >>>just have
> >>> a short amount of text and then a "read more" link that expands the
> >>>text
> >>> when the student wants to read the whole thing. See this example. But
> >>>how to
> >>> do this in Sakai?
> >> Modify the Sakai config package and change the goodTags property to
> >> allow all input from users.  It's a five minute change that will stop
> >> all HTML filtering and sanitation in Sakai.
> >>
> >> Making this change would be a security disaster if you do not have
> >> full trust in every *possible* user of your system. If you allow users
> >> to input Javascript into a web-based system, you are open to a
> >> gigantic class of attacks
> >> (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-site_scripting).
> >>
> >> If you don't have full trust in every single user in your system, then
> >> you need to add functionality centrally to your portal rendering
> >> instead of doing it as an instructor in a browser.  Add new styles
> >> into the rich-text editor configs.  Then render those new styles using
> >> the centralized jQuery code in your primary Sakai JS files.
> >>
> >> --Sam
> >
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