Layout Generator
The layout defines how the portlets are displayed by the portal. Each portlet gives access to a functionality selected by the VRE Designer. The layout of the VO/VRE is persisted as a generic resource in the Information System and can be edited using the 'Layout Generator' portlet. Using this portlet, the VO-Admin/ VRE-Manager can add or remove tabs and subtabs, rows and columns inside the space area of the portal in order to organize the appearance of the available portlets. For submitting and saving the changes the administrator needs to press the "Create Layout" button before exiting the portlet.
Below, a detailed description of the procedure for creating or editing the layout of the corresponding VO/VRE through the layout generator is provided:
When loading the portlet, the current layout of the entered VO/VRE is displayed. The image bellow shows an example of the layout for the FARM/FCPPS vre:
The structure of the layout is hierarchical, containing tabs, subtabs and the portlets at the lowest level of the hierarchy. By clicking on one tab you can explore its subtabs or its containing portlets. For intsance, in the picture bellow, you can see the expanded Search tab, that includes three sub tabs (Search, Results and Annotations) and the portlets that the Search sub tab contains (QuickSearchPortlet, GoogleSearchPortlet, CollectionsNavigatorPortlet, SearchPortlet). The portlets will be appearing in the same structural order as they appear in the rows and the columns of the layout. The designer can also swap the places of two tabs by clicking on the green arrows that appear on them.
When wanting to create or edit a layout, the designer has two options: To create/remove tabs and to create/remove portlets. A tab can be added to a level of the hierarchy by clicking on the "+" button on the right of the level. When adding a tab, the designer inputs the tab name and choses the necessary roles that a user should have, in order to see the tab in the portal. The procedure is depicted bellow:
In order to add a new portlet, the designer needs to create a new row first, in case there is no space in another pre-constructed row. In order to add/remove rows the "Rows" buttons, on the right of the panel should be used. It is also possible to split the row in separate cells, by chosing among the available separation possibilites, provided by the portlet. The image that follows depicts this functionality:
Finally, a portlet can be created inside a pre constructed level, by clicking on the "+" button, inside the corresponding row. The designer can chose among the available portlets and the available roles for access restriction.
When having finished the "Apply Layout" button needs to be clicked in order for the changes to be saved.
The screenshot or the search portlets corresponding to the above layout structure is shown below:
