NYUHome v2.0 Randy Wright and Robert Brill randy.wright@nyu.edu; bobby.brill@nyu.edu

Building on Version 1

NYUHome, the University's customizable portal to many web-based services and tools, gradually went into production last fall, replacing numerous antiquated NYU-Internet ("is") text-based systems. The conversion was a resounding success. Over thirty thousand individuals' accounts were migrated to the new campus portal.

NYUHome enables students to learn about campus events, to check their e-mail, and to see their schedules and grades; professors can use the online directory to look up colleagues; and administrators can access a wide range of University resources. The customizable channels of NYUHome also offer access to web forums, research tools, news, campus events and more. So far, the feedback that we have received has been overwhelmingly positive. The good word has spread to other universities, who continue to contact us about getting customized versions of NYUHome for their own school.

Over the past year, the NYU Community has made many useful suggestions on features that they would like to see in future versions of NYUHome. Quite a few of these have already been incorporated in the upgrades that we made during the 2000-2001 academic year. And, as we started planning the upgrade of NYUHome from version 1 to version 2.0, we collected and discussed the suggested improvements that we had not yet incorporated. The NYUHome v2.0 planning meetings to map out the evolution of the portal were attended by developers, students, faculty and staff from around the University. After a series of these meetings, we were able to compile a master list of enhancements: the blueprint for NYUHome v2.0.

Quality control measures

Nearly ready to act upon this blueprint, we decided that it was essential to first take a few important quality control measures that would help ensure the success of NYUHome v2.0. Therefore, we installed a software version control system, improved the existing source code documentation, and streamlined our software distribution system.

Key Features

The beta version of the NYUHome v2.0 homepage.

During the analysis and design phase of our software cycle, we realized that a key component in our implementation of this blueprint was ensuring that the portal maintained a fast response time. While making additions, we did not want to risk creating a less responsive system that individuals would be hesitant about using.

Even though NYUHome has very powerful computing resources behind it, a poorly designed program could bring even a supercomputer to a halt. We determined that one of the ways to achieve high performance would be the creation of a configuration caching system; NYUHome v2.0 utilizes much more configuration information than its predecessor.

To meet our performance target, we tested a number of configuration models and finally concluded that using DBM files would be our preferred method. DBM is a system that uses a high-speed local indexed database file. A DBM file is like a dictionary. You look up a word in the dictionary's alphabetical list and in return for your effort, you get the definition. In a DBM file, you might look up a NetID and, in return, get a list of channels that the person who owns the NetID can see.

In addition to performance im-provements, NYUHome v2.0 makes use of a concept called "roles". NYU-Home v1.6 was primarily aimed at students. By using roles in v2.0, we will be able to provide more personalized access for faculty, administrators, alumni and perhaps, someday, prospective students or even members of other universities. Moreover, the roles implementation is nearly transparent to the individual, who sees only the tabs and channels for which he or she is eligible.

For example, administrators will be able to access certain work-related applications from their NYU-Home screen, while others will not even see those applications. In order to support roles, new infrastructure was needed. It is called the Roles and Registry Database, and it gathers information from a number of NYU systems.

NYUHome v2.0 has a new look and feel. It now makes use of tabs on a multiple framed page. The top frame includes all the tabs that are available to a person based on their role at the University. The middle frame contains e-mail information and is refreshed frequently to alert for new e-mail. The bottom frame contains all the channels associated with the tab that the user has selected in the top frame.

NYUHome v2.0 has an improved preferences mechanism. It allows a person to view and to update certain ITS database settings associated with his or her NYU account (e.g., e-mail forwarding address, vacation message, etc.). It also allows one to customize individual tabs by turning channels on and off. Finally, it enables each user to change the motif (e.g. color, size, etc.) of his or her own NYUHome account.

NYUHome v2.0 was initially beta tested (phase I) on our development machine by about forty people. We are continuing to collect bug reports via our new "Mothra" channel and to make software fixes. In early August, we began beta testing (phase II) on our staging area (1 domain on a Sun E10K) with about 100 testers. We expect to make NYUHome v2.0 available to approximately forty thousand users in Fall, 2001.