Oh my, your post slipped my attention though it is an important one. Thanks for picking up the topic again and the prospect of developing an integration. That would be fantastic!
What I would like to see from a file repository integration with Mahara is the minimum of being able to browse and integrate files from the external repository in Mahara. In addition, what would be needed is that files that are used in views can be locked down when such views are submitted to a course group. That functionality itself is new in Mahara 1.3 and important for assessment / feedback purposes.
Furthermore, it would be good if a file from the repository could be put into the Mahara files area if necessary. That could become important if you have a national portfolio and the student moves from one institution to another and thus becomes disconnected from his previous repository but would still like to have access to his files.
It would also be good if a student can decide to put a file currently in his regular Mahara file area into his repository with a simple "click" (and the choosing of a folder). That may be interesting for users who use mobile apps that put files directly into Mahara but which the student then ultimately wants to have in their repository.
I guess, what I am saying here is that the repository could show up as a folder (with subfolders) in the My Files area so that students can move files around easily. If the files and folders moved between Mahara's own file storage and the repository could keep their description and tags, I'd be very happy.
Thinking about the export of a portfolio, files that are provided from a repository also need to be exported. Similar, when you copy a view to a group or another user, the file must ultimately be placed in the files area of that group / user.
Were any of these ideas on your development horizon or am I off the mark with my wishes?
I would love to hear how your development is progressing.
Cheers
Kristina
]]>we are at the moment designing a knowledge platform that has Alfresco as it's main repository. At the moment we have integrations with (hopefully soon available) Moodle 2.0, Drupal, Zimbra and SugarCRM. Mahara is the first on our list to be integrated. As this project will become rather large quite soon, I think funding for at least basic integration (at least file storage integration in some way) will become available between now and let's say 8 months.
When this proves to be successful I see more potential for integration, but that should be discussed at that moment. For now, I am very interested in what the Mahara community considers to be usefull in respect to Alfresco integration.
]]>Has anybody looked more into the issue of having a file repository in Mahara or support for linking Alfresco?
I was asked about Mahara having a file repository at the Midwest MoodleMoot.
Would the experience of integrating it in Moodle help? Or could the files that were put into Moodle through the repository API from Alfresco be used in Mahara?
Thanks in advance
Kristina
]]>regarding this discussion I would like to recommend the Document Management System KnowledgeTree (http://www.knowledgetree.com/opensource) cause it's based on same LAMP technology! So integration should be quite easy and roll-out would not imply additional tech. barriers likeTomcat, JBoss ...
BR, Peer
]]>I suggest you have a trawl through those database tables and look in dataroot to see what happens when you add and remove files and images. Following the code will help you, it's all in htdocs/artefact/file/.
Presumably, what you could do is refactor things so that where the files are actually stored is pluggable, while the metadata continues to reside in the database. That would mean that Mahara can still present the files in the file area, but actually store them elsewhere using a plugin.
I hope that's a good enough start. Feel free to ask more specific questions, of course. Maybe we could take them to the Alfresco group - once it has a forum
]]>I am hoping to get some information on Mahara's file repository implemention (without digging into the code yet); so, I can analyze on how much work will involve before deciding to move toward to it.
By the way, I really like the design of Mahara. Great work!
]]>which features of Alfresco are you looking for to be integrated in Mahara? Petr explained that Moodle 2.0 will integrate it as a repository. I think that you are looking for the outstanding web content management and document management possibilities?
Any ideas/discussions about a mahara plugin to support these things will be great!
greetings fromo the black forest
Heinz
Sadly, we have no developer documentation for artefact plugins at this time - the source is the only documentation.
If you are interested in having a serious go at Alfresco integration, you might like to discuss your plans some more with us, as it sounds like a cool feature to make it into Mahara and we can help suggest the best way to implement things
]]>just heard about alfresco at an workshop with Petr Skolak. Sounds great
greetings Heinz