Paul and I just had a brief meeting to discuss what we wanted to do about this. We decided that the best thing to do would be to set if free, and see if anyone on campus starts fiddling with it.
It’s a beta, and we’ll be experimenting with the best setup of modules and content, but the only way to know if this boat will float is to put it into the water. So…
weblogs.ucalgary.ca is on the air.
Anyone with a valid University of Calgary email address can go ahead and login – a blog will be set up automagically for you – and start creating content.
It’s still got some quirks to iron out, but the blogging part works pretty well. I’ll figure out some of the quirks when I get a chance, and many other improvements are in the works when Drupal 4.6 is released.
Why use this rather than something like Blogger, or Typepad, or something else? The biggest benefit (at least initially) is the ability to create ad-hoc organic groups, where content that is published by group members is displayed on a “group page” – an easy way to collaborate with a research group, a breakout group that’s part of a class, or a department.
I’m planning on conducting some workshops around blogging (and collaborative publishing, and RSS, and wikis, and….) when my projects calm down a bit (perhaps this summer?).
If you have any questions about it, please let me know.
Paul and I just had a brief meeting to discuss what we wanted to do about this. We decided that the best thing to do would be to set if free, and see if anyone on campus starts fiddling with it.
It’s a beta, and we’ll be experimenting with the best setup of modules and content, but the only way to know if this boat will float is to put it into the water. So…
weblogs.ucalgary.ca is on the air.
Anyone with a valid University of Calgary email address can go ahead and login – a blog will be set up automagically for you – and start creating content.
It’s still got some quirks to iron out, but the blogging part works pretty well. I’ll figure out some of the quirks when I get a chance, and many other improvements are in the works when Drupal 4.6 is released.
Why use this rather than something like Blogger, or Typepad, or something else? The biggest benefit (at least initially) is the ability to create ad-hoc organic groups, where content that is published by group members is displayed on a “group page” – an easy way to collaborate with a research group, a breakout group that’s part of a class, or a department.
I’m planning on conducting some workshops around blogging (and collaborative publishing, and RSS, and wikis, and….) when my projects calm down a bit (perhaps this summer?).
If you have any questions about it, please let me know.
I’ve been going through the various options, and I’ve come to the conclusion that Drupal may well be the best solution for what we’d need for a campus weblogging service. It doesn’t have per-blog themes, but that’s coming in Drupal 4.6. The rest of the package is rock solid, and the LDAP integration means every @ucalgary.ca could hit the ground running, as Drupal creates weblogs and forums on the fly as users enter the system. That makes administration much simpler for me, and makes the system more flexible for the users.
The first thing I’ve done is install the SpreadFirefox theme, which looks amazing, but has some quirks with CSS and clear so that some things display only after a LOT of vertical whitespace.
I’m slowly putting together a User Manual, using the Book feature of Drupal. It makes a book into some freakish hybrid of weblog and wiki, with a hierarchical organization of pages and an automatically generated table of contents.
I’m meeting with Paul tomorrow, and we just might decide to roll this out for a limited test period. I’m teaching a class on Friday, to a group of Anthropology grad students interested in new technologies and strategies for teaching and learning. Could be a good fit… 🙂
I’ve been going through the various options, and I’ve come to the conclusion that Drupal may well be the best solution for what we’d need for a campus weblogging service. It doesn’t have per-blog themes, but that’s coming in Drupal 4.6. The rest of the package is rock solid, and the LDAP integration means every @ucalgary.ca could hit the ground running, as Drupal creates weblogs and forums on the fly as users enter the system. That makes administration much simpler for me, and makes the system more flexible for the users.
The first thing I’ve done is install the SpreadFirefox theme, which looks amazing, but has some quirks with CSS and clear so that some things display only after a LOT of vertical whitespace.
I’m slowly putting together a User Manual, using the Book feature of Drupal. It makes a book into some freakish hybrid of weblog and wiki, with a hierarchical organization of pages and an automatically generated table of contents.
I’m meeting with Paul tomorrow, and we just might decide to roll this out for a limited test period. I’m teaching a class on Friday, to a group of Anthropology grad students interested in new technologies and strategies for teaching and learning. Could be a good fit… 🙂