).Portlets provide your portal users with customized tools and services as well as information. The portal comes with many portlets, but you can also create your own. Have a Web developer or an Oracle portlet developer create portlets for you, or download portlets from the Oracle Technology Network at http://www.oracle.com/technology/index.html.
This topic discusses:
To learn how to create or edit administrative objects (including portlets, portlet bundles, portlet templates, and portlet Web Services), see Creating and Editing Administrative Objects.
There are two types of portlets: intrinsic portlets and remote portlets.
An intrinsic portlet consists of one or more sets of code that are located on the portal computer. Your portal administrator needs to install this code in the correct location before an intrinsic portlet can be created.
A remote portlet is a portlet hosted by a separate remote server. When a user displays a My Page or community page that includes a remote portlet, the portal contacts the appropriate remote server to obtain updated portlet content.
Some portlets are installed with the portal and are readily available to portal users, but others require you to manually install and configure them.
Note: For information on installing portlet code, refer to the Installation Guide for Oracle WebCenter Interaction (available on Oracle Technology Network at http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/bea.html) or the documentation that comes with your portlet, or contact your portal administrator.
To make an intrinsic portlet available to portal users:
To make a remote portlet available to portal users:
Portlet Web services allow you to specify functional settings for your portlets, leaving the display settings to be set in each associated portlet. There are intrinsic portlet Web services and remote portlet Web services.
To learn about the Intrinsic Portlet Web Service Editor, see one of the following:
To learn about the Remote Portlet Web Service Editor, see one of the following editor pages:
Portlet bundles are groups of related portlets, packaged together for easy inclusion on My Pages or community pages. When users add portlets to their My Pages or community pages, they can add all the portlets in a bundle or select individual portlets from a bundle. You might want to create portlet bundles for portlets that have related functions or for all the portlets that a particular group of users might find useful. This makes it easier for users to find portlets related to their specific needs without having to browse through all the portlets in your portal.
To learn about the Portlet Bundle Editor, see one of the following editor pages:
Portlet templates allow you to create multiple instances of a portlet, each displaying slightly different information. For example, you might want to create a Regional Sales portlet template, from which you could create different portlets for each region to which your company sells. You might even want to include all Regional Sales portlets on one page for an executive overview.
To learn about the Portlet Template Editor, see one of the following editor pages:
To create a portlet from a portlet template:
).Some portlets and portlet templates (and their necessary portlet web services and remote servers) are available with the portal installation:
Note: You can also create your own portlets, have a web developer or a Oracle WebCenter Interaction portlet developer create portlets for you, or download portlets from the Oracle Technology Network at http://www.oracle.com/technology/index.html. For information on installing and configuring portlets provided as a software package, refer to the portlet software documentation instead of the procedures in this guide. For information on developing portlets, see the Oracle WebCenter Portlet Toolkit for .NET Development Guide, which is located on the Oracle Technology Network at http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/bea.html.
The following navigation portlet can be used with the Portlet-Ready Navigation scheme (set in an experience definition) to provide custom navigation for your portal:
Navigation Tags
Header Portlet: This portlet is provided as an example of a custom
header that includes navigation tags; you can customize it and use it
in communities or experience definitions. This portlet is stored in the
Portal Resources folder.
Note: The Tag Navigation experience definition is also included
in the portal as a convenience when you are using portlets for navigation.
This experience definition uses the Portlet-Ready Navigation scheme and
has the Navigation Tags Header Portlet set as its header.
The following login portlets can be added to guest default profiles so users can log in to the portal:
Portal Login: This portlet enables users to log in to the portal. You probably want to add this to all your guest users' home pages so that users can log in from the default page displayed when they navigate to your portal. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder.
Tag Login Portlet: This portlet is provided as an example of a custom login portlet that uses adaptive tags; you can customize it and add it to your guest users' home pages so that users can log in from the default page displayed when they navigate to your portal. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder. For information on adaptive tags, see the Oracle WebCenter Interaction UI Customization Guide, which is located on the Oracle Technology Network at http://www.oracle.com/technology/documentation/bea.html.
The following user profile portlets are included on the user profile page by default:
Folder Expertise: This portlet displays the folders for which the user is an expert. Portal administrators can add users to a folder as an expert through the Related Resources page of the Folder Editor, or, if users have the Self-Selected Experts activity right, they can add themselves as experts when they are browsing folders in the Directory. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder.
General Information: This portlet displays user profile information such as name and address, but it is configurable by the portal administrator to display any information. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder.
Managed Communities: This portlet displays the communities to which the user has Edit or Admin access. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder.
For more information on user profiles, see About User Profiles.
The following portlets are ready to be added to My Pages and community pages:
Job Histories Intrinsic Portlet: This portlet displays the same job history information that is displayed on the Job History page of the Automation Service Manager. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder.
Portal Search: This portlet enables users to search your portal and access their saved searches. Users might want to add this to one of their My Pages for easy access to their saved searches. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources folder.
RSS Reader Portlet: This portlet enables users to specify an RSS or ATOM feed to display on a My Page. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources/RSS Reader folder, but is available only if the portal administrator installed the Remote Portlet Service.
RSS Community Reader Portlet: This portlet enables community managers to specify an RSS or ATOM feed to display on a community page. This portlet is stored in the Portal Resources/RSS Reader folder, but is available only if the portal administrator installed the Remote Portlet Service.
The following portlet templates (and any necessary portlet Web services and remote servers) are created when you install the portal:
Community Links Portlet Template: This template is used by the portal to create portlets that display the links saved in a Community Knowledge Directory folder. This portlet template is stored in the Portal Resources folder. To learn more about community links portlets, see Community Links Portlet.
Content Snapshots: This template is used by the portal to create portlets that display the results of a Snapshot Query. This portlet template is stored in the Portal Resources folder.