CHEFCSG

May 7, 2003

Joseph HardinCollaborative Technologies Lab

Media Union & School of InformationUniversity of Michigan

University Missions• CourseTools – a first-generation course

management system• WorkTools – part of a series of efforts

in building systems for support of scientific research teams

These two paths have a lot in common, as instances of collaboration support systems, and have led to:

• CHEF – A framework for building the next generation of both systems

UM.CT

Custom course page presentedtoeach student

Students working off campus often run into difficulty because their browser or dial-in service

is not correctly configured.

UM.CT

Help for Remote Users

Support forWork Groups

UM.Worktools

Scientific ResearchGroups

Science ReviewTeams

TechnologyDesignTeams

Currently over5500 users

worktools.si.umich.edu

Adoption of CT/WT

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CT Users - Saturating WT Users – Accelerating

CT Use - Deepening

Over 35,000

We see these as foundation efforts in understanding and building “Knowledge Work Support Systems” for UMich faculty, students and staff, and remote collaborators.

Over 9,000

So, CHEF as Next Step(s)

http://chefproject.org

CourseTools:Assignments Quizzes …

Worktools:ToDo listData Access…

Teleobservation – NEESInformatics/MetaData - CMCS

SharedCore Features:LogonFile uploadAnnouncementsDiscussionChatScheduleMail archive …

Gradebook CAPA Quizzes

DissertationTool

OKI APIs

CHEF Technology

Leveraging Education/Research Complementarities

Network for Earthquake Engineering Simulation

CHEF node

CHEF node

CoGXML

CoGXML

Grid

CHEF and the Grid – Access to Globally Distributed Computing

Resources

Moving to GRID services model (OGSA) as it develops. And it did last Wednesday…

Home

Home

Resources

CMCS is enabled by broad collaboration

• Development partnerships cut across offices and agencies

• Collaborations also include CCA, SDM ISICS.

• A collaboration of eight national labs and universities span chemical scales

• Collaboration opportunities for future– Xportlets work at Indiana

University– Portal web Services– NeesGrid work at University of

Michigan

SAM

CMCS Explorer is a data management tool for accessing data across DAV resources.

The default address in CMCS Explorer for My Workspace is the path to your personal data folder. In a team workspace, the default address points to the team’s data folder.

CMCS Explorer shows tree and file views, can spawn viewers and tools for specific files, and has search, notification and pedigree capabilities.

Current Implementation

Pedigree Browsing in CHEF

The Browser enables metadata editing.

Data is linked to projects, references, inputs, and outputs

Automatic Translation and Metadata

ExtractionData translations provided automatically by SAM using previously registered XSLT’s for this file type.

Pedigree Graph in CMCS

Pedigree graph provides a two-dimensional visualization of a data resource and all of its relationships. Users can easily see the relationships without following all pedigree links.

Data + Metadata • Metadata allows the creation of revolutionary new

types of collaborative chemical science projects, coordinating research efforts across chemical scales.

• Metadata dramatically increases accessibility of state-of-the-art research knowledge to industry and the public.

• CMCS data repository with pedigree tracking provides a new means for evaluating research claims.

• CMCS pedigree graphing provides a visual representation of data relationships.

• CMCS metadata supports allows scientific peer review of electronic data, which is important to groups like IUPAChem.

• CMCS metadata is extensible.

Leveraging Research Support

• NSF National Middleware Initiative grant– U Michigan– U Texas-Austin– Indiana U– NCSA– Argonne National Lab3 year support for core GRID services

integration; Jetspeed/CHEF as portal tech

CHEF Summary• CourseTools.NG – online support for

learning; in pilot, fall rollout• WorkTools.NG – online support for

research, workgroups; in development for NEES, CMCS, NMI, rollout late summer; continuing development

• Goals – enhance online tools; make it easy to move between teaching and research; build standards efforts, collaborations so market of components develops

Why Open Source CMS?• University should not outsource a

core competence – teaching• It fits University value structures,

we are an open community• It can build the extended academic

community through collaboration and shared effort

• It is a grand experiment, worthy of the University’s participation

Portal Engine:

JetspeedVelocityCHEF

Teamlets:Written in JAVAResponsible for

GUI Operate in the

context of a session.

Rely on services for any persistent

or “cross-user” information.

ServicesPersistent

System-wideMultiple

implementations of services

Configurable as to what

implementation provides what

service

Servlets:Access services outside of the portal engine: AccessServlet

and WebDavServlet

Services A

PI

CHEF Architecture

WebServer:

TomcatTurbine

Non-HTTP Components (i.e. E-Mail)

Portal:

TomcatTurbine

Jetspeed

+

CHEFextensions

toJetspeed

Teamlets:Written in JAVAResponsible for

GUI Operate in the

context of a session.

Rely on services for any persistent

or “cross-user” information.

ServicesPersistent

System-wideMultiple

implementations of services

Configurable as to what

implementation provides what

service

….

….

Services A

PI

CHEF/OKI Relationship

OKI

OKI APIs – CHEF Implementation

• Authentication • Authorization • Local ID • Logging • DBC • Shared Objects

(Agent, Group, AgentIterator)

• Filing (*) • Hierarchy (*) • UserMessaging (*) • WorkFlow (**) • Scheduling (**)

* unpublished but well enough along that we can do something ** unpublished, unspecified

As OKI APIs become available we either swap out CHEF APIs or build OKI translators – ‘Innovate and Normalize’

localid and locallyuniqueidentifier

ToolTool

ToolToolTool

ToolTool

OAIRecords

ToolUser 1

2n

User portals

Team-awarePortlets

CHEF

Web Services

Standard CHEF services(e.g., Discussions, Schedule)Added Value: Saving/retrieving query/response setsIn team context

OKI APIs• Retrieving• Saving• New Search

DLXS

DLXS Middleware

OAIsterTopical

Data Sets

• Transformation• Indexing• Filtering

OKIDR

• Query• Response

Team aware portlets includeStandard CHEF tools plusSearch (with search tracking)

NSDL OAIster/CHEF Proposal

Current CHEF EnvironmentCHEF Uses Jetspeed as its tool coordination framework, velocity as its presentation language, Portlet for its tool specification, and Turbine for its service broker. There is a wide range of underlying services including OKI, CHEF, and Grid Services.

CHEF/Jetspeed also supports “simple” integration of tools using an i-frame which are not portlet-based.

A CHEF Application

TurbineJetspeed

CHEF

OKI

Grid

Portlet

Portlet

Portlet

Velocity

XML/XSLT

HTML

PERL, JSP, etc

Ideally, all of these interfaces would not be based on a particular product (Jetspeed, uPortal, WebSphere, etc) but instead would be based on a standard which was supported across products. Then we could share components.

Standards Efforts• The full suite of standards is several years out

– Some need our input now• OKI – we are working in this space• WSRP – Support WSDL (i.e. pre-presentation data) instead

of HTML (post-presentation)• JSR-168 and WSIA – Service lifecycle, brokering, discovery

• We need to start a collaborative effort to bring order to this problem space– CHEF has one useful architecture to provide transition

• In both the Educational and Research support areas• As standards evolve, we can quickly test and deploy them• Becoming “Jetspeed agnostic” by abstracting APIs

• If we can work together to solve the standards problems, organizations can maintain their existing portals and add support for these standards, upgrading as they go.

Cross-Portal Development • IMS at data level• OKI at services level• Building channel adapters for

Jetspeed<->uPortal• WSRP++ and display level

‘standards’ and best practices– Setting up meeting with uPortal, CHEF,

IU portal, Stellar MIT developers to discuss, figure out next steps

Goal is, always, interoperable components

•Navigo project Michigan,MIT,Stanford,Indiana•Goal is real tool, module interoperability•On the way to standards

Component Interoperability

Research, Teaching and Public Service

• Alliance for Community Technology• African AIDs Project• AIHEC – American Indian Higher Education

Consortium

How do open source, collaborative efforts contribute to and help us understand the new information dynamics in all our domains of interest?

CHEF Project Site

http://chefproject.org

stop

hardin@umich.edu