wiki templates and drop down menus

[ssterjo]

Hi everyone,
I am currently writing my Bachelor thesis and after comparing many CMSs, I found Alfresco is the best choice for use at the chair.
So my problem is:
I need to create a staff directory with enhanced profiles where each faculty member can insert his capabilities. I thought to do this with a wiki, where a list of the members is presented, each linked to other wiki pages with the respective member profiles. I need the profiles to be searchable, and since the existing profiles are basic, I think this is a good way to go. What I need though is to create a template so that members can fill according to their capabilities. The capabilities or experience also need to be based on a rating system. I mean that for every member there is a list of features, where they rate themselves on a scale how much they know about this or that subject. additionally, if possible, I would need to search for a specific capability and I need the search to return the results sorted by experience on the specific topic.
So to summarize:
wiki template with drop down lists for the ratings
searchable and sortable rating.

I hope I was clear enough and any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

PS: Worst case I can do the lists in exel or something similar, and present each profile not as a wiki but as a document, but I still would need a way to sort the ratings from the document in the alfresco search

[afaust]

Hello,

I think this could be achieved by implementing a data list for faculty members where each entry represents a member and can only edited by that member. This can be used as a way to provide a structured entry template. Via a script / rule / policy, a standardised wiki page layout can be generated. The search could be provided by a special advanced search form and a custom sort field. If you transfer the properties from the data list entry to the wiki page, this search could be configured to display only the wiki pages and ignore the data list used for authoring (which has the same values and might also match your query).

Regards
Axel

[ssterjo]

thanks Axel,
it was very helpful, I will be looking into it the next few days. Meanwhile if you could just point me to the right direction for actually implementing these in alfresco, for example the rule for the standard wiki, or the custom search, I would really appreciate it because Im completely new to Alfresco and probably dont have too much time available. Thanks again though for the very important main points.

PS: what kind and structure of the data list do you have in mind? create a contacts list with all the members, or treat every person as a separate list? or smth else? thanks a lot

[afaust]

Hello,

I would use a list with all the members and each entry has the structured data for that member.

For the custom search please have a look at the <a href="http://wiki.alfresco.com/wiki/Share_Advanced_Search">wiki article about it</a>.
For managing rules you should look at <a href="http://docs.alfresco.com/4.2/topic/com.alfresco.enterprise.doc/concepts/library-folder-rules.html">the documentation entry for managing folder rules</a>. A datalist is essentially a folder and you can manage its rules if you use the Repository view to navigate to it (unfortunately not directly accessible in the site view). For the logic I suggest starting with a JavaScript that you place in /Data Dictionary/Scripts. You can use the <a href="https://addons.alfresco.com/addons/javascript-console">JavaScript Console addon</a> to iteratively develop that script in a test environment and observe the results.

Regards
Axel

[ssterjo]

thanks Axel.
Since I don't have much time left for my thesis, I really appreciate your help. However, I think the wiki would then be unnecessary if I just use a custom data list with the required information. So I believe adding every capability as a separate field with a number value would be easily achievable, and then you can just sort the list by number to get the most expecienced members for a specific capability. In addition to the standard capabilities I will define though, I may also need to provide extra capabilities which everyone can include. can I just put this in a single fiend, such as a Notes field, and then search, just like with tags? I couldnt find anything for full text search through the data list directly, except for metadata search which finds a datalist as a node.
So, my questions: how can I easily search through data lists? how can I implement a sort field in a custom search form? How can I theoretically implement a dynamic wiki based on data lists?

PS: is it possible to include automatically-generated mindmaps according to the site content, so that I can put it in a dashlet. thanks a lot for everything