Installing dotLRN

Last updated: $Date: 2002/05/17 17:00:21 $

Contents

Read the dotLRN FAQ
Get and Install OpenACS from development CVS
Get dotLRN from CVS
Install dotLRN on your system
Explore dotLRN
Reinstalling dotLRN

Especially important is the State of dotLRN Development section.

Get and Install OpenACS from development CVS

If you have a working OpenACS installation from the latest development CVS, skip to the next section.

If you are installing OpenACS, follow the extensive installation documenation. Stop at the point where the OpenACS installation instructions tell you to "download OpenACS". Don't use the "Quick Downloads"! Continue on with this document.

      
      cvs -d :pserver:anonymous@openacs.org:/cvsroot login
      (just hit return for the password)
      cvs -z3 -d :pserver:anonymous@openacs.org:/cvsroot checkout acs-core

CVS commandlines are given in terms of anonymous users, if you have an account on openacs.org, use your login where appropriate. Don't forget to set the CVS_RSH variable in your shell envrioment to "ssh".

dotLRN requires some more modules that are not in acs-core, but not all of the packages in the OpenACS source tree. Next are the commands to get these modules.

Here's the current list of non-core packages needed for dotlrn:

      acs-datetime 
      acs-events
      acs-interface
      acs-mail-lite
      bulk-mail
      calendar
      faq
      file-storage
      general-comments
      news
      ref-timezones
      simple-survey

Do not install or remove these packages since they conflict with dotlrn packages:

      bboard (conflicts with sloan-bboard)
      portal (conflicts with new-portal)
      spam (conflicts with bulk-mail)

cd to the newly created /openacs-4/packages directory before the next step.

      
      cvs -z3 -d :pserver:anonymous@openacs.org:/cvsroot co acs-datetime \
      acs-events acs-interface acs-mail-lite bulk-mail calendar faq file-storage \
      general-comments news ref-timezones simple-survey

Installation timesavers: If you have a full checkout of the OpenACS tree (or a nightly tarball), and are setting up a server for dotlrn use only, you can save time by removing modules not in acs-core or in the above checkout command. Also, cut down the huge (10MB!) files in /packages/ref-timezones/sql/common/ to a line or two.

You will now have an /openacs-4 directory with all of OpenACS required by dotLRN.

Get dotLRN from CVS

Getting dotLRN from CVS is just like getting OpenACS from CVS with a different CVSROOT.

Change to your /openacs-4/packages directory issue the following commands:

      cvs -d :pserver:anonymous@dotlrn.openforce.net:/dotlrn-cvsroot login
      (hit return for prompted for password)
      cvs -z3 -d :pserver:anonymous@dotlrn.openforce.net:/dotlrn-cvsroot co dotlrn-core

This will fetch the following packages to your /openacs-4/packages directory:

        dotlrn
        dotlrn-syllabus
        dotlrn-research
        new-portal
        profile-provider
        sloan-bboard
        user-profile
        bboard-portlet
        dotlrn-bboard
        bm-portlet 
        dotlrn-bm
        calendar-portlet
        dotlrn-calendar
        dotlrn-portlet
        dotlrn-dotlrn
        faq-portlet
        dotlrn-faq
        fs-portlet
        dotlrn-fs
        news-portlet
        dotlrn-news
        static-portlet
        dotlrn-static
        survey-portlet
        dotlrn-survey

Next, copy the /openacs-4 directory to where ever you prefer your webserver root to be, traditionally /web. Now you can continue with the OACS installation document at the third bullet point. Continue with the standard OACS installation process until your reach the "Congratulations!" front page, then return here.

Install dotLRN on your system

Go the the "ACS Package Manager" (APM) on your system at http://yourserver/acs-admin/apm and hit the "Install packages" link. After the installer loads, you will see a list of the dotlrn packages you just got from CVS. Install them, return to the main APM page, and restart your server.

Go to the "Site Map" on your system at http://yourserver/admin/site-map. Click the "new sub folder" link to the right of the "Main Site" link at the top of the table. Enter dotlrn in the textbox, and hit the button.

There will be a new entry in the URL column for "dotlrn" with "(none)" in the application column, to the right of this, click the "New Application" link. Enter dotlrn into the textbox and select "dotLRN" from the drop-down list and hit the button.

There will now be "dotlrn" in the application column to the right of the "dotlrn/" URL.

You must now restart your server, wait, and reload the "Site Map" page in your browser After the server restarts, refresh the "Site Map". You will see a "(+)" to the left of the dotlrn/ URL and a new URL: "portal/" with application "new-portal".

Aren't seeing the "(+)" beside dotlrn/? Something went wrong. Did you restart your server? Restart again while doing a tail -f of the error log. Unique constraint violations while creating certain site-nodes are a known issue, but any other errors should be reported to us.

One last step: Then set the "DefaultMaster" parameter of the Root ("Main site") from /www/default-master to /packages/dotlrn/www/dotlrn-default-master

Explore dotLRN

Go to dotLRN Administration at http://yourserver/dotlrn/admin. Make some dotLRN users, terms, departments, classes.

Here are some suggestions for things to check out in dotlrn:

Goto /dotlrn your "workspace". Click the "Control Panel" link at the top and try the "Customize this portal" link there. Goto the admin pages for a class or community and try the "Manage Membership" link. Create a new sugroup for a class or community. Edit or create new "Custom Portlets".

Enjoy!

Reinstalling dotLRN

Sometimes you have to dump your DB. Here's the dotLRN reinstall process.

Stop aolserver and any open sqlplus sessions
Create a drop/create user script. Lars has a swift tool to help you create one.
In a shell, type:
```
           % sqlplus internal < my-drop-create-script.sql
         
```
Verify that your database user was droped and created successfully. If you get an error saying: Cannot drop a user that is currently connected, close all open sqlplus sessions and repeat the command above.
Now would be a good time to cvs update OpenACS and dotLRN
Re-start aolserver, wait 20 seconds or so, and do the standard OpenACS installation.
Go to the Install dotLRN on your system section of this document and continue from there.