Course Site Creation Tutorial

Owned by Scott Amerson
Last updated: Jan 30, 2007 by Corey Owens (Unlicensed)Version comment

Creating a course site in Sakai (SmartSite instance)

This is a summary of the steps needed to create a course site in Sakai. Course sites can be created using the Worksite Setup or Sites tool. Sites tool is only available for admins.
The Worksite setup tool method is the only one discussed, because this is the process that admins should be using to create course sites if needed. The Sites tool can be further used to update site information once the initial course site is created, if need be. One can follow the same process described in creating Project sites, using the Sites tool described in the Project Site Creation Tutorial.

Logging into SmartSite

  1. Log into SmartSite at the following URL: https://sakai2.ucdavis.edu:8443/portal/xlogin
  2. Enter "user id" as "sitemaker" along with the password.

Creating "Skeleton course site"

Method Using Worksite setup tool in Sakai

  1. Click on the "Worksite setup" item in the left hand navigation area Note: This is only available on your "My Workspace" tab
  2. Select "New" link in the center, top of the page
  3. Fill in the information for the site. Some examples are:
  • Type: course website
    --Academic Term: Summer 2006. We need to handle this better, in that the term will appear when the user selects the Site Info tool. We need to sync the properties data with Banner at some point, and Sakai 2.2 handles this properly with the site manage tool.
  • Title: BIS 001A 001 (appears in the tab)
    --Note, this will create a site with the format "SUBJ COURSEID SECTION". Based on what academic term was selected previously, the tab will show a Quarter that is not synced up directly with what will be used in the batch provisioning process at a later date. The batch process uses the format SUBJ COURSEID SECTION TERMABBREV TERMYR
  • Roster: Choose I want to give access to a roster not listed above
  • Authorizer's name: account that authorizes this site to be created. E.g. sitemaker
  • Short Description: some short description of the course
  • Description: some description of the course
  • Appearance(icon): default
  • Contact, Contact email information
  • Tool Set: Email Archive, etc. Whatever tools you want to have in site. Is there a default set?
  • Publish site?: yes
  • Role to assign to joiners: (e.g. Student, Instructor, etc.) Course sites will have default of "Student" role assigned.
  • Select "Request site" upon confirmation of details.
    Site is then created for you.

Adding tools to the site

  1. Default tools to use are:

Making your site joinable

  1. By default, site members can only access your site if you explicitly add them as members.
  • "Can be joined by anyone with authorization to log in" allows you to assign a role to members that you allow to add themselves to your site.

Adding members to site

What you need in advance:

List of kerberos names that you are adding to the site. If you don't have a list of kerberos logins, you can convert their UC Davis email address into their associated login IDs using this tool: Bulk Email to ID Converter

  1. Log in as the Sakai account that created the above site (if already still as this user, go to next step)
  2. Select "Worksite Setup" from left hand menu item
  3. Select the site you want to add members to, and click the "Revise" link at center, top of screen
  4. Select the "Add Participants" link at center,top of page
  5. When given the textarea to add participants, add the given kerberos names with a hard enter after each name
  6. Check to see if the kerberos names were added correctly. If any of the names have a "UCD: " in front of them, then they are incorrect. You probably entered the first part of their email address. They should be listed in the "roster" of the site
  7. Define whether or not you want to give roles to the members independently, or as a group. For example, if I wanted to add 5 members as all having access I can give all members the access role at once.
  8. Give appropriate members their respective roles in the site, and check the member list.
  9. Save the site
  10. Exit site
    **See attachment screenshot of Update Site Participants for more information.

Fixing Message Center permissions

The permissions are blank on newly created sites. This must be fixed by clicking "Return to Sites List" (if you are still in the "Worksite Setup" area and revising a site.

  1. You may have to type in part of the name of the site to bring it up on the current page
  2. Click on the site name you created
  3. Click Message Center (left hand side)
  4. Click Template Settings
  5. Click the Revise button
  6. Click the arrow next to Permissions to expand them
  7. Permissions are as follows:
  • Student: Contributor
  • Instructor: Owner
  • Teaching Assistant: Author

Adding site to list for programmers (Automatically pulling rosters from Banner)

  1. Go to the following URL: