Creating page collections from tags

[shanen]

Mahara 1.7+

The process of creating and managing collection of pages is somewhat complicated - and puts limits on real world requirements by the fact that pages can only be added to one collection.

Could the collection system be extended to allow the creation of collections based on one or more tags?

We can already add tags to pages so we are half way along this path. The ability to create a collection tagged with "Professional Development Activity" and "Professional Development and Review" and "2013" would be very powerful - especially since any other pages I create and tag in this way will "just appear" in that collection without any further action.

The ability to re-order would be important, in fact the existing collection workflow could remain largely unchanged - it's just that there would be an alternative to individually adding pages called "Add pages by tag". The user may have to come back to this screen to re-order pages that are added over time.

Cheers.
Shane.

[shanen (shane-nuessler-canberra)]

This wishlist item would incorporate the other wishlist item that a page can be in more than one collection. Cheers.

[Kristina Hoeppner (kris-hoeppner)]

Shane's comment refers to bug #1208313.

Hi Shane,

Thanks also for this wishlist item. While we we investigating the possibility to add one page to multiple collections and making a page available without sharing the entire collection for Mahara 1.8, we realized that these two scenarios are extremely difficult, and that it would be better to take a fresh look at the entire collections feature and go back to the drawing board / rethink multi-page views. Therefore, there won't be changes to collections in that regard for 1.8.

I'll tag this item "collections" so we can find again when we get the chance to rethink this feature.

Cheers
Kristina

[shanen (shane-nuessler-canberra)]

Thanks Kristina,
I'm working on a research proposal with colleagues around using Mahara with standards frameworks, tagging of evidence, reporting, etc. I'll provide more detail a bit later on, but we have thought of CatalystNZ being a partner. Our project would seek funding and some of that would go toward mahara development. I'd like to give more detail as we have an exciting idea, but will have to wait till we have something on paper fully.
Cheers,
Shane.

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----- Original Message -----
From: Kristina Hoeppner <email address hidden>
To: "Shane.Nuessler" <email address hidden>
Sent: 2013/08/21 13:11
Subject: [Bug 1208312] Re: Creating page collections from tags

Shane's comment refers to bug #1208313.

Hi Shane,

Thanks also for this wishlist item. While we we investigating the
possibility to add one page to multiple collections and making a page
available without sharing the entire collection for Mahara 1.8, we
realized that these two scenarios are extremely difficult, and that it
would be better to take a fresh look at the entire collections feature
and go back to the drawing board / rethink multi-page views. Therefore,
there won't be changes to collections in that regard for 1.8.

I'll tag this item "collections" so we can find again when we get the
chance to rethink this feature.

Cheers
Kristina

** Summary changed:

- Wishlist: Creating page collections from tags
+ Creating page collections from tags

** Tags added: collections

--
You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to the bug
report.
https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1208312

Title:
  Creating page collections from tags

Status in Mahara ePortfolio:
  New

Bug description:
  Mahara 1.7+

  The process of creating and managing collection of pages is somewhat
  complicated - and puts limits on real world requirements by the fact
  that pages can only be added to one collection.

  Could the collection system be extended to allow the creation of
  collections based on one or more tags?

  We can already add tags to pages so we are half way along this path.
  The ability to create a collection tagged with "Professional
  Development Activity" and "Professional Development and Review" and
  "2013" would be very powerful - especially since any other pages I
  create and tag in this way will "just appear" in that collection
  without any further action.

  The ability to re-order would be important, in fact the existing
  collection workflow could remain largely unchanged - it's just that
  there would be an alternative to individually adding pages called "Add
  pages by tag". The user may have to come back to this screen to re-
  order pages that are added over time.

  Cheers.
  Shane.

To manage notifications about this bug go to:
https://bugs.launchpad.net/mahara/+bug/1208312/+subscriptions

[Kristina Hoeppner (kris-hoeppner)]

Thank you very much, Shane. That sounds fantastic and we'd love to be involved.

Cheers
Kristina

[Aaron Wells (u-aaronw)]

To add an implementation note here, the way "Collections" were implemented in Mahara was sort of an after-thought, and that's the reason why each View can only belong to a single Collection.

Basically, the problem is access control. We don't store an access control record for the Collection itself; instead, we just sync up all the Views in the Collection so that they have the exact same access control settings.

I took a stab at refactoring this to keep separate access control records for Collections (with an eye that, perhaps, we could expand access control to other things as well, like individual Artefacts). But the access control code is all over the place in Mahara, and there turned out to be several weird little corner cases involving the permissions page; and basically it wound up needing an enormous and widespread code change to implement the relatively modest benefit of being able to put a Page into multiple Collections. :(

So, we decided at the moment it would be more beneficial to put our development resources into other areas.

I'd still like to do it, though, because logically it makes little sense that a Page can belong to only one Collection. Or perhaps what we need to do is come up with a more robust "Site" type entity for Mahara. What Collections were supposed to be, in the first place, was a way to create a multi-Page mini-website or book out of Mahara Pages.

I suppose also complicating things, is the fact that Collections are about the only way to organize and collectively manage a user's Pages. So, they sort of do double-duty as "folders" for the Page list.