7.1 Logical Structure of a Portal
The portal uses a tree like hierarchical structure, where the root o tree is called Content Root. Nodes in this hierarchy belong to one of the following types:
Pages
Labels,
URLs,
Pages: the basic building block used for displaying content in the form of portlets. Page nodes may contain other nodes, including other pages.
Labels: a placeholder for pages. Labels may contain other nodes, but display no content, and are used to provide logical grouping of nodes which are used to define common attributes such as access permissions.
URLs: used to access any resource that can be addressed with a URL. URLs obviously do not contain any other nodes. URLs are useful for addressing external Web sites or another part of the portal.
7.2 Browsing through the Content Hierarchy
7.2.1 The Manage Pages window allows you to browse through the content hierarchy. On the right-hand side of the current node name are some buttons:
Editing page properties
Editing page layout (only for page nodes)
Controlling access permissions
Deleting the node
7.2.2 Page Inheritance with Shared Pages
When content of a new page is based on another page, the new page is essentially the aggregation of the existing page with a new specialized layer on top of latter. This implies that a prerequisite for accessing a page using a shared page is that both the page and the shared page must be accessible by the user. Shared pages essentially implement a form of inheritance. A page based on a shared page inherits the layout and content of latter.
An important characteristic of share pages is that any changes made to the share page are reflected on all the pages referencing it. A shared page can reference another shared page, thus creating a chain of page references.
7.2.3 Advanced Layout Editing
WebSphere Portal allows six different page basic layouts. Click the Configure button in top-right corner of the window, we can check the box reading Show Toggle Link for Show Layout Tools/Hide Layout Tools. Once do this, the six layout patterns are no longer visible and you may customize your layout by adding as many container as you want. For each column container you may set its width, as well as add row containers within it.
7.2.4 Locks
The Locks tab allows the administrator to limit the flexibility of a user in editing the page layout and content. Locking the container prevents users from removing this container from a page, whereas locking the container content prevents users from adding or removing portlets and sub containers from the container. Lock are applicable to shared pages, and allow top-level administrators in cascading portals to define content that is mandatory in a page. Of course, you can un-lock containers.