Welcome to the Jetspeed-2 Tutorial with Ant and Eclipse

This Jetspeed-2 tutorial is a step-by-step set of instructions and source code for creating a custom Jetspeed-2 Portal from scratch using Ant and Eclipse.

When starting a new Jetspeed-2 portal project, we strongly recommend that you create a new portal project using the working JetExpress as a base. Do not edit the Jetspeed-2 source and resources directly.

As your project progresses, you may want to look at the Jetspeed-2 sources to answer questions or for hints on how to implement additional functionality in the Portal framework. It is not a bad idea to download them into a separate Eclipse project for ease of access.

Goal of the Tutorial

This tutorial will guide you through the steps to create your own sample portal based on a working portal called JetExpress . The goal of this tutorial is to show you how to create your own custom Jetspeed-2 portal, complete with your own set of portal pages, your company logos and text, your own set of portlet applications, and any special integration required to run your portlets inside Jetspeed-2.

We are going to use the following steps to get you started:

  • We will get the development environment setup.
  • Then, we will build and test the JetExpress as it is comes "out of the box". It is a simple portal with a very basic layout and simple "look and feel". It will support logging in and a few simple portlets.
  • Once it runs, we will show you how to alter the "look and feel" with your own logo and colour scheme.
  • Once you can change the appearance, we will show how to add portlets to a Jetspeed-2 Portal. Since Jetspeed-2 complies with the JSR-168 portlet specification, any JSR-168 portlet can be configured as part of your application.
  • We will then start 4 new portlet projects and show you how to build your own JSR-168 portlets and add them to your customized portal.
  • Once we have implemented some custom portlets we will show how Jetspeed-2 can used to provide WebServices.
  • Finally, we will discuss some of the alternatives for Servlet containers and databases. We will also introduce you to the full Jetspeed-2 documentation, the pre-built portals and the support services available.

Prerequisites

The tutorial requires the following software installed on your system:
  • Java 1.4 or higher. Java 5 is recommended.
  • Eclipse 3.2.2 or higher
  • WTP Eclipse plug-in
  • Ant 1.7.1 or higher
  • Database - The tutorial uses Derby which is included the tutorial.
  • The tutorial includes its own built-in servlet engine
Of course, you will need an internet connection to use internet-based portlets and download components.
If you are familiar with Eclipse, Ant and Java you can start work on the tutorial. Otherwise, take some time to review the pre-requisite software packages that are new to you. You might also want to take a quick look at the skills profile that this tutorial assumes.