Grouper Developers Forum

["Jessica Bibbee" <>]

Grouper Working Group Meeting
Monday, December 13, 2006

*Attendees*
Tom Barton, U. Chicago (chair, Grouper)
Blair Christensen, U. Chicago
Gary Brown, U Bristol
R. L. "Bob" Morgan, U. Washington
Brendan Bellina, USC
Ann West, EDUCAUSE/Internet2
Renee Frost, Internet2
Steve Olshansky, Internet2
Jessica Bibbee, Internet2 (scribe)

*Action Items*
[AI] {Blair} will begin profiling the API to for performance issues, based on {Shilen's} recent thread on the grouper-user list.

Carry-Over *Action Items*
[AI] {Lynn and Dave} will schedule a call for further discussion of Hibernate with {Albert, Tom B., Blair Christensen, and Michael Douglas (RPI; Bedework). (4-Dec-06)

[AI] {Joy} will share a write-up of a Cornell use case for the provisioning connector regarding the preservation of a query for group attributes. (9-Nov-06)

[AI] {Blair} will share his testing results with the Working Group. (6-Sep-06)
[AI] {Stephen L. and Blair} will speak offline regarding the development of additional interfaces. (6-Sep-06)
[AI] {Stephen L.} will pass along a link to their CVS for a model similar to the Grouper object model, including use cases and code. (6-Sep-06)
[AI] {SteveO} will work with {Tom} to create higher-level screenshots. (12-Jul-06)

*Agenda*

1. I2 meeting debrief
2. Sig-Gro LDAP Connector news
3. Any issues to address stemming from Shilen Patel's message to grouper-users?

*Discussion*
{Tom} reviewed the Hibernate discussion from the 3-December Signet/Grouper Bof at the Fall Internet2 Member Meeting. The Group had raised issues with Hibernate and other potential alternatives. The newer version of Hibernate may address some of the current challenges with using Hibernate.

The Group also discussed uPortal and other potential integration contexts. {Blair} discussed a private development plan that would simplify things with smaller and more maintainable code to be used with Hibernate. Hooks for extending API functionality could be used with both Springs or Hibernate. Jabber was also discussed as another integration topic. {Tom} asked whether it was amenable to expose the full range of UI functions through a portlet, due to its complexity. {Gary} suggested it could be done, but the benefits would have to be weighed against doing so.

{Tom} hinted that the v1.0 LDAP Provisioning Connector might be available as soon as January 5^th, complete with the usual documentation, javadocs, install documents, and configs. The use of 3^rd party libraries has been worked out, such that it will be in common to Signet/Grouper.

{Bob} asked about how the Provisioning Connector will be invoked – by script or event? A script will be used to pull the java class, as it is not set up for notification, which event-based operations need. It will periodically need to check for updates as well.

A recent thread on the <grouper-users> mailing list came from Shilen Patel at Duke U., who shared several performance issues after installing Grouper v1.1. {Gary} suggested that with so many groups (20K +), significant personalization cannot be avoided, via a plugin or other modification. There is additional testing and profiling that needs to be done. [AI] {Blair} will begin profiling the API to see which areas can be easily improved, based on {Shilen's} recent thread on the grouper-user list.

Due to the holidays, the following Grouper Working Group call will be cancelled.  Please join us for the next Grouper Working Group call on January 10, 2007 at 12pm EST.

-- 
Jessica Bibbee, Technical Analyst
Internet2

mobile: +1-734-255-6644

Wishing you an inspired and innovative 2007.
http://www.internet2.edu/greetings/newyears2007/