Grouper Developers Forum

["Jessica Bibbee" <>]

Grouper Working Group Meeting
March 21, 2007

*Attendees*
Blair Christensen, U. Chicago
Gary Brown, U. Bristol
Dave Donnelly, Stanford. U.
Kathryn Huxtable, U. Kansas
Chris Hyzer, Penn State U.
Bill Kasenchar, Penn State
Ann West, EDUCAUSE/Internet2
Steve Olshansky, Internet2
Jessica Bibbee, Internet2 (scribe)

New *Action Items*
[AI] {Blair} will tally a list of remaining ToDos for the next release of Grouper.

Carry-Over *Action Items*
[AI] {Blair} will send a link to a document describing the Shibboleth extension framework.
[AI] {Kathryn} will look at source adapter implementations from classes, for the Subject API.
[AI] {Kathryn} will email the list with a proposal about giving class structure differences, and why a more inclusive product would be more useful than a provisioning connector that only works for LDAP.
[AI] {Joy} will share a write-up of a Cornell use case for the provisioning connector regarding the preservation of security for a query for group attributes. (9-Nov-06)

*Agenda*
1. Update on shib-like extension framework - Blair
2. Misc. comments on using hibernate
3. Report on UI v1.2 ToDos - Gary
4. Lessons to be learned from recent grouper-users posts - Gary
5. Upcoming events: Spring 2007 Internet2 Member Meeting

*Discussion*
Following up on an action item, {Kathryn} has had some discussion with {Tom, Blair, Lynn, and Dave} regarding source adapter implementations from classes for the Subject API. She plans to clarify the result of their discussions and feed it back to the Working Group.

{Kathryn} has also provided a descriptive example showing how prepared statements are done, and it is available from CVS under the v0.3 tag of the Subject API. The test case is not there yet.

{Kathryn and Dave} spoke offline regarding the possible use of Velocity, though they both agreed that it might be overkill for the extent of the project.

-Shib-like extension Framework-
{Blair} did not have any updates to share with the Group on the shib-like extension framework.

-Hibernate-
While there are no plans to do away with the use of Hibernate, there are plans to change how it is used. {Dave} asked if there were plans to switch to Hibernate v3.2, and {Blair} said that the full switch will not happen until the next release of Grouper v1.2. This lead to a question of the potential release date, which is still not defined. A few delays have meant that a hopeful release before the Spring Internet2 Member Meeting is likely not to materialize by that time. [AI] Blair will tally a list of remaining ToDos for the next

-UI v1.2 ToDos-
{Gary} emailed the Group with a set of screenshots of his latest work on the UI features for v1.2: <http://portal.bris.ac.uk/grouper-ui-docs/Grouper-ui-1.2/one-two.html> (c.f. email 21-Mar-07). A brief summary taken from the screenshots offers:
     - implemented advanced search stems
     - advanced search groups form now includes group type
     - sorting implemented – Group seasrch
     - takes account of attribute displayed - displayExtension
     - …and displayName
     - sorting also works when browsing
     - …including 'flat' mode
     - more control over which attributes are displayed when – media.properties
     - added ability to import and export members from / to flat files in various formats
     - importing first
     - resulting in…
     - similarly, for exporting – comma separated
     - export to excel
     - import configuration
     - export configuration

These items have been checked in to CVS and ought to work with v1.0.1, though {Gary} has not yet tried that.

-Lessons to be learned from recent grouper-users posts-
{Gary} shared a few thoughts stemming from discussion on the Grouper-user mailing list. Some of the issues that people are having are quite basic, such as the database appearing to not run, due to the schema not being installed. Many posts to the lists could be extracted into a technical FAQ for general use. He is thinking about a utility that could offer a simpler output of data. Many would find it helpful to have a diagnostics pages with user-friendly messages.

A few bugs have surfaced through user testing, which though is helpful, is not ideal. {Blair} has unit tests for the API, but there are no such tests for the UI currently.

-Upcoming Events-
The Spring 2007 Internet2 Member Meeting will take place in Arlington, VA over April 23-25. There will be a Grouper/Signet combined Working Group meeting on Monday the 23^rd; refer to the abstract <http://events.internet2.edu/2007/spring-mm/sessionDetails.cfm?session=3217&event=267>. Early Bird registration ends on March 30; see the Meeting Program for more information <http://events.internet2.edu/2007/spring-mm/>.

The next Grouper Working Group call will be on April 4, 2007 at 12pm EDT.

-- 
Jessica Bibbee, Technical Analyst
Internet2

mobile: +1-734-255-6644

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