1. Introduction to Portals
Web Portals: Gateways to Information
February 2, 2001

2. What is a Portal Anyway? Generally fall into two categories :
“A Web site or service that offers a broad array of resources and services, such as , forums, search engines, and on-line shopping malls. The first Web portals were online services, such as AOL, that provided access to the Web, but by now most of the traditional search engines have transformed themselves into Web portals to attract and keep a larger audience.” - ZDWEBOPEDIA.
Generally fall into two categories :
Horizontal, also called HEPs (Horizontal Enterprize Portals) and mega-portals. General sites that attempt to provide on a single web page all the services any user might need - Examples: MyYahoo, Excite
Vertical, also called VEPs (Vertical Enterprize Portals) or Vortals. Delivers organization-specific information in a user-centric way. Examples: MyLibrary (from NCSU),pets.com
Other terms in use include ERP (Enterprize Resource Portals), EIP (Enterprize Information Portal), Affinity Portal, Corporate Portal, Knowledge Management Portal, IT Portal, Niche Portal, Industry Portal, B2B Portal...

3. Common Components of Portal Space
Gateways to Web Access, i.e. well-defined “places to start”
A “hub” from which users can locate all the web content they commonly need at a general level (Horizontal) or organizational/interest level (Vertical)
Usually support some level of personalization and/or customization
A portal is “user-centric”, while a homepage is “owner-centric”

4. Horizontal Portals Up Close: MyYahoo

5. Horizontal Portals Up Close: MyYahoo

6. Horizontal Portals Up Close: MyYahoo (what it can’t do)

7. Vertical Portals Up Close: MyAssociation
How do we both ensure and leverage our credibility is one of the key issues facing academic libraries

8. Vertical Portals Up Close: MyAssociation

9. Vertical Portals Up Close: MyAssociation

10. Portal Technologies: at a web page near you

11. The Achilles’ Heel of Portals: does Yahoo’s disadvantage work to the library’s favour?

12. Portals & Libraries: the building blocks for a social machine?
Some web pundits envision a “social machine” based on web technologies to allow citizens to fully participate in society
Portals offer a network “desktop” that can follow users everywhere
Voting is already taking place on the Internet for various organization activities, e.g. electing board representatives
Libraries have a historical and important role to play in allowing the broadest spectrum of society to take advantage of all forms of communication
Libraries are a sensible infrastructure for bridging the “digital divide”

13. Tools for Building a Portal
Commercial
Actuate, Blackboard, Epicentric, Perspecta, Plumtree, Lotus Notes/Domino, eLPHIN
Library System
iBistro (from SIRSI)
Open Source
JetSpeed (from Apache), MyLibrary, Zope
Key Question: Where will the content of the portal be created?

14. Library Examples: MyLibrary from NCSU

15. Library Examples: iBistro

16. Library Examples: iBistro

17. Library Examples: Open Online

18. Library Examples: Michigan Electronic Library

19. Library Examples: TeleEducation NB

20. Where to go for more information on Portals
- PC Magazine’s Introduction to Portals
- The “Guide to Portals”
- CREN TechTalk on Portals
- MyLibrary site
- Search for “portal”, there is a “Portal Toolkit” and information on applying it to specific organizations, including schools