Quick Start Guide for Faculty and Other Site Owners
What Sakai does
Sakai is a system for collaboration. It can be used for courses, research projects, student clubs, or any other group that has information that they want to share, and that wants to use communications tools such as mailing lists, chats, and discussions.
Sakai is organized into sites. A site is a collection of information and communications tools intended for a specific set of people. Sites are often used for courses or sections of courses, for departments, or for project teams.
Any user with a NetID can create a site. In the process of creating a site, you need to think about two things:
- Who will use the site? You can add members yourself, allow members to join, or specify that everyone enrolled in a course is automatically put into the site.
- What information and tools will be available on the site. You can place documents, spreadsheets, etc. in the site, and allow other site members to do so as well. You can make specific documents or whole folders public or limit access to site members. You can add tools such as discussion groups, mailing lists, and chat rooms.
When users login, they will see a tab near the top of the screen for each site in which they are a member. That will allow them to move between sites easily.
Setting up a site
- Login if you aren't already
- Choose the "My Workspace" tab at the top.
- Choose "Worksite Setup" in the left margin.
- Click "New" at the top of the frame. (It's not as obvious as it might be.)
- Choose "Course" or "Project". Normally you should use "Course" if the site is associated with a course. You will have access to your class roster and a few tools intended for courses. "Project" sites can be used for anything else.
- Choose a "Title". Members will see this as the name of the tab for this site, so choose a name that your members will recognize. The Title is automatically created for Course sites. Other information on that screen is optional.
- For course sites,you will see a list of your courses. You can choose one or more to add to the site. Students in those sections will automatically be put in your site.
- Choose what "Tools" should be on your site. We suggest starting with "Home", "Announcements", "Resources", and "Site Info", although you should feel free to experiment with other tools.
- Choosing "publish site" makes your site available to other users.
- You will need to click "Create site" on the last page to confirm that you want your site to be created. Until you do this, nothing actually happens.
Managing Users
There should now be an item, "Site Info", in the left margin. Choose it.
In Site Info you'll see a list of your site members in the middle and bottom of the page. You can add members using the "Add Participants" buttom at the top of the frame.
If you are adding a Rutgers faculty, staff or student, please use the first section, NetID. If you don't know an individual's NetID, use the "Lookup Rutgers User" button.
The second section allows you to add guests with their email address. Sakai will send them email that leads them through the process of setting up a guest account. They will login to Sakai using their email address as a username.
Do not use the guest process for Rutgers faculty, staff and students. They will probably not be able to find your site if you do this.
Managing Tools
Once a site has been created, you can add and remove tools from it using the "Site Info" tool in the left bar.
Click on the "Edit Tools" button at the top of the window. You can add or remove checks to add or delete tools. You will need to click "Continue" and then "Finish" for those changes to take effect.
For more information, please refer to the Rutgers Help pages or the Sakai Help pages.