At the moment, Matrix provisioning which is based on Apache ActiveMQ has been trundling along for some time with some basic reporting. So recently I sat down with some quality coffee and some new experience of MongoDB to come up with a way of easily finding out the status of accounts. The current setup for provisioning Blackboard using ActiveMQ is shown below:

(more…)

When I’m on the move, to a conference or a meeting or something, I quite often like to do some work on the laptop which can mean writing code that talks to internal servers via the VPN. That means usernames and passwords and the possibility of the laptop being purloined by some footpad who then gets access to the internal systems. To get round this I organise my coding into different folders:

/Users/alistair/dev/matrix-blackboard/
  local
  matrix-blackboard
  matrix-blackboard-config

(more…)

You can download it from Guanxi::SP::Engine@github.

This release adds the Internet2 Embedded Discovery Service user interface (more…)

I did a test today, ahead of Mimas pulling out of Athens . I logged in to Zetoc via the Shibboleth to Athens Gateway (AthensLA) and set up  an alert list. Then I logged in to Zetoc using the  UK Federation and was my alert list there?  No! (more…)

image #1

I thought it was time I updated the cakeBlog as I was getting a bit fed up with the narrow layout and lack of widget support. So I plumped for the stardust theme and to celebrate the new look, I also knocked up a WordPress plugin to display Flickr images. There’s an example of the plugin in action on this page. You can download the plugin from here. (more…)

With the Shibboleth to Athens Gateway in production at UHI, using our Guanxi IdP, I’ve now got eBooks access working through the gateway too. (more…)

Hot on the heels of the Cuckoos, I spotted the Swallows on Skye today although I thought I saw either a swallow or a martin about a week ago

A few people have been commenting on the previous post about the Cuckoo’s arrival and today I heard the first one this year on Skye. It’s also the first fine day since the run of wild and very wet weather we’ve had since the Easter holidays.

Ah, the bane of my life, classloaders! Here’s an interesting webcast about them.