Provider-specific Properties

In the display profile, properties contain configuration information for the provider and the provider’s channels. A provider can define any number of specific properties. See Properties in Display Profile and the Sun Java System Portal Server 7.1 Technical Reference for more information.

Also, a provider can have more than one properties file, which is actually a Java resource bundle file that enables localization of on-screen images or text. See Properties in Resource bundle for more information.

Properties in Display Profile

The display profile document defines a Provider. The definition of a Provider associates the Provider with the class file that implements its behavior. A Provider definition includes a number of properties, mandatory and provider-specific.

Provider specific properties are defined in the display profile. Provider specific properties are defined in the display profile within the <Properties></Properties> tag for the provider. The following is the structure of the properties in the display profile:

<Properties>
	<Collection>
		...subset of property definitions
	</Collection>
		<Integer>...</Integer>
		<String>...</String>
		<Boolean>...</Boolean>
</Properties>

Typically, the custom provider will not modify the required properties. When properties are updated, they are set in the user’s display profile by the administrator via the administration console. However, values can only be set on existing properties.

If the provider class does not extend the ProfileProviderAdapter and implements the Provider interface, then the get*Property() methods cannot be used directly, and the display profile properties are not accessible. If the provider class implements the Provider interface directly, then no properties are required. Properties must be hardcoded return values or can come from another source such as a database. However, some provider properties are required if the provider implementation extends ProviderAdapter or ProfileProviderAdapter.

The following is a list of the mandatory properties for a provider. The mandatory properties described below are for a provider extending the ProviderAdapter or the ProfileProviderAdapter classes. If you are implementing the Provider interface directly, you can avoid the use of the display profile and the required properties outlined below.

title

Title of the Provider

description

Description of the Provider

refreshTime

Time interval for cached content

isEditable

Can the Provider be edited

editType

Type of edit form to use

width

Width of the Provider

helpURL

URL of a help page for this Provider

See Technical Reference Guide for detailed information on the Display Profile properties.

Channel definitions that use a provider can overwrite the properties of that provider. At runtime, channel property values can be affected by the display profile merge process. See Technical Reference Guide for detailed information on the display profile merge process.

Properties in Resource bundle

Strings defined in the provider’s resource bundle properties file are displayed on the user’s Desktop and they are not the channel’s properties (such as the channel title). Strings are defined in the resource bundle to enable localization.

Typically, resource bundle includes properties that do not need to be customized by the administrator or the end-user. For example, properties that need to be localized, are read-only at runtime, and properties that do not change per channel should be included in a resource bundle. Properties that need to be localized, are settable, and properties that change per channel should be in the display profile.

By default, a provider’s resource bundle properties file is stored in PortalServer-base/web-src/WEB-INF/classes directory. Note that you can change the file here, but you must re-deploy the portal web application for the changes to take effect.

Resource bundles that are needed by the custom providers should be copied into the provider class base directory (see Provider Class File for more information.) Resource bundles should be placed as individual files and cannot exist inside the JAR file under the provider class base directory.

Resource bundles are given a base name that equals to the name of the display profile provider definition that they are associated with. Typically, this is the class name of the Java class file that implements the provider.

To get the name of the resource bundle in your custom provider, call ProviderContext.getProviderName(). This value can then be used as the baseName argument to ResourceBundle.getBundle(). If you are extending ProviderAdapter, simply call getResourceBundle().