One of the beauties of Mahara is that the menu options are laid out very simply. After clicking through the menu options a few times you will find that you instinctively know where the option that you are looking for is located.
It is important to realize that Mahara is an Open Source software and can be easily personalized and themed. This means you are able to change the visual layout of Mahara — the header section can be configured to have a different logo, layout can be altered, and font size/color can be adjusted (among other things). Theming doesn't affect Mahara content, it affects only the way it looks. For example, the theme for the site http://maharaforbeginners.tdm.info is an adaptation of the Default theme, which is the theme you will begin with:
Let's now explore the Mahara user interface so that you can get used to finding your way around.
The main menu is the first place to look when navigating around your Mahara. That is because it appears on every page that you visit and contains options for linking to all the important sections of your portfolio. You should see it towards the top of the page in your Mahara and it will look a bit like this:
As you can see, this menu is very simple. It only has four options, each one representing a different area of your portfolio. You will be looking at each of the sections of the main menu in detail, as you go through this book. Let's get a quick idea of where each button takes you:
- Dashboard: Clicking here takes you to your dashboard page — a customizable home page for your portfolio.
- Content: This is where you can create and collect the content for your portfolio including files, journals, and profile information. This is essentially your own private storage space (or closed cupboard/locker).
- Portfolio: This is where you put your content together into pages and collections of pages, which you might later choose to showcase to others. Pages are essentially web pages and collections are essentially websites. In this section, you are also able to share and export your portfolio.
- Groups: This area contains all the social aspects of Mahara. You can join groups, access forums, and get in contact with other Mahara users in this section.
Each of the menu items discussed in the preceding list, with the exception of the Dashboard, has its own menu associated with it. These are what we call submenus. Submenus are found below the main menu. The following screenshot shows the submenu for the Content section:
Tip
Drop-down menus
Mahara has introduced a drop-down menu feature, which shows the submenus as drop-down menus when you hover over a main menu item. It may be that your version of Mahara has this feature enabled, so don't be put off if yours doesn't act as we've described here. If drop-down menus aren't enabled for you, why not talk to the Mahara admin and ask them to allow it!
Side blocks are another important navigational tools. In a standard theme, they appear on the right-hand side of the screen. Side blocks contain quick links to sections of your portfolio, offering you rapid access to certain areas of your portfolio such as groups. In the side blocks, there are some links to areas that can't be accessed through the main navigation menus, such as tags. You can use the main side block to link to your personal profile (by clicking on your profile picture):
There are side blocks that display useful information such as the Online users block, which shows the users of the site who have been online within a certain time period. By default, this is 10 minutes:
The footer is located at the bottom of the Mahara site and contains links to Privacy Statement, the About page (which tells you a bit about Mahara), and the Contact Us page (which allows you to get in contact with the site administrator). Mahara provides templates for some of these pages, but your site administrator should have adapted them to your own organizational requirements. There will also be an image linking to www.mahara.org. There may also be a Terms and Conditions link, if they have been set. Here is what the footer could look like:
