My Site refers to the personalized web space made available to you through the CMU Portal. This help guide overviews the layout and functionality your personal My Site has to offer. Additional help guides that address My Site's many advanced feature will be continually added to the Portal web site.

How to get to My Site

To access your personalized My Site from within the CMU Portal, two links are made available. These links can be found in the following locations:

1) The upper-right corner of the CMU Portal screen [Figure 1].

2) The Portal’s side navigation [Figure 1].

My Site Features

The first time you click a "My Site" link, your personal My Site web space is created for you automatically. A few noteworthy features of My Site include:

• 10 MB of storage space for documents (to be increased in the near future)
• Accessibility 24 hours a day, 7 days a week
• Availability across campus as well as off-campus
• A customizable interface
• A private view for personal use
• A public view for sharing information with users throughout the CMU community
• A collaborative environment for receiving and sharing information and documents

In viewing your My Site space, you will notice it resembles the look and feel of the CMU Portal. While certain items are automatically provided for you, you do have freedom with regard to what content displays and how it displays.

Web Parts

The items displayed on your screen are referred to as "Web Parts" [Figure 2: See arrows labeled "Web Part"]. Of these items, three are considered permanent: CMU News for You, CMU Links for You, and My Alerts Summary. My Links Summary is a removable web part but offers great value when utilized. The special purpose each web part serves is as follows:

• CMU News for You reflects the same information displayed under the News and Announcements section of the CMU Portal home page.
• CMU Links for You displays links to vital information pushed to you from CMU entities across campus.
• My Links Summary is completely controlled by you and displays links to information you have supplied. These links can be shared with other users or reserved for personal use only.
• My Alerts Summary displays alerts from different sections of the portal from which you have requested to receive alerts.

NOTE: These are the four web parts currently provided to you by default. Additional web parts are available.

Moving Web Parts

While some web parts (or sections) are considered permanent features, you do have the ability to control their layout and reserve the right to move them to different areas on your screen. To do this, follow the instructions outlined below:

• Click the Modify My Page link located in the upper right-hand corner of the text area [Figure 2: See arrow labeled "Modify Page"].

• Select Design this Page from the menu that appears [Figure 3: See arrow labeled "Design View"].
• Selecting this option will outline the content of your web page into zones [Figure 4: Zone areas are circled]. You may drag any web part currently displayed on your page to a different zone. In Figure 4 (shown below), the My Alerts Summary web part was dragged from the Middle Right Zone and dropped into the Bottom Zone.
• To return to the normal view of your web page, click Modify My Page and select the Design this Page option again [Figure 3: See arrow labeled "Design View"].

Select View

The Select View section, located in the lower part of the left-hand navigation area, indicates whether you are viewing the public or private version of your My Site [Figure 5]. By default, you are viewing the private version when you click a "My Site" link from within the CMU Portal. Everything we've considered in this tutorial so far has been performed in private view.

Public View

The public view allows you to share information and collaborate with other portal users in the CMU community. To view how your My Site would display, click the public option. A screen will appear similar to what is shown in Figure 6.

Shared Links. The Shared Links section allows you to share links to information with other users [Figure 6: See arrow labeled "Share Links"]. You can designate this section to reflect links also displayed in the My Links Summary web part shown in the private view of your My Site [Figure 3: See the My Links Summary web part]. If you have designated a link as "shared," it will display both in the private and public views of your My Site. This functionality will be covered more in depth in supplemental help tutorials.

Recent Documents. The Recent Documents section allows you to share word documents, PDF's, images, and other files with Portal users [Figure 6: See arrow labeled "Shared Files"]. Documents you have uploaded to your My Site and designated as "shared" will display in this section. This functionality will be covered more in depth in supplemental help tutorials as well.

Profile. A major portion of your My Site home page is dedicated to your profile information [Figure 6: See arrow labeled "Your Profile"]. If you are a student, this title will be displayed along with your current class designation (freshman, sophomore, etc). If you are a faculty or staff member, your current title and department or office will appear. The area beneath this is reserved for an "About Me" section which you have the ability to modify. The "Details" section allows you to display contact information should you wish others to have access to view this.

To edit your profile information, click the Edit Profile link located under the Select View section in the Portal's left-hand navigation area [Figure 7: See arrow labeled "Edit Profile Info"].

Conclusion

This concludes the introductory overview of your personal My Site space. For more detailed information, please visit the Resource link located in the top navigation of the main CMU Portal. The How-To section will continually be updated with new information and how-to guides in helping you utilize the features made available through the CMU Portal.

To leave My Site and return to the CMU Portal, click the link labeled Up To Central Michigan University Portal. This link is located just above the search box on the right side of the My Site screen [Figure 6].