Mahara

Instructions

http://mahara.infotech.monash.edu/mahara/

Mahara is an ePortfolio system. The information is this guide is a simplified set of instructions, with information
specific to the way the Mahara ePortfolio is used in FIT5120 and FIT5122. For more information about Mahara,
please visit : http://manual.mahara.org

1 Overall concept of Mahara 2
2 Authcate-based login to Mahara 2
3 The navigation “tabs” of the Mahara system 3
3.1 The Content Tab 3
3.1.1 Profile 3
3.1.2 Profile pictures 3
3.1.3 Résumé 3
3.2 Portfolio 3
3.2.1 Pages 3
3.2.2 Export & Import 5
3.3 Groups 5
3.3.1 Create groups 5
3.3.2 Invite group members 6
3.3.3 Manage group page 7
3.3.4 Configure group sharing page option 7
3.3.5 Group file management 8
4 Creating and sharing your reflective diary 10
5 Generate secret URL from Group Page 14
1 Overall concept of Mahara System

The overall concept of the Mahara System is shown in the following figure. Mahara allows students to create a
portfolio of artefacts, these are linked and presented in pages to different audiences (Groups). This guide will
provide an overview of how to create artefacts, pages groups.















2 Authcate-based login to Mahara

Access to Mahara is via login using Authcate credentials. You go to the URL
http://mahara.infotech.monash.edu/mahara/.

From there – you don’t type your login detail to the login form that appears! (Don’t ask why – it’s just the way the
system has been set up). To login click the button labelled SSO, , then another login form appears, that’s the
one to use. Type your authcate username and password into the appropriate fields and you will then be able to
access the system.
Note, the loading of authcate details into the Mahara system is a manual process. The lecturers provide a class list
to the system administrator who uses that to provide access. If you enrolled late, or there was some issue with
your enrolment access might not have been granted. If you have trouble accessing the system, let your lecturer
know and they will check with the administrator of the system.

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3 The navigation “tabs” of the Mahara system

When you access the Mahara system you will see a set of Tabs labelled: Dashboard, Content, Portfolio and Groups.

Dashboard A place to see your latest changes of the pages, friend requests, inbox, and quick links to
navigate to your Groups.

Content A place to manage your own stuff (artefacts and these can be anything – photos, videos,
word documents and so on), for more information, you can check under section:

Portfolio A place to manage your pages, where you can share and edit your own personal pages.

Groups A place to manage your Team, you can join Groups or create Groups by yourself.

Most of the tabs are self-explanatory, to view descriptions of each section, press the button near the title.
This sections that follow will provide instructions of functionalities that are crucial to daily activities.

3.1 The Content Tab
Content tab contains artefacts that can be used when creating pages.

3.1.1 Profile
Manage your personal information that is going to be displayed to the public.
*Note: When you navigate to Profile => About me, please make sure your first name, last name and student ID is
the same with your student card. Please also make sure your contact information (Email, Mobile phone) is correct
under Profile => Contact information.

3.1.2 Profile Pictures
Please upload a recent face picture by clicking on the default Profile Photo.

3.1.3 Résumé
This is your C.V. - the section where you document your study and working experience for potential future
employers. Resume is one of the artefacts that will become one of the options to select when create/edit pages.


3.2 The Portfolio Tab

3.2.1 Pages
A page contains a selection of artefacts which you arrange and present to others, it enables you to present your
résumé details, reflective diaries, video and audio, uploaded document files, etc.
Page section contains 2 pages by default – Dashboard page and Profile page. Dashboard page is the welcome page

When creating a page, you can configure 4 different aspects – title and description, layout, content, sharing. By
default, you will be in “Edit content”.

The default layout for a page is the third column (see below, Figure.1) side by side. Please choose the “best” layout

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depending on the purpose and your audience.

Figure 1 - Default Page Layout

When you want to put your previous artefacts from content tab inside your system, simple drag and drop your
item to the content area or you can click on the item you want to insert and wait for the pop up to configure.

Figure 2 - Add artefacts to page

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3.2.2 Export & Import
This functionality provides a backup mechanism. The functionality enables you to backup all your page into either
HTML type or Leap2A type. Leap2A files have the capability to be re-imported to Mahara.

3.3 Groups Tab
Note only one person in a team need to create a group. Groups are the same concept as ‘Teams’. When in a group,
you can share your own portfolio pages with the other members and participate in group activities such as
discussion forums. You can upload files that are going to be shared inside groups as well.

3.3.1 Create Groups
Navigate to Groups => My Groups, click on Create group. (You can update the group name later if you are lacking
information by the time you create group).

Figure 3 - Create Group Button

Enter Group information accordingly, please follows the following convention to enter information:

Group Name: Team Number - Team Name - Project Name - Topic Name , e.g.: 18P – Cleanman – New Breath –
What a waste

Figure 4 - Input Group Details

Make sure you change Membership => Open to ‘No’, and lastly click Save group.

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3.3.2 Inviting Group Members
When inviting Group members, make sure the group administrator invite your lecturer and your own studio
mentors to join the group. In this way, they will have full access to see what the group has uploaded and
discussed.

Navigate to Members tab inside your Group and click: send multiple invitations at once link.

Figure 5 - Invite Group Members

You will be redirected to a page shown in Figure 6. Choose the person you want and press the button to invite. You
can search by name. Enter the person’s first name or last name in the search field and press “Go” button or enter
key.

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Figure 6 - Send invitations

3.3.3 Manage Group page
The Group page works the same way as the Portfolio page. It contains Group homepage by default, which is the
welcome page that will display to members when they first enter the group.
When creating pages, give them appropriate and meaningful page names for easy access and management.

3.3.4 Configure group sharing page option
Note, this is optional, used for sharing to Monash mentors who are not in your studio. Pages within your group can
be configured to share to other groups or the public or individual personnel under ‘Share’ tab inside your Group.
Navigate to ‘Share’ Tab, choose the page you want to share, and click on to grant additional access to another
entity. You can also configure the access start date and end date if you just want to share the file within a specific
period. By default, when you leave access start and end date empty, it is shared permanently. You should invite
your own studio mentor and lecturers as members of the group (section 3.3.2), not to just share pages only. The
sharing page function is usually used for sharing to the studio mentors who are not in your studio (Choose the
group name “IE mentors Latest” if you want to share).

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Figure 7 - Share Group Page


3.3.5 Group file management

When your Group needs to upload files, navigate to Files tab under your group. Create a folder based on the topic
you are in. When creating folders, name them appropriately for easy access and management.

Figure 8 - Create Folder

After creating a folder, click it to open it.

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Figure 9 - Navigate inside the folder

Upload files directly into this folder. You can either press Choose Files button to upload or Drop file under the
section to upload it.

Figure 10 - Upload Files
Important Notes:
1. (A reminder) When creating a group, make sure only one person in your team creates it.
2. Under your group, each team needs to create 2 pages:

• FIT5120 Studio Mentor page - contains all the documents for grading and updated version of the
document after feedback is given.

The file naming convention that should be used for submissions of documents for grading:
File Name – For Grading.pdf, E.g.: Iteration 2 – For Grading.pdf

After studio/ industry mentors have given you the feedback and your team has updated
the documents based on the feedback, upload the modified version of your document to
this page as well

The file naming convention that should be used for updated files should be: “File Name –
Updated.pdf”
You must always show the latest version of your document

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 • FIT5120 Industry mentor page for your industry mentor, layout it professionally

In the next page, we will show you how to create and share your reflective diary as well as create secret URL while
shorten it.

4. Creating and Sharing your Reflective Diary

The reflective diary is a weekly journal where you review and reflect on your past week and sharing of what you
are learning about yourself. Your diary must be shared with all studio mentors.

Step 1: Creating a new entry as reflective diary
At the end of each week on Friday, you will have to write reflective diary, do this through creating entry inside the
journal you have created.

Navigate to Content => Journals, click on New entry button as highlighted in red in Figure 11.

Figure 11 - Click on create new entry

Please follow the following conventions when making your write your reflection:

Title: Week n Reflection
If you have any attachment (such as your photo), you can also attach in here, you should directly put your
reflective diary inside the text-area instead of attaching a word document. Click on save entry once you have
finished your diary.

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Step 2: Creating a page for reflective diaries
This step only needs to be done once inside your Journals. There is no need to redo this step afterwards

Under Portfolio => Pages, click on Create page

Figure 12 - Create Page I

Please follow the following conventions to input your details under edit title and description:
Page title: Student ID - Student Name (Your preferred name) - Reflective Diary
Then choose your name format which you preferred, lastly click on Save.

Figure 14 - Create Page II

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Step 3: Adding content
After clicking save, you will be redirected to Edit content page, navigate to edit layout tab first, choose the first
layout and click on save:

Figure 14 – Adding content I

After save is clicked, you will be redirect to edit content page, click on Journals, choose Journal (as shown in Figure
15)

Figure 15 - Put up content II

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You will be asked to choose the layout of journal. Leave it as default (shown in figure 16) then click on Add to add
the content.

Figure 16 - Adding content III

From the pop up, Check the radio button which indicates your Reflective dairy and change the Entries per page to
12, after that click save.

Figure 17 - Adding content IV

Step 4: Configure sharing option
After you have successfully created the page, go to Portfolio => Shared by me, click on the icon to edit access.

Figure 18 – Configure sharing I

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Your portfolio is shared to all your tutors. So please give your tutor the access to this page. Do this through clicking
on Share with users, search for the group called “IE Mentors Latest” and click on the group. Leave the Access
start/end time text field empty and then click on the save button. Your portfolio is shared to all your tutors. So
please give your tutor the access to this page.

Figure 19 - Configure sharing II

Figure 20 - Configure sharing III

After this is completed, share the link name for your reflective dairy with your tutor. Do this by entering it into the
Google spreadsheet (During Week 2 studios) provided by your tutor. Go to your diary page and copy the URL from
your address bar

Note: If you find it is difficult to remember the link, provide them with page id number – Go to your diary page,
find the URL in your address bar, which looks like this:
http://mahara.infotech.monash.edu.au/mahara/view/view.php?id=4710, 4710 is your page id number, tell your
tutor this number. If your URL does not look like this, it means you are not doing it correctly, please double check
on the instructions again.

5. Generating a secret URL for a Group Page

A secret URL is a link that you give to an audience e.g. potential employer or an industry mentor and they then
have access to that “page” only, with all its content.

Step 1: Create your page under your Group
You will need to create a page that is dedicated to your industry mentor under your Group. (See creating page
instructions).
However, please change your page title into this format:
Page title: Team Name – Project Name – Industry Mentor Name

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Step 2: Generate Secret URL
After you have successfully created the page, please navigate to Share tab
Click on button to continue.

Figure 21 - Generate Secret URL

Click on Add to generate secret URL, anyone who has the URL will be able to access the page.

Figure 22 - Generate Secret URL II

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Step 3: Sign Up at bitly.com
Bitly.com is a free online service that can shorten URLs. When registered, you will can provide a meaningful name
to the URL, please sign up at https://bitly.com/a/sign_up

After you sign up, you will be redirected to your management console, paste your secrete URL in the text field
highlighted in Figure 27.

Figure 23 - Past link after logged in

You will then be prompt to enter custom bitlink, make sure your custom link follows an appropriate naming
convention. Remember it is for your industry mentor and should be a professional meaningful name.

Custom BitLink: TeamName-TopicName
E.g.: Cleanman WhatAWaste

Figure 24 - Customize bitlink

After you have finished customising the link,
click save button and you can distribute this link to your audience.

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