26
Thu, Dec
0 New Articles

IBM Accelerates Portal Based Learning and Business Process Management

Other Industry Solutions
Typography
  • Smaller Small Medium Big Bigger
  • Default Helvetica Segoe Georgia Times

IBM has announced an expansion of its WebSphere Portal software portfolio with the availability of two additional business-ready packages - called accelerators - that can be easily added to a customer's portal to drive online training projects and automate key business processes.

These two new accelerators provide training, development and education projects via an IBM Lotus Sametime Web conference, and also make it easier for customers to automate core business processes with easy entry and integration of data and electronic forms across numerous systems.

The two accelerators add to the collection of those that IBM has released incrementally since April. These include: IBM Self-Service Accelerator for human resources tasks, IBM Dashboard Accelerator, IBM Collaboration Accelerator for team collaboration, IBM Content Accelerator for building and managing websites, and IBM Enterprise Suite Accelerator which supports multiple portal projects, including Web content management and electronic forms.

"IBM continues to see significant momentum from accelerators as customers are showing ever growing interest in using accelerators to help speed the time to value for portal-based business solutions. With these two new accelerators, customers have a full range of choice to implement projects quickly and cost-effectively, adding value to their existing Portal investments," said Larry Bowden, Vice President of Portals and Interaction Services."

IBM Learning Accelerator enables customers to provide personalized online training within the context of employees' ongoing activities. Highlights include:

  • Optimization for WebSphere Portal 6 including unified administration, personalization, and performance benefits. The user interface fully integrated within the Portal environment to lower administrative overhead and provide key tasks in one location.
  • Improvements to key learning administrative tasks, such as managing results, enrollment and course uploads. Learning administrators now get a quick view and links to key learning responsibilities - helping them identify the critical tasks and their status. Quick links give easy access to commonly performed tasks to manage courses, curriculums, and certificates.
  • Distributed content deployment options that offer response time improvements by placing content geographically closer to students. Critical learning data can be updated in bulk allowing learning administrators to more efficiently handle large learning initiatives Support for software license migration and learning data migration from previous Lotus eLearning solutions, including Workplace Collaborative Learning and Learning Management System.

IBM Learning Accelerator is also integrated with IBM Lotus Quickr and Lotus Sametime Web Conferencing, providing the ability to deliver long-distance training, share multiple content types, and collaborate on documents from a central, shared repository without tying up email resources. Integration with Lotus Sametime Web Conferencing gives the learning admin the ability to schedule and drive enrollment of training web conferences from within the learning accelerator. The addition of Lotus Quickr capabilities in this software provides students and instructors a place to collaborate on learning topics to enhance the overall learning experience

 

IBM Business Process Accelerator is designed to simplify and improve the adoption of business processes by using the role based, personalized user interface of WebSphere Portal to improve both implementation and end user response time for the entire range of processes, i.e.: document centric, human centric and system centric processes. Users can more efficiently complete workflow tasks when they have role-based, personalized access through a portal to all the information, applications and data necessary to complete their assigned task.

 

This accelerator helps integrate siloed applications and processes through out-of-the-box integration. The IBM Business Process Accelerator consists of market-leading IBM WebSphere Portal Server and IBM Lotus Forms Server. Users can easily view and act on workflow tasks assigned to them in IBM WebSphere Portal through the My Tasks portlet. The IBM Lotus Forms Server enables pixel-perfect rendering of electronic forms in the portal user interface. Then, eForms, portlets and workflows can be quickly customized and easily integrated with backend systems.

 

This offering enhances and complements the other offerings from IBM, such as WebSphere Business Modeler, IBM FileNet Business Process Manager and WebSphere Process Server. What's more, IBM Business Process Accelerator enables electronic forms and workflows to run in personalized business mashups that provide an aggregated view of information and tasks based upon the user's role and stage of the workflow.

 

Customers across numerous industries including government, banking and insurance can benefit from this new accelerator package which streamlines integration of data with Websphere Portal and other existing back end systems from IBM as well as with independent software vendors such as SAP and Siebel. By automating core business processes with electronic forms run in personalized business mashups, customers can help improve response times by rapidly building and deploying customer and partner facing workflows in WebSphere Portal.

 

Cardiff University in the UK plans to use key components of IBM Business Process Accelerator: Lotus Forms, WebSphere Portal and WebSphere Process Server as a part of an overall plan to create a collaborative environment for students, researchers, staff and partner organizations.

 

With IBM's help, the University's Information Services Directorate is creating a personalized environment whereby through a single sign on an individual has access to all the resources they need to perform their role, e.g. a student will have access to personalized areas such as files, timetables, bookmarks, school notices, Cardiff email, Forums, study-groups and discussions, school software, and course fee payments.

 

"We will use a combination of WebSphere Portal, WebSphere Process Server and Lotus Forms software to help streamline our business processes with electronic forms and role-based portal applications. This implementation will enable us to move towards streamlined administrative processes, either directly or through pre-reqs, we can now model, orchestrate, deploy and participate in the business processes. We have the flexibility of choice to plug-in process engines from WebSphere, FileNet or third parties to run these processes," said Simon Bradford of Cardiff University.

Cost and availability

Customers can purchase individual accelerators and snap them onto their existing WebSphere Portal environment, or they can purchase the entire solution together with WebSphere Portal.

 

Learning Accelerator is available now for $36 per user. The IBM Business Process Accelerator consists of IBM WebSphere Portal Server and IBM Lotus Forms Server. Those products are available now at $515 per value unit and $400 per value unit, respectively.

BLOG COMMENTS POWERED BY DISQUS

LATEST COMMENTS

Support MC Press Online

$

Book Reviews

Resource Center

  • SB Profound WC 5536 Have you been wondering about Node.js? Our free Node.js Webinar Series takes you from total beginner to creating a fully-functional IBM i Node.js business application. You can find Part 1 here. In Part 2 of our free Node.js Webinar Series, Brian May teaches you the different tooling options available for writing code, debugging, and using Git for version control. Brian will briefly discuss the different tools available, and demonstrate his preferred setup for Node development on IBM i or any platform. Attend this webinar to learn:

  • SB Profound WP 5539More than ever, there is a demand for IT to deliver innovation. Your IBM i has been an essential part of your business operations for years. However, your organization may struggle to maintain the current system and implement new projects. The thousands of customers we've worked with and surveyed state that expectations regarding the digital footprint and vision of the company are not aligned with the current IT environment.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT Generic IBM announced the E1080 servers using the latest Power10 processor in September 2021. The most powerful processor from IBM to date, Power10 is designed to handle the demands of doing business in today’s high-tech atmosphere, including running cloud applications, supporting big data, and managing AI workloads. But what does Power10 mean for your data center? In this recorded webinar, IBMers Dan Sundt and Dylan Boday join IBM Power Champion Tom Huntington for a discussion on why Power10 technology is the right strategic investment if you run IBM i, AIX, or Linux. In this action-packed hour, Tom will share trends from the IBM i and AIX user communities while Dan and Dylan dive into the tech specs for key hardware, including:

  • Magic MarkTRY the one package that solves all your document design and printing challenges on all your platforms. Produce bar code labels, electronic forms, ad hoc reports, and RFID tags – without programming! MarkMagic is the only document design and print solution that combines report writing, WYSIWYG label and forms design, and conditional printing in one integrated product. Make sure your data survives when catastrophe hits. Request your trial now!  Request Now.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericForms of ransomware has been around for over 30 years, and with more and more organizations suffering attacks each year, it continues to endure. What has made ransomware such a durable threat and what is the best way to combat it? In order to prevent ransomware, organizations must first understand how it works.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericIT security is a top priority for businesses around the world, but most IBM i pros don’t know where to begin—and most cybersecurity experts don’t know IBM i. In this session, Robin Tatam explores the business impact of lax IBM i security, the top vulnerabilities putting IBM i at risk, and the steps you can take to protect your organization. If you’re looking to avoid unexpected downtime or corrupted data, you don’t want to miss this session.

  • SB HelpSystems ROBOT GenericCan you trust all of your users all of the time? A typical end user receives 16 malicious emails each month, but only 17 percent of these phishing campaigns are reported to IT. Once an attack is underway, most organizations won’t discover the breach until six months later. A staggering amount of damage can occur in that time. Despite these risks, 93 percent of organizations are leaving their IBM i systems vulnerable to cybercrime. In this on-demand webinar, IBM i security experts Robin Tatam and Sandi Moore will reveal:

  • FORTRA Disaster protection is vital to every business. Yet, it often consists of patched together procedures that are prone to error. From automatic backups to data encryption to media management, Robot automates the routine (yet often complex) tasks of iSeries backup and recovery, saving you time and money and making the process safer and more reliable. Automate your backups with the Robot Backup and Recovery Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAManaging messages on your IBM i can be more than a full-time job if you have to do it manually. Messages need a response and resources must be monitored—often over multiple systems and across platforms. How can you be sure you won’t miss important system events? Automate your message center with the Robot Message Management Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAThe thought of printing, distributing, and storing iSeries reports manually may reduce you to tears. Paper and labor costs associated with report generation can spiral out of control. Mountains of paper threaten to swamp your files. Robot automates report bursting, distribution, bundling, and archiving, and offers secure, selective online report viewing. Manage your reports with the Robot Report Management Solution. Key features include:

  • FORTRAFor over 30 years, Robot has been a leader in systems management for IBM i. With batch job creation and scheduling at its core, the Robot Job Scheduling Solution reduces the opportunity for human error and helps you maintain service levels, automating even the biggest, most complex runbooks. Manage your job schedule with the Robot Job Scheduling Solution. Key features include:

  • LANSA Business users want new applications now. Market and regulatory pressures require faster application updates and delivery into production. Your IBM i developers may be approaching retirement, and you see no sure way to fill their positions with experienced developers. In addition, you may be caught between maintaining your existing applications and the uncertainty of moving to something new.

  • LANSAWhen it comes to creating your business applications, there are hundreds of coding platforms and programming languages to choose from. These options range from very complex traditional programming languages to Low-Code platforms where sometimes no traditional coding experience is needed. Download our whitepaper, The Power of Writing Code in a Low-Code Solution, and:

  • LANSASupply Chain is becoming increasingly complex and unpredictable. From raw materials for manufacturing to food supply chains, the journey from source to production to delivery to consumers is marred with inefficiencies, manual processes, shortages, recalls, counterfeits, and scandals. In this webinar, we discuss how:

  • The MC Resource Centers bring you the widest selection of white papers, trial software, and on-demand webcasts for you to choose from. >> Review the list of White Papers, Trial Software or On-Demand Webcast at the MC Press Resource Center. >> Add the items to yru Cart and complet he checkout process and submit

  • Profound Logic Have you been wondering about Node.js? Our free Node.js Webinar Series takes you from total beginner to creating a fully-functional IBM i Node.js business application.

  • SB Profound WC 5536Join us for this hour-long webcast that will explore:

  • Fortra IT managers hoping to find new IBM i talent are discovering that the pool of experienced RPG programmers and operators or administrators with intimate knowledge of the operating system and the applications that run on it is small. This begs the question: How will you manage the platform that supports such a big part of your business? This guide offers strategies and software suggestions to help you plan IT staffing and resources and smooth the transition after your AS/400 talent retires. Read on to learn: