source: main/waeup.kofa/trunk/docs/source/userdocs/customization.rst @ 13124

.. _customization:

Portal Customization
********************

Portal customization requires profound knowledge of the Python
programming language. Customization is part of the portal deployment
process. It can only be done by the custom package manager and
activated by the system administrator, who is allowed to
update/upgrade the package on the server and restart the portal.
Usually, custom packages are not designed for regular
reconfiguration. Due to the complexity of school fee computation at
Nigerian universities, however, a lot of configuration had to be
done in the Python code and can thus not be subject to online
configuration. Technically speaking, the parameters are only loaded
and registered once during start-up and are not stored in the
database like the configuration parameters described in
:ref:`configuration`.

Kofa must not be customized by manipulating original Kofa code, i.e.
by editing Python files, Zope page templates or ZCML configuration
files in the Kofa base package. Customization is done by deploying a
custom package which can inherit all the Python classes from the
base package, in order to override distinct attributes and methods
and register these customized classes instead of the orginal classes
during start-up. It would go beyond the scope of the user handbook
to explain, how to build such a Kofa custom package. This will be
done in the :ref:`developer_handbook`. Here we roughly describe the
three different customization approaches with a focus on the third
approach, the customization of utility attributes and methods.

Localization
============

The base language of the Kofa User Interface (Kofa UI) is English.
The English language regime has been specified by WAeUP's first
customer, the University of Benin in Nigeria. Kofa is language-aware,
which means it has been translated into different languages (German
and French so far), and the preferred language can be selected via
the UI. The Kofa UI translations and also the English language
regime can be localized in custom packages by overriding single
entries of the language files. Headlines, field labels, field
descriptions, navigation tabs, buttons, page comments, flash
messages etc. can be easily adjusted to the needs of the institution
which wants to deploy Kofa.

Kofa is using the `GNU gettext utilities
<http://www.gnu.org/software/gettext>`_ for translation and
localization. Translation is done via ``po`` text files which are
located in the ``locales`` folder of a package. Each language has
its own subfolder. Localized English Kofa terms, for instance, can be
found in ``locales/en/LC_MESSAGES/waeup.kofa.po``. A single
entry/message consists of two lines.

Example::

  msgid "Login"
  msgstr "Let me in"

``msgid`` contains the original term from the base package,
``msgstr`` contains its localized/translated version, which results
into a renamed login tab on the right side of the navigation bar.

``po`` files must be compiled before restarting the portal. Editing
and compilation of ``po`` files can be done with a nice tool called
'Poedit' which is `available <https://poedit.net/download>`_ for
various operating systems.


Zope Interfaces
===============

Adding further schema field attributes to content components can be
done by inheriting Zope interfaces from the base package and adding
new schema fields to these custom interfaces, see :ref:`note
<kofa_interfaces>`. This sounds simple, but it isn't. There are many
things to think about, when customizing interfaces:

1. A customized interface alone doesn't have any effect, beause the
   content classes still implement the original interfaces. Thus, also
   all content classes, which are supposed to implement the extended
   interfaces, must be customized, and must be registered instead of
   the orginal classes which they inherit from. Drawback is, that this
   must be done before the first start-up of the portal. Otherwise,
   instances of the original content classes might have been created
   which cannot be changed afterwards.

2. Also the forms which are being auto-generated by
   `grok.AutoFields` (see :ref:`views_pages`), must be customized and
   use the new and extended interfaces. Otherwise added fields won't
   appear on form pages.

3. The same holds for exporters and importers. They also consider
   the fields from interfaces when processing the data. If we forget to
   customize exporter or batch processor classes, only the fields from
   the original interfaces will be exported or reimported.


Zope Utilities
==============

Kofa's global utilities are perfectly suited for customization.
Their attributes and methods can be easily overridden in custom
packages.

Kofa Utils
----------

The central `KofaUtils` utility contains not only most dictionaries
used for sources (see
:py:class:`API <waeup.kofa.utils.utils.KofaUtils>`) but also attributes 
like `PORTAL_LANGUAGE` and `tzinfo`. The first defines the default
language, which is used for pdf slips. The second defines the time
zone where the institution is located.

Customizable utility methods are:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.utils.utils.KofaUtils.sendContactForm()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.utils.utils.KofaUtils.fullname()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.utils.utils.KofaUtils.genPassword()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.utils.utils.KofaUtils.sendCredentials()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.utils.utils.KofaUtils.getPaymentItem()
   :noindex:

Students Utils
--------------

Customizable utility methods are:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.getReturningData()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.setReturningData()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.setPaymentDetails()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.setBalanceDetails()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.increaseMatricInteger()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.constructMatricNumber()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.setMatricNumber()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.getAccommodationDetails()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.selectBed()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.renderPDFAdmissionLetter()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.getPDFCreator()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.renderPDF()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.renderPDFTranscript()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.maxCredits()
   :noindex:

.. automethod:: waeup.kofa.students.utils.StudentsUtils.getBedCoordinates()
   :noindex:




Applicants Utils
----------------