Portals are a framework within Slate that let you build custom sites. These sites let a population that you define, like applicants, current students, and alumni, interact with Slate.

Technolutions provides a number of ready-made portals that you can import with Suitcase.

What are portals?

A portal is a curated window into Slate instance. You define the data points visible to the user and how that data moves between the portal and the Slate instance. Portals can also incorporate a number of Slate tools, like forms, checklists, and reports, and they can use Liquid markup to display content conditionally.

Portal use cases can be as simple or as complex as you like. For example, you can make a no-login, one-page site, where prospects can select a date and sign up for a campus tour with portals. With the same tools, you can also build a task management system for academic advisors managing multiple student records.

Who can access portals?

Access to portals can be locked-down or unrestricted, depending on your needs. Portals can be linked to or embedded in another site. They can require authentication through Slate login or institutional Single Sign-On.

They can be accessed by person records, applicant records,or the records in a custom dataset you’ve created. Portals can gather and display information to your own Slate users, as well.

Portal building blocks

Views

If a portal is like a website, views are like webpages.

There must be at least one view for your portal to work. Portals can have multiple views. You can render views as separate pages, or as tabs or pop-ups on a single page.

Views can display query results and static content, which can be customized with liquid markup. Portal widgets on a view can users update their address, show them a report or a form, or display their local weather forecast.

Queries

Portal queries pull the Slate data that users interact with on portal views.

The building blocks of a portal query are the same as the general query tool (exports, filters, joins), with one primary difference: a variable called @identity that stores the ID of the end-user, and allows you to filter results based on who is logged in to the portal.

Methods

Portal methods serve as the connection between views and queries.

Each method defines how the view is displayed (as a page, a tab, or a popup). Methods can be called automatically when the portal is loaded, or by a link inside another view.

✨ Use Suitcase to import a portal, or provision a Clean Slate environment to use our pre-built portals as inpsiration.

More stuff

Views, queries, and methods are the most fundamental elements of portal-craft, but there’s plenty more that can be added to a portal.

🛠️ See the Portal Building Blocks section to learn what content you can include in your portals.

Building your portal

Because they can integrate with many other Slate tools, building a functioning portal requires an intermediate grasp of Slate. You should have strong foundational skills in querying before you attempt to make a portal.

While you can certainly import  ready-made portal into your database with Suitcase, it’s also important to understand how they work.

Portals can be expanded and enhanced over time to increase their utility in your instance. However, there are factors that will need to be set early and left as they are. Namely: who are the end-users for this portal, and what should they be able to accomplish? Common types of portals include:

• Volunteer portal: Including alumni interviewing portal.

• Athletic portal: For coaches to track and manage athletic recruitment efforts

• Applicant status portal: Admitted status portals can be created as a standalone portal, although many institutions fold in functionality for admitted students into status portals.

Portals can redirect end-users to other portals as well, though it may also be possible to fold multiple functions into one (e.g., an Admitted Students’ Portal and Enrolling Students’ portal).

📝 Avoid wasted effort: don’t make a portal to replace existing Slate functionality.

Further reading

➡️ Continue to Creating a Custom Portal to get started with portals in Slate.