Web Publishing

1. You can use CourseWorks to publish your syllabus, assign homework, invite online participation, and perform a variety of other functions.
2. You can set up a course blog through EdBlogs.
3. You can use Zoom video conferencing to hold (and record) remote meetings or classes

1. You may request a group blog (essentially a website, with time-based content) on Columbia Blogs.
2. If you need a custom design, along with assistance in setting up and maintaining your site, look no further than CUIT's Web and Mobile Apps team, which offers competitive, fee-based Web design, development and maintenance services to the entire University.
3. If you need a basic site design, CUIT and Public Affairs offer free standard websites with research, administrative, and academic models.
4. If you are familiar with HTML and Javascript, or just need some Web space, you can request space.
5. If you are interested in setting up a site for documentation, training materials, meeting notes, or related information, perhaps a wiki is the right tool for you. You may request a wiki at Confluence@Columbia.

The logout link

When a user logs into the secure server, the server remembers that the user is logged in by setting a cookie in the user's browser known as a "session cookie".  This cookie lets the user navigate the website without having to log in repeatedly.  When the cookie is unset or the user's session on the server expires, the server forgets the user and the user must log in again to access the website.

If the browser is on a public terminal or a shared machine, we recommend that you create a logout link that will cause the browser to unset the session cookie.  There is no logout option available for the regular server.

To create link to the CAS logout, insert the following:

<a href="https://cas.columbia.edu/cas/logout">Logout here [or your text]</a>

Adding a landing page

You can add a landing page with your own content where the user will be directed after logging out by adding a "service" request parameter to your link, whose value is the landing page URL:

<a href="https://cas.columbia.edu/cas/logout?service=https://www1.columbia.edu/path_to_landing_page">Logout here</a>

Your landing page must not be protected with an .htaccess file that requires a login.

If you wish to restrict access to a Web directory on the regular server to a specific list of users, the list of valid users will be contained in your htpasswd file, which is created and modified by the htpasswd program. This file is stored in your directory and maintained by you, so you will need to enter the usernames and passwords yourself. You are the only person that can change passwords and add new users to the file.

The passwords in this file are encrypted using a simple algorithm, so it is important that your htpasswd file should not be publicly readable. At the same time, your htpasswd file must be readable by the web server. Therefore, it is important that you follow these steps when creating your htpasswd file. After you are familiar with the process you can try different directory names and file names.

Create the htpasswd File

Create an empty directory.

$ mkdir ~/passwd

Use the setweb program to put that directory in the www group and make it group readable.

$ setweb ~/passwd

In that directory create a new password file containing your username. If your username is xyz4 you would type $ htpasswd ~/passwd/htpasswd xyz4

Type the password that you will use to access Web documents. Make up a new password: do not use your CUNIX password here.

Additional usernames can be added using the htpasswd program $ htpasswd ~/passwd/htpasswd jkl3

Type the password that jkl3 will use to access Web documents. Tell them to make up a new password: do not use their CUNIX password here.

The htpasswd program will make sure that your password file is not publicly readable.

The htpasswd file was created in the ~/passwd directory so it will be in the www group. You can move it to another directory but we recommend that you leave it there. If your password file is not in the www group then you forgot to run setweb (see above).

If you decide to use separate password files for various web directories we recommend that you put them all in the ~/passwd directory. But it would be easier to create a single password file and use it for all your web directories that need to be restricted.

Create the .htaccess File

Use the echo command to determine the full path to your htpasswd file

$ echo ~/passwd/htpasswd

If your username is xyz4 the system would respond this way

/h/u4/x/xyz4/passwd/htpasswd

Go to the Web directory to which you want to restrict access. If you are going to restrict access to your ~/public_html/private directory, you would type

$ cd ~/public_html/private

Create a file called .htaccess in that directory, bearing in mind the path information obtained earlier (e.g. /h/u4/x/xyz4/passwd/htpasswd). The .htaccess file should contain these directives, at least

AuthType Basic
AuthUserFile /h/u4/x/xyz4/passwd/htpasswd
AuthName "ByPassword"

Require valid-user

The "Require valid-user" directive will permit access to any user in your htpasswd file. Alternatively, you could name all the users that should have access, for example

Require user xyz4
Require user jkl3

Make the .htaccess File World Readable

Using the chmod command, add read access for everyone.

$ chmod a+r .htaccess

Conclusion

Any Web access to a file in your private directory will cause the browser to prompt for a username and password. Since you are the owner of that file, you are the only person that can change passwords and add new users to the file. Use the htpasswd program to modify that file.

$ htpasswd ~/passwd/htpasswd jkl3

You can also include the "satisfy any" directive to allow access by domain name or by password. In that case the web browser would not prompt for a password if the user is in the specified domain:

AuthType Basic
AuthUserFile /h/u4/x/xyz4/passwd/htpasswd
AuthName "ByPassword"

Satisfy any
Order deny,allow
Deny from all
Allow from .columbia.edu
Require valid-user

You can restrict access to a Web directory to a specific list of users. Users will be required to log in when attempting to access documents you place in this directory.

If all of the users that need access to your documents are affiliated with Columbia, you can make use of their UNI.

For users not affiliated with columbia, you must maintain a list of user names and passwords. If you are going to maintain this list and place your files on the regular server, you should follow the instructions for using the regular server. However, placing your files on the secure server will add an extra measure of security. If your users include both columbia and non-columbia users, you may have those with UNI's use that ID system, and for the others, you may maintain your own username and password list. You are required to use the secure server if your users will be using their UNI's.