nitrc:User Guide - Getting Started (Users)
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NITRC serves as a storehouse and storefront, a library, a workshop, and a laboratory for the functional and structural neuroimaging community. It is all presented at www.nitrc.org for you to utilize as you need it. For the best experience, please use one of the supported browsers listed in the Browser Support section of the NITRC Community wiki.
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NITRC Users
The NITRC community is made up of researchers, developers, academics, clinicians, administrators, scholars, and others interested in finding, developing, improving, and sharing functional and structural neuroimaging tools and resources. Depending upon the tool/resource, site users may fill different roles as they utilize different functions.
NITRC has been developed to have roles with predefined permissions. This allows users to easily move from acting in one role in one tool/resource (for example, acting as a team member) to another role in another tool/resource (for example, acting as a developer or a reference). Below is a general definition of the roles to help you understand your options:
Unregistered User: Everyone starts out as an unregistered user. Unregistered users, also called observers or visitors, may see the NITRC Home page and access NITRC Community functionality. An observer may visit public tools/resources, read postings by others in public forums, read wikis and news, browse documentation, and download tools/resources. For public tools/resources, observers may view the feature request and bug trackers to see what may be coming or what may be a problem in a tool/resource. If you are an observer or a registered user who has not logged in and you attempt to perform any function that requires registration, you will be taken to the Login page.
Registered User: Registered users may do everything unregistered users can do. In addition, registered users may receive e-mail about changes in tools/resources they are following, respond to surveys, rate and review public tools/resources, contribute to public discussion forums, and submit documentation to the NITRC Community that may be posted at the discretion of the NITRC Community administrator. A registered user may request to join tool/resource development teams, and as a tool/resource member or developer, he may be given additional capabilities by the tool/resource administrator. A registered user may also register his own tool/resource with NITRC, and once approved by a NITRC administrator, become a tool/resource administrator for that tool/resource.
Member: Members are registered users who have been granted permission to join a tool/resource development team. A registered user may request to join any public tool/resource by clicking the "Join the team" link on the Tool/Resource Summary page. The tool/resource administrator reviews the request and accepts or rejects it. The level at which the member is allowed to participate is set by the tool/resource administrator through the role the member is assigned. A member may be able to fully participate in discussion forums, submit documents, and edit wikis. A member may be able to suggest enhancements to tools/resources and report bugs through the trackers. A member may also be able to administer the document manager. There are several predefined roles in NITRC, but these roles can be modified by each tool/resource administrator, and new roles can be created. More information on editing and adding roles is in the Tool/Resource Admin section. Below is a description of the predefined roles with their default permissions.
- Reference: References are members who have elected to be a point of contact for the tool/resource and have been assigned the role of "Reference" by the tool/resource administrator. If other users have questions about a tool/resource, they may contact anyone listed as a reference for that tool/resource. References have all the capabilities of a registered user, but no additional permissions as a tool/resource member.
- Support Tech: Support Techs are members who are technical managers. Support Techs can create and edit trackers and have tracker items assigned to them. They can also approve document submissions and perform other document administration activities.
- Doc Writer: Doc Writers are members who manage the document repository. Doc Writers can administer the document manager. They can add/edit document groups and approve pending documents or make other status changes to documents.
- Junior Developer: Developers are members who have chosen to help build or improve the tool/resource and have been granted permission to do so by the tool/resource administrator. They may download and upload source code for a tool, offering changes and enhancements to the software. Developers may be assigned to work on specific tasks and tracker items in order to manage their development activities.
- Senior Developer: Senior Developers have a greater authority over the system than Junior Developers. In addition to all the capabilities of a Junior Developer, Senior Developers can create software packages and upload files to the packages. These are the files that the NITRC community is able to download and use. Senior Developers also have permission to administer docs, forums, tracker, and tasks.
- Tool/Resource Administrator: Tool/Resource Administrators are decision makers for the tools/resources hosted on the NITRC site. Using NITRC, they can manage their tools/resources more easily. They decide who may be a member or developer, which suggestions for enhancements will be accepted, which bugs will be assigned to which developers, which documents and files will be published for their tools/resources, and what news is presented for their tools/resources. They also have the ability to delegate these responsibilities, or limit them to certain users. A tool/resource may have only one tool/resource administrator or it may have many administrators. The person who first registers the tool/resource is the default administrator, and that tool/resource administrator may designate other tool/resource administrators.
NITRC Home Page
Use a supported browser to go to www.nitrc.org. Once you are using the NITRC site, you may access the NITRC Home page from other NITRC pages by clicking the "Home" menu link or the NITRC logo in the banner.
Browse: The NITRC team has developed a set of specifications, or attributes, that may be important to the NITRC user in search of a tool/resource. The tool/resource administrators assign as many of these specifications as are applicable to each of their tools/resources. You may quickly browse through the list and select a specification to find tools/resources with that assigned specification. The number following the specification name in the list indicates the number of tools/resources with that specification.
Search: You may use the search field to find a tool/resource based on its name, public description, or assigned category. Boolean logic is supported, and the search is not case sensitive. (Refer to the Search Syntax page for more on searching options.)
Featured Tool/Resource: If the NITRC moderator has designated a featured tool/resource, that tool/resource will be displayed in the search section. You may click on the tool/resource name or its image, if one exists, to get to the Summary page for that tool/resource. Hovering over the brief description below the tool/resource name will display the full public description.
The NITRC moderator will periodically select tools/resources to be featured on the Home page. Criteria for being selected may include:
- exceeding NITRC basic level of compliance, by monitoring and responding to bug, feature request, and support tracker requests, or by keeping file releases and documentation current (Refer to the note in the Getting Started (Administrators) section of the User Guide for more information on the basic level of compliance.)
- serving a underserved scientific niche within neuroimaging analysis
- securing high ratings from the NITRC community
- providing test data sets
- hosting active forums
- securing high downloads from the NITRC site
We encourage you to send the NITRC moderator other suggestions to include in NITRC's Featured Tool/Resource selection criteria.
Latest News: This section shows the seven latest NITRC Community news bulletins with the most recent post first. News that is displayed on the Home page is selected from submissions directly to the NITRC Community (see NITRC Community News for more information) and from news posted for individual public tools/resources (see News Administration for more information). Selections are approved by the site moderator for publication on the Home page.
The news posts are shown with some descriptive information, including the tool/resource for which the news was submitted, the date of submission, the number of comments, the news title, and the first few lines of text (up to 250 characters). To read the full news bulletin, click on the title, or simply hover your mouse over the truncated text. To view or add comments, click on the comment link.
To see older posts, click the more news link at the bottom of this section.
Community Quick Links: This section provides links to some of the most useful sources of information for NITRC users. It also provides quick links to submit community news or to register a new tool/resource.
At the bottom of this section is the total number of active users who have registered with NITRC. This statistic does not include users who are pending, deleted, or suspended.
Recently Active Forums: This section shows the three most recent forum posts for any public tool/resource or NITRC Community. The tool/resource name or NITRC Community appears first, followed by the forum name. (Clicking this link takes you to a page that shows all the threads for this forum.) Below the forum name is the thread title. (Clicking this link takes you to a page with all the posts related to this thread.) The number of posts is indicated below the thread title, along with a date or how long ago the latest post was submitted.
To see the most recent forum post for each public tool/resource and NITRC Community, click the more forums link.
Recently Updated Files: This section shows the three most recently updated files for any public tool/resource. The tool/resource name appears first. (Clicking this link takes you to the Summary page for that tool/resource.) Below the tool/resource name is the release name. (Clicking this link takes you to a page that lists all releases for the tool/resource with the selected release highlighted.) The date of release is displayed below the release name.
To see the most recent file released for each public tool/resource, click the more updates link.
Recently Registered: This lists the last four public tools/resources that have registered with NITRC and have been approved. The month and day that the tool/resource submitted its registration with NITRC is included in the list. You may click the tool/resource name to get the Summary page for that tool/resource.
At the bottom of this list is the total number of approved public tools/resources that have registered with NITRC. This statistic does not include private tools/resources, and it does not include recently registered tools/resources that have not yet been approved.
To view all the hosted public tools/resources, click the more tools/resources link.
RSS Feeds: You may also access NITRC Community Web feeds from the Home page. Your browser's feed icon is enabled for the NITRC Home page when using a browser that provides Web feed support. Three RSS feeds are available for the NITRC Community:
- NITRC Community News RSS: Contains the news items that are posted to the NITRC Home page. These are news items that are of general interest to the NITRC community and have been approved for publication by the NITRC news team. The most recently published news item is displayed first.
- All Tool/Resource News RSS: Contains all the news items that have been posted for any public NITRC tools/resources. The most recently published news item is displayed first.
- Tool/Resource Listing RSS: Lists all the approved public tools/resources registered with NITRC. The most recently registered and approved tool/resource is displayed first.
New User Registration
As a registered NITRC user you will be able to participate fully in this on-line community. You can join tool/resource groups and contribute your knowledge through the forums, shared documents, wiki, and the ratings and reviews. You can also register your own structural and functional neuroimaging analysis tool or resource with NITRC, creating your own group in which other NITRC users can participate.
To register as a new user, click the Register link in the banner below the search box. You will be taken to a form where you enter the following data:
Required Fields—indicated by a red asterisk (*)
- Spam Prevention: This helps prevent automated programs from abusing NITRC. Enter the two words you see in the box, in order and separated by a space. If you would like to get new words, click the reload button below the distorted words. Visually impaired users can click the audio button to hear a set of words that can be entered instead of the visual challenge.
- Login Name: You need a unique user name to access to the system. Login names must be all lower case. If the name you choose is already in use, the system will tell you. Be sure to use a name you can remember; the system will not remind you if you have forgotten your login name, and you will have to set up a new account and reset all your preferences.
- Password: Passwords must be at least six characters.
- First Name, Last Name: If you use a middle name, include it in the first name field.
- Email Address: Your e-mail address is the one to which NITRC will send a confirmation e-mail message to activate your registration. When you receive the confirmation message, you will need to connect to NITRC using the URL in the message to activate your account.
Suggested Fields
- Time Zone: The NITRC site uses GMT as the default, but you may want to change your time zone, as all dates are shown relative to the time zone. (For example, if your time zone is EST and you register at 4:43 pm, with your account set to GMT your registration time will show as 20:43 instead of 16:43.)
- Receive email about NITRC website updates: This box is checked by default. If you leave this checked, you will periodically receive information about the NITRC site, including code updates and security notices. The traffic is very low; we recommend that you activate this option.
- Receive NITRC Community mailings: This box is unchecked by default. Check this box if you are interested in notices of interest to the NITRC community. The traffic is low.
- Subscribe to the Community Forum: This box is checked by default. If you leave this checked, you will be subscribed to the NITRC Community open discussion forum. You will receive e-mail whenever a new message is posted to the forum.
- Receive weekly followup email related to tools/resources that you have downloaded: This box is checked by default. If you leave this checked, you will receive a followup email reminding you to review any tools/resources that you had downloaded the previous week.
Note: After you have logged in, you can change any of these setting through your Account Maintenance page.
Click the "Register" button and your registration is automatically accepted on NITRC—it does not have to be approved by a NITRC site administrator. Within minutes you will receive an e-mail message with a URL to click on to establish your account. When you do, you will be asked to log in, and then you will see a welcome screen. NITRC is happy to have you join!
| Note: If you happen to lose the e-mail message with the URL to establish your account, do not submit a new registration. At the bottom of the User Registration page, and at the bottom of the Login page, is a Resend confirmation email to a pending account link. Click this link, enter your login name, and click the "Submit" button. A new account registration e-mail will be sent to you to complete the registration process. |
Logging In
You may log in to NITRC with your registered NITRC account, or you may use your Google user account to log in. Click the Member login link in the banner below the search box. On the Login page, enter your NITRC login name and password in the fields provided and click the "Log In" button, or click the Google image to log in with your Google user account. When you have successfully logged in, you will be taken to your My Personal Page.
If you have forgotten your NITRC password, click the Lost your password? link and fill in your NITRC login name. You will receive an e-mail message at the address associated with your NITRC account. Click on the URL in that message to set a new password.
Logging Out
To log out from NITRC, click the Log Out link in the banner below the search box.
Tool/Resource Membership
Some tools/resources restrict collaboration activities to users who are members of their group. As a registered user, you may request to join a public tool/resource in NITRC so that you may fully participate in that group. To the right of the Tool/Resource Summary page in the Participate box, or to the left of the Summary page in the Members box, click the "Join the team" link. The information you submit here will be sent to the tool/resource administrator who will approve or reject your request. You will receive an e-mail notification of whether your request was approved or rejected.
