Managing Channels

About Channels

A channel is a topic or identifier that acts as a conduit for related information. The channel carries the information from the publishers who created it to the subscribers who want it.

A channel has a name, a description, a subject, keywords, and a persistent store associated with it. A channel also has individual and group subscribers associated with it. Subscribers can be event subscribers or package subscribers.

The Publishing Framework plug-in to SAS Management Console provides a New Channel Wizard, which enables you to define all the properties of a channel, including what subscribers are associated with it. Each association of a subscriber to a channel is a subscription. A subscription enables the information that is published to a channel to be delivered to the interested (subscribed) users.

You should create a channel for each distinct topic or audience. For instance, users of a particular application might want a channel for discussion and data exchange, while the programmers of that application might want another channel to discuss technical problems and future enhancements. Although the topic is the same application, the discussion and data exchanged will be very different, so two separate channels would probably best serve the needs of the two groups of users.

Create a Channel Folder

If you anticipate creating a large number of channels, then consider grouping related channels into channel folders. You can create subfolders within folders, thereby creating a folder hierarchy to which access controls can be applied.

To create channel folders:

1. From the SAS Management Console navigation tree, expand the Publishing Framework node.
2. Select the desired metadata repository node.
3. If you are creating a top-level folder, then select Channels. If you are creating a subfolder, then navigate to and select the desired parent folder.
4. From the menu bar, select Actions New Folder. The New Channel Folder wizard displays.

You can create a subfolder by selecting the desired parent folder and selecting Actions New Folder from the menu bar.

Note: Currently it is not possible to move an existing channel into a folder or from one folder to another. Plan ahead to avoid having to delete and recreate channels.

Create a New Channel

To create a new channel:

1. From the SAS Management Console navigation tree, expand the Publishing Framework node.
2. Select the desired metadata repository node.
3. If you are creating a channel within a folder, select the Channels node and navigate to the desired folder.
4. Select the Channels item or the desired folder and select Actions New Channel from the menu bar to open the New Channel wizard.

Duplicate an Existing Channel

To create a channel with substantially the same properties as an existing channel:

1. In the SAS Management Console navigation tree, expand the Publishing Framework node.
2. Select the desired metadata repository node.
3. Select the Channels node and, if applicable, navigate to the folder where the existing channel is stored.
4. Select the existing channel and select Actions Duplicate Channel from the menu bar to open the New Channel wizard. All of the wizard's fields are filled in with values from the existing channel.
5. Because channel names must be unique, you must change the Name attribute. Click Next to change other attributes.
6. Click Finish to create the new channel.

Modify an Existing Channel

To modify the properties of an existing channel:

1. In the SAS Management Console navigation tree, expand the Publishing Framework node.
2. Select the desired metadata repository node.
3. Select the Channels node.
4. If applicable, open the appropriate folder(s) to navigate to the desired channel.
5. Select the channel that you want to modify and select File Properties from the menu bar. The Properties window for that channel displays.
6. Use the tabs in the Properties window to modify the various properties.
7. When you are finished modifying properties, click OK.

Delete a Channel

To delete a channel:

1. In the SAS Management Console navigation tree, expand the Publishing Framework node.
2. Select the desired metadata repository node.
3. Select the Channels node.
4. If applicable, open the appropriate folders to navigate to the desired channel.
5. Select the channel that you want to delete and select Edit Delete from the menu bar.

To delete a channel folder (including any subfolders and channels under it), right-click the folder and click Delete.

To delete all channels, right-click the Channels item and click Delete.