The current version of ALOE provides new functionalities on the user interface side as well as on the application programming interface side. For the user interface the support for closed groups has been implemented. Whenever a user wants to join a closed group she has to request authorization for the membership from the group administrator. Group administrators can then decide whether they grant or deny access to the group. Further resource previews have been enhanced by status bars which show the user how often a resource has been viewed and how it has been rated in average.

In order to avoid misuse of the system a user has to confirm her e-mail address which she has provided with the registration. For this purpose she receives an e-mail with a confirmation link which she has to click. Her account will then be activated subsequently.

On the application programming interface side possibilities have been provided to reference licenses which are associated with published resources via URI. For the Creative Commons licenses which are supported by the system shortcuts are provided additionally. If you plan to make use of this new functionality please consider our javadoc documentation of the Web service interface. In order to make our Web service easier to use for arbitrary clients the validation of input parameters has been improved. Optional parameters which have been omitted will be set to appropriate default values.

One of the next steps which has to be performed is the integration of the ALOE bookmarklet that has been implemented by our intern Martin Uhlir. Contributing resources to ALOE will then be even easier than today