bSpace’s new “View Site As" feature

How many times have you wondered what your students see when the log in to your bSpace site? Or what other site participants may see?  With the newest Sakai release—2.6—bSpace users can now view their sites from their students’ (or other participants’) perspective.

How “View Site As” works
Whenever you're in one of your group sites, you'll see a “View Site As” dropdown list just beneath the tool list on the left-hand side of your screen.  Simply select a role from the list. You will be taken to the front page of the tool you were in with an updated display of what the page looks like to the users/people in the role selected. This view will remain for other tools in the site as well. You may return to your default view of the site at any time.

This feature—available previously only in the Assignments and Gradebook tools—will help users in a variety of ways. Not only does it lend you the perspective of your site participants; it also enables you to view their experience when, for example, you are adding a new tool with which you’re not entirely familiar, or when you're adding a new role to your site.

As well, this feature updates dynamically as you select new roles. For example, if you’re an instructor for a course, you will see the roster tool in your Toolbar. If you select View As Student role, the Roster tool will “disappear” from your view, because if a student were to log in, they would not see the roster. Once you click Exit Student View, and are an instructor again, the Roster tool will be restored to your view.

Share your experience with us!
The bSpace team would like to learn from you how you use this  feature. Please send feedback to the bSpace team and tell us what you like about this new feature.