Orientation: BYU’s new custom portal: myBYU

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By Jenna Cason

Similar to customizable startpages and web portals such as My Yahoo or iGoogle, myBYU allows users to access campus information on a tailored page that contains personalized portlets and tabs.

Sparked by advances in technology, myBYU was generated to replace the previous system, Route Y.

“Route Y has served us well, but technology has evolved,” said Michael Brown, director of Information Technology Communications. “We now have the ability to personalize and customize a little more, so users are able to control what they see and look at when they log in.”

MyBYU consists of four major parts:

Portlets which are small self-contained windows that contain information, links or services.

Tabs are pages with pre-defined or customizable collections of portlets.

Settings provides various ways to customize myBYU.

Banner Area includes links to the BYU home page, BeSafe, Help and a search window.

To access myBYU, go to my.byu.edu click the orange Sign In button, and log in using your BYU net ID and password.

The first time you sign in to myBYU you will see three tabs: Home, Tools and News. Each tab includes a collection of portlets that have been pre-selected for you. Users can create additional tabs with personalized content.

The Add Content feature of myBYU takes users to a list of external material that can be added to their personalized homepage.

By default, campus-related notifications will be located on the myBYU Home tab. The Home tab is the only tab that cannot be renamed, moved or deleted. Likewise, the “my announcements” portlet is the only portlet that cannot be deleted since the university will be using that portlet to notify students of important information. Users can subscribe to targeted campus notifications by selecting the “my announcements” link.

“It’s Route Y and more,” Brown said. “It’s the ability for us to make more information accessible to our users. They now have the ability to personalize their experience and have more information than before. It’s a more personalized way to receive campus information.”

To learn more, visit it.byu.edu/go/mybyuhelp.

 

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