Collaborative Environments Group

Here are some pointers to get started developing portlets with GridSphere:

join the gridsphere-dev, gridsphere-users and java mailing lists @gridlab.org, also portals@cct.lsu.edu.
find some place to store your source code, I recommend using CVS
read up on Portlets (IBM Developer Works should be a good place to start, gridsphere.org also)
go to GridSphere's website, read the user manuals, download and install GridSphere w/examples on some machine
do the Gridsphere tutorial to create a simple Portlet (that displays "message of the day") & deploy it
create a Portlet Service for use with your Portlet (stores all the "message of the day" data) & deploy it
modify your Portlet Service to use the persistence manager provided with gridsphere
... start working on more portlets...

Note: Check out our "links" section for good sources of information on Java and Portal development.