Version 1 of GSOC2010:SCORM Compliant Run-Time Environment for OpenACS

Updated 2010-05-07 06:45:44 by michaelaram

Summary

This project is a follow-up project to last year's successful project "SCORM Compliant Content Packaging for Wiki-based Content Development", which focused on input/export and presentation of SCORM learning resources. During the last project, it turned out that implementing the runtime environment specified by the standard is a relatively big task. Thus, in the current state, the runtime environment implements only the most basic RTE-API functions and is therefore only capable of importing simple packages. However, a standard conformant runtime environment is still a precondition for using the outcome of the former project in real-world scenarios.

General Information

OpenACS is a powerful open source community system used for a wide set of applications ranging from e-learning (DotLRN) over community sites to e-commerce shops. The xo*-family of packages (xotcl-core, xowiki and xowf) has established itself as a flexible, generic, object oriented toolkit for OpenACS, enabling rapid development of arbitrary applications for both OpenACS and DotLRN. XoWiki is one of the most flexible wiki-frameworks, supporting advanced concepts like for example structured wiki features, multiple access policies, flexible application integration and workflows. In the e-learning context, XoWiki can be used as a single tool for content development for (adaptive) content presentation, (collaborative) content development, blog style content distribution and assessment.

The Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM) is a collection of standards and specifications adapted from multiple sources to provide a comprehensive suite of e-learning capabilities that enable interoperability, accessibility and reusability of web-based learning content. SCORM is a de-facto standard in the e-learning world. It focuses on the interoperability of learning management systems. To achieve that it standardizes the way, in which learning material should be packaged, so that it can easily be transported (content aggregation / content packages). Moreover, it specifies how the communication between these content packages and the "hosting" system should take place (run time). Finally, SCORM provides the means for defining rules whether or not and in which order subparts of the content package can be accessed by the learner (sequencing).

Project Idea: http://wiki.tcl.tk/23186#pagetocc7fa62b9