Technology

information & communication technology

Blackboard patents the LMS, but does it matter?

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Via Stephen Downes, is this post by Michael Feldstein that Blackboard (aka BlackWeb) has been granted a US patent on the learning management system (LMS). My initial reaction was indignation that a greedy corporation was once again trying to stifle innovation in education. Then I read Brent Schlenker’s reaction to my post on the lack of open source learning applications, and Brent correctly noted that there are a lot of learning applications, just not that many “educational” ones;

My point is that we don’t need any specific open source learning applications. That would be just another thing that people need to learn…another interface to learn…another login id and password to remember. We are at our best when we evaluate the existing technologies and leverage them for the purpose of learning. We are at our worst when we try to create our own little system and call it the Learning thingy.

The Blackboard patent may become a defining moment for learning technologies. Let’s use this as an opportunity to cast off the classroom and course metaphors:

In yet another aspect of the invention, provided is a method for providing online education, which includes the steps of establishing a course to be offered online, offering the course to be taken online to a group of student users; and providing access over the network to the course files to a student user who has enrolled in the course. The establishment of the course includes an instructor user generating a set of course files for use with teaching the course, then transferring the course files to a server computer for storage thereat, and then making access to the course files available to a predefined community of student users having access to the server computer over a network.

Let’s use all those wonderful Web 2.0 tools for learning, not schooling. Blackboard spent a lot of time and money filing for this patent and they can have it, because it has no value. It’s no longer about online courses, it’s about learning and performing.

LMS? We don’t need no stinking LMS!

Where are open source learning applications?

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I’ve previously discussed the use of open source for the learning sector as well as the business models that could work for learning applications. Matt Asay has posted his OSCON presentation on open source business models that shows how the field has developed and how different projects are at various levels of maturity.

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Now if you look at open source platforms in the learning space, my first take would put these on the curve:

  • Innovators – Elgg Learning Landscape and several others
  • Early Adopters – Moodle and a few others
  • Early Majority – nobody
  • Late Majority – forget about it

Read the rest of Asay’s presentation to see what strategies are necessary at these stages.

Open source in education for bean counters

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A while back I was asked to evaluate some learning management systems and part of the project required a price comparison. Costs over five years, for 5,000 users averaged $370,000 for the proprietary systems.

At the time, there were not a lot of open source services providers (which I had suggested was a good business model). Now that Moodle has over 10,000 installations, including Online Campus with 54,955 users, there are a number of reputable service providers for Moodle hosting, support and consulting, in several countries.

I know that it is possible to get full Moodle hosting and support for ~$5,000 per year for 5,000 users. So what could you do with all of the savings (~$345,000)? How about:

  • Hire an internal technical support person
  • Hire an internal learning support person
  • Pay to develop the one additional function that you need and then give it back to the community under GPL so others can benefit as you have from open source
  • Buy Moodle T-shirts for the accounting department

Anyway, open source learning management systems are not only viable options but can be an order of magnitude cheaper than many proprietary systems. Other systems and resources are listed on OpenSource4Learning.

Skype 101

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I’ll be hosting my last skypecast for our informl learning unworkshop tomorrow. The availability of Skype and now skypecasts has simplified the process of hosting audio conferences with people distributed around the world. Here’s what I’ve learned this past month about hosting free skype conferences and skypecasts.

Skype Conferences

  1. Skype conferences are the simplest way of getting up to five people into a conference call. Just right-click on the contact you wish to “Invite to Conference” after you have started a call with one person.
  2. The host cannot mute other particpants in a skype conference, but each person has a mute button on the skype application (top right).
  3. If you have an Intel dual core processor powered computer, you can invite up to ten people to your skype conference.

Skypecasting

  1. For more people, you can create a skypecast which will allow you to have ~99 participants in a call.
  2. To create a skypecast, the host goes to the Skypecast website and logs-in with his or her skypename and password.
  3. The host creates a session, either to start immediately, or for a later time. Provide a title and description and set the time (after the set time period, no one can join or rejoin the skypecast so set a sufficient time period).
  4. As the host, you can mute anyone/everyone, which you should do, as it keeps the excess noise level down. Imagine the sound of a cocktail party coming through your headset. I would strongly suggest that all participants use a headset and microphone.
  5. Muted participants can “ask for the microphone”, which the host will see as the icon beside the participant’s name turning from green to orange.
  6. Note that skypecasts are open to the public and anyone can drop in. The host can eject anyone, but be sure to read the terms set by Skype.
  7. With most people muted, the sound is usually quite good.

Recording

  1. I used Pamela to record our skypecasts. Pamela Pro is required and it’s available for a 30-day trial or can be purchased for $25.
  2. Once you’ve downloaded and installed Pamela Pro, go to “Tools – Options – General” and uncheck the box marked “Automatically start on Windows start-up”.
  3. When your skypecast is running and you decide to start recording, just open the Pamela Pro application (easy if you accept a shortcut on your desktop on set up). A window will open asking if you want to record the call and click yes. Pamela will record the call for as long as you keep it and the skypecast open.
  4. Pamela Pro will save the recording as a date stamped .wav file in “My Documents – Pamela – Callrecord”.
  5. To convert from .wav to MP3 and make the large file a lot smaller, you will need a converter application like Free CD to MP3 Converter. Using this application, click on “File – WAV to MP3” and it will do the rest. The resulting MP3 can be renamed and uploaded to a website or shared via FTP. An hour recording is about 40 MB.
  6. There are many other ways of recording a skypecast, including more complex audio edit suites, but this is the simplest method that I’ve found so far.

“OpenOffice.org challenges Microsoft’s Office Test Drive”

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Microsoft today announced the opening of a “test drive” so that people can see what Microsoft Office 2007 might look like when it finally goes on sale.

The OpenOffice.org Community invites potential upgraders to go one better – download the full OpenOffice.org 2 office suite today for a test drive, and if you like it, use it free for as long as you like. It’s the ultimate no-strings-attached test drive – if you enjoy the test drive, keep the car!

As office software becomes a commodity product, Microsoft has been forced to make significant changes to the ‘look and feel’ of MS-Office 2007. Because of this, analysts now agree that migrating to Microsoft Office 2007 will be a major upheaval with a significant cost impact.

Unlike changing to Microsoft Office 2007, changing to OpenOffice.org 2 does not require learning how to use office software all over again. Indeed, reports have shown migration to OpenOffice.org 2 is 90% cheaper than migrating to Microsoft Office 2007.

For more information and references to the reports, please see http://why.openoffice.org

As announced by OpenOffice.org, open source makes sense when you need a commodity product like office software. Combine OpenOffice with a few web applications like Writely, Google Spreadsheets and Gliffy and you’re all set for your business needs.

Open Source LMS

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A lot of people come to this site searching for “open source LMS”. These are some of the web-based learning systems that I have used, and would recommend:
  • Elgg – for informal web-enabled learning where the learner is the centre of it all. Though still in its early development, I would recommend Elgg as a virtual space to foster community outside of the course-based LMS.
  • Moodle -a constructivist web environment for more formal learning with an extensive user base worldwide. Combining Elgg and Moodle makes an excellent choice for formal and informal learning.
  • ATutor – a Canadian-based web learning system designed for accessibility and with a number of easy to add modules, such as collaboration.

There are many others, many of which are reviewed on EduTools, and I’d suggest that you go to my Open Source for Learning lens for further links.

NB schools to receive more laptops

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It looks like the New Brunswick public education sector is slowly advancing into the 21st century. The government announced today that, “About 2,900 grades 7, 8 and 9 students at 27 New Brunswick schools will have a notebook computer in the fall of 2006 …”. On a personal note, this is not that positive, because only one school in our district, and no schools in our town are on the list. Oh well, we get to continue enjoying the 20th century and the industrial era for a while longer.

Update: After a little more digging and a few conversations, I think that a few factors in this school laptop initiative have to be raised.

All of the computers in the school will be loaded with Microsoft Windows and MS Office. This may seem like a real deal for our education system but it is really creating a continuing market for MS products. The students get used to using the Win/Office combination so that’s what they’ll use at home or after graduation. MS has even offered this great deal:

Partners in Learning School Agreement – offers upgrades for Microsoft® Windows® operating system for free and Office software for no more than $4.00 per year, per desktop to Canadian schools considered disadvantaged.

Given that the initial laptop program had 500 computers, and this initiative has an additional 2,900 plus the 6,000 notebooks provided to all NB teachers, there are at least 9,400 new computers in the system. Paying $4 per year per computer for Microsoft products costs – $37,600. Had the government decided to use a basic Linux system, complete with ALL the necessary applications, such as the free and open source UNESCO Young Digital Creators CD, the cost would be $0.00 (zero). It would also be free to copy and put on home computers and it would be free forever.

Even my own public education district, financed by Canadian taxpayers, is using paid staff to train teachers on American produced proprietary software applications. This is not a rant against our US neighbours, but I would rather have seen the money go to developing some “made-in-New Brunswick” capacities.

Tutorcasts – community-built learning objects

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My good friend Dave Cormier has started Tutorcasts, self-described as:

Tutorcasts is meant to be a repository (and directory) of screencasts available for educational purposes. If you would like to become a part of this group, please sign up and post your screencast information.

The first example, made by Dave, is An introduction to Wikipedia. The site is still in its infancy, but I think this will take off.

Dave used Camtasia to create the tutorial. Camtasia retails for $299 but has a free 30-day trial . Microsoft Encoder, which is free, could also do the trick, but not as well. Thanks for leading the way, Dave.

Cheap Web Conferencing Tool Selection

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This past week I’ve been testing out some tools for audio and web conferencing for our Informl Learning Unworkshop. The platforms range from free, to pay, to open source, and each option has its pros and cons. Free programs, like Skype for audio and Vyew for slide presentations and text chat, are just fine if you want something that is quick and simple to set up. There is a still a learning curve, as I learned with our skypecast, but little technical skill is required. The problem with these free systems is that they don’t scale well. For instance, you can’t run a private skypecast, nor can you run Vyew on your intranet (at least not for free).

If you are planning on using a system inside your company or your Intranet/Extranet then you may want to start with an open source system. It will require more technical expertise to get the software operating on your server, but you will own the installation and code and will be able to grow it according to your business needs. One of the few available open source web conferencing tools is Canadian-made ePresence. I haven’t tried it out yet, but it appears to be fairly stable.

Another option would be to pay for a service or proprietary system. The trade-off with these proprietary systems is that you will have a packaged solution, but you won’t own the code. System upgrades may cost you more money than anticipated, and you can’t “look under the hood”. There are dozens, if not hundreds, of web conferencing systems on the market. These range in price up to hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. Unfortunately, you don’t always get what you pay for. One of the lowest cost systems, which also interoperates with skype, is Persony, available for a one-time cost of $299 and recommended by the web collaboration guru, Robin Good.

There’s a good range of options available today but you have to test these tools within the context of your operations. For instance, certain platforms work better with international conferences. Others are great when all of the participants are in North America, but break down when you add people from across oceans. Try them out first.

Elgg update

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I’m a great fan of the Elgg learning landscape and feel that this blogging, eportfolio, social networking platform is an excellent vehicle for informal learning and filling in the cracks created by those pesky LMS/LCMS that academic institutions insist on using.

This past year David Tosh and the Elgg community have been busy with several upgrades to the system. For instance, the Elgg-Moodle integration is moving ahead, as is Elgg-WebCT. Other improvements are listed on the Elgg roadmap. Another great resource is the University of Leeds Tour of Elgg and overview of blogging tutorial.