Cloud computing for authoring process automation

Malinka Ivanova, Technical University - Sofia

George Ivanov, Mathematical School, Blagoevgrad

WCES 2010 , 04-08 February, Istanbul, Turkey

AimExploring and analyzing the possibilities for automation of the authoring process in the Web 2.0 cloud and prototyping a model

Outline

• The concept of cloud computing in the educational sector

• Present Web specification and Authoring 2.0• Automated authoring process in the Web 2.0

Cloud• Utilized Web 2.0 Applications for Authoring

in Edu 2.0 and beyond• Conclusion

Cloud Computing

Cloud Computing includes both the applications delivered as services over the Internet and the hardware and systems software in the data centres that provide those services

PaaS SaaS IaaS

Cloud Computing in Higher Education

• Increases IT capacity

• Adds on the fly capabilities

• Without investing in new infrastructure

• No need for new training

• No need for the licensing new software

• No need to setup, configure and

manage large physical installations

• Allows centralized storage

• Provides memory, processing and bandwidth

• Reduces/eliminates problems

associated with software version installation, control and updates

Advantages

• Depends on

Internet connection

• Possibility for

cloud disappearing

• Lack of control• Depending on a

third party to ensure the security and confidentiality

Disadvantages

Cloud Computing in Higher EducationIt brings many benefits and innovative opportunities to

the authors of learning content: it provides expanding opportunities for resource creation and dynamic combination

for sharing and transferring resources between management systems (LMS, LCMS)

for achieving greater experimentation and agile applications usage

for increasing the possibility for participation and contribution among systems and applications

for achieving efficiency, high utilization, and productivity

Authoring 2.0 :

A process of content creation in an interactiveand collaborative way utilizing Web 2.0applications and services and their remixingfrom various sources for building alearning/teaching environment

Web Specification

It is a cause for social interactions and discourses that arebases for an iterative collaborative authoring process

From a static to a more dynamic, interactive, and social

Read/write web

Web applications - Wikis, Blogs, Forums, CMS - with friendly GUI, inviting educators to add content directly

Educators and students are active content contributors

From one information source where information is consumed to many sources that can be remixed

A wide range of social networks are formed building online communities of educators, researchers, students whoshare and examine the common interests and/or activities

Networked webAn authoring process is more than an individual possess - the behaviour of an individual is affected by the kinds of relations and technical ties

Network effect benefits: the number of contributions grows, the quality of information on the website improves, the authoring process is transparent

The networked web influences on the performance of authoring tasks of both educators and students

Web Specification

Personalization technologies put the studentin the center of an interaction, application or service ensuringrich learning experiences acrossactivities, devices, services,locations and networks

Personalized Web

Personalization involves technologies to accommodate the differences between individuals

Web personalization - a strategy that requires implicitly or explicitly collecting user information

The implicit personalization – services utilize: presentation agents, tracking and profiling, notification

The explicit personalization - the web page is changed by the author using the features provided by the system

The author can personalize (1) the content, (2) the services, (3) the student's interactions to enhance his/her experiences with applications and services

Hybrid personalization – implicit +explicit

Web Specification

Mashable web

New authoring tools are developed that enable non-technical authors to create sophisticated products without programming

Educators develop custom mashups to illustrate concepts as they teach

Students include them in artefacts, reports and assignments

The power of mashups for education lies in the way they help new conclusions reaching or new relationships discerning by uniting large amounts of data in a manageable way

MashUps – a combinationof separate, stand-alone technologies into a novel application or service

Web Specification

Visual webVisualization - a mapping process from computer representations to perceptual representations, choosing encoding techniques to maximize human understanding and communication

The goal of an educator - to visualize phenomena or concepts for the student’s deeper understanding and thinking stimulation

Web 2.0 technologies propose dynamic visualization tools: visual search engines, timelines, tools for organization of personal notes, plans, ideas, simulations

Educators can present in an interactive visual way gathered and explored knowledge

Web Specification

Semantic web

Three views of the term semantic web: the vision, the program and the technology

The vision - an extension of the current Web in which information is given well-defined meaning, better enabling computers and people to work in cooperation (Matthews, 2005)

Several applications of which authors can take advantage: from web browsing to research, blogging, and collaboration

Semantic Web offers complicated well-developed logic based technologies for knowledge processing

Web Specification

RSS - a powerful research tool aiding educators and students in performing in depthresearch both individually and collaboratively by sharing and combining feeds across

various sources

RSS syndicated web

RSS technology allows an aggregator to check the subscribed feeds and to collect all the new content from many sites

The educator - create feeds about any topic, can make a syndicated feed of search results

Students - arrange individualized, syndicated web pages creating large repositories of knowledge

Web Specification

Virtual web

Different educational strategies : for individual, group, collaborative work, for experiments, simulations and research, for university students, life-long or self-paced learners

Educators have tools for authoring of flexible and attractive teaching/learning environment, automating the objects generation, publishing and presenting

The flat 2D web is replaced by an immersive and highly social 3D online world - the teaching/learning process is translated in virtual worlds

Web Specification

Augmented web

AR - takes technologies that add contextual data to deepen a person’s understanding of the subject

At this moment there are few authoring tools to support educators, creating AR applications

Web Specification

Open web

On the web the educational materials of many open courses are shared for reusage in concrete context with minimal restrictions

The main purpose is the broadest possible dissemination of knowledge

Open software and open code is widely adopted in Higher education - the possibilities for modification, integration, no restriction on other software, technology neutrality, license policy

Web Specification

Automated authoring process - the sequence of actions that the author performs utilizing applications and services in order to build a complete teaching/learning environment

Techniques that automate and facilitate content authoring:

Templates usage- Allows the fast creation of unique content and automatic publishing

- to control the automatic content generation - to format multiple

application pages with little or no hand-crafting

Techniques that automate and facilitate content authoring:

Generation of embed code

- Created, uploaded and edited content can be converted into embed code - It can easily be integrated in other applications and sites- It gives huge possibilities for authors to create a flexible, extendable mashup learning/teaching environment

Techniques that automate and facilitate content authoring:

Different media format conversion- The automatic conversion from one media format to another - Support the author in the easy distribution of created content - Facilitate content integration in a wide range of media environments on different platforms, including PDA and mobile versions

Techniques that automate and facilitate content authoring:

Sharing function- Developed content can be shared, voted and favorited- It automates the publishing process in different media sites such as: Facebook, Twitter, Digg

Techniques that automate and facilitate content authoring:

Automatic tag generation- Social tags are author-generated keywords associated with some resource on the Web

- They are an important component of content searching and folksonomy forming- The tags can be automatically created, applied and dynamically shared

Techniques that automate and facilitate content authoring:

Localization- Localization of blogs, RSS feeds, Wiki and knowledge bases is increasing - In many social applications the translators are integrated and content can be globally accessible

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Read/Write Virtual

VisualAugmented

Networked Perso

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Mashable Semanti

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syndicated

Open

analyze

design

Templates usage

Embed code generation

Media format

conversion

Sharing functions

Iterative process

Collaborativeprocess

Bottom-up process

Virtual process

Working in cloud

Rich tools for non-technical authors

Different output formats

Features for automation

Authoring in Web Clouds

Authoring in Edu 2.0

Authoring in Edu 2.0

Authoring in Edu 2.0

Authoring in Edu 2.0

Authoring in Edu 2.0

Authoring in Edu 2.0

Authoring process in Edu 2.0 and beyond

Beyond:

Creation of:

Media content

Instructions

Profiles

In Edu 2.0:

HTML Editor

Blog WikiRSS

Widgets

Media authoring

Assignments

Community

Networks

Concepts authoring

Conclusion

• The authoring process in the clouds of the contemporary Web : – It is an individual, but not a stand-alone process– It is a collaborative, creative, iterative, virtual process – Gives authors powerful functions for automation of

content production, remixing, conversion and publishing

• The IT automation– Increases productivity and tasks performance

The images from the clouds:http://a.images.blip.tv/KerryJ-NotYetThreeInSecondLife974.jpghttp://tecnofreaks.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/bluecloud_400.jpg http://novini24.files.wordpress.com/2009/05/google.jpg http://www.jumpingbean.co.za/files/files/sun_microsystems_banner.jpg http://blogmines.com/blog/images/upload/2006/09/WindowsLiveWriter/7754c173b35c_1261A/Microsoft%20Office%5B5%5D.jpg

http://www.sandia.gov/news-center/news-releases/2005/images/future-participants.jpg http://www.brianmicklethwait.com/images/uploads/ChicagoBridges.jpg http://www.hemmy.net/images/arts2/upsidedownhouse01.jpg http://www.duxburyeducationfoundation.org/mediac/400_0/media/IMG_2498.JPG http://lifeboat.com/images/semantic.png http://nanobugle.files.wordpress.com/2008/12/second_life-nanobugle.jpg http://wits.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/magic-window-by-oldvidhead.jpg http://earth.google.com/intl/en_uk/outreach/images/balloon_all_templates.jpg http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ae/DecollageDeltaPlaneDuMontStJoseph.JPG

http://www.philosophyofinformation.net/blog/uploaded_images/ontology-758072.jpg http://whollysblog.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/flashing-lights-wallpaper2.jpg

Thank you for your attention!

… and let’s start the automated authoring process journey in the

clouds!

For contacts:m_ivanova@tu-sofia.bg