Unifying Distributed Processing and Open Hypertext through a Heterogeneous Communication Model

A successful distributed open hypermedia system can be characterised by a scaleable architecture which is inherently distributed. While the architects of distributed hypermedia systems have addressed the issues of providing and retrieving distributed resources, they have often neglected to design systems with the inherent capability to exploit the distributed processing of this information. The research presented in this paper describes the construction and use of an open hypermedia system concerned equally with both of these facets

A schema-based P2P network to enable publish-subscribe for multimedia content in open hypermedia systems

Open Hypermedia Systems (OHS) aim to provide efficient dissemination, adaptation and integration of hyperlinked multimedia resources. Content available in Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networks could add significant value to OHS provided that challenges for efficient discovery and prompt delivery of rich and up-to-date content are successfully addressed. This paper proposes an architecture that enables the operation of OHS over a P2P overlay network of OHS servers based on semantic annotation of (a) peer OHS servers and of (b) multimedia resources that can be obtained through the link services of the OHS. The architecture provides efficient resource discovery. Semantic query-based subscriptions over this P2P network can enable access to up-to-date content, while caching at certain peers enables prompt delivery of multimedia content. Advanced query resolution techniques are employed to match different parts of subscription queries (subqueries). These subscriptions can be shared among different interested peers, thus increasing the efficiency of multimedia content dissemination

Personalisation and recommender systems in digital libraries

Widespread use of the Internet has resulted in digital libraries that are increasingly used by diverse communities of users for diverse purposes and in which sharing and collaboration have become important social elements. As such libraries become commonplace, as their contents and services become more varied, and as their patrons become more experienced with computer technology, users will expect more sophisticated services from these libraries. A simple search function, normally an integral part of any digital library, increasingly leads to user frustration as user needs become more complex and as the volume of managed information increases. Proactive digital libraries, where the library evolves from being passive and untailored, are seen as offering great potential for addressing and overcoming these issues and include techniques such as personalisation and recommender systems. In this paper, following on from the DELOS/NSF Working Group on Personalisation and Recommender Systems for Digital Libraries, which met and reported during 2003, we present some background material on the scope of personalisation and recommender systems in digital libraries. We then outline the working group’s vision for the evolution of digital libraries and the role that personalisation and recommender systems will play, and we present a series of research challenges and specific recommendations and research priorities for the field

A Microservice Infrastructure for Distributed Communities of Practice

Non-formal learning in Communities of Practice (CoPs) makes up a significant portion of today’s knowledge gain. However, only little technological support is tailored specifically towards CoPs and their particular strengths and challenges. Even worse, CoPs often do not possess the resources to host or even develop a software ecosystem to support their activities. In this paper, we describe a distributed, microservice-based Web infrastructure for non-formal learning in CoPs. It mitigates the need for central infrastructures, coordination or facilitation and takes into account the constant change of these communities. As a real use case, we implement an inquiry-based learning application on-top of our infrastructure. Our evaluation results indicate the usefulness of this learning application, which shows promise for future work in the domain of community-hosted, microservice-based Web infrastructures for learning outside of formal settings

A social personalized adaptive e-learning environment : a case study in Topolor

Adaptive e-Learning is a process where learning contents are delivered to learners adaptively, namely, the appropriate contents are delivered to the learners in an appropriate way at an appropriate time based on the learners’ needs, knowledge, preferences and other characteristics. Social e-Learning is a process where connections are made among like-minded learners, so they can achieve learning goals via communication and interaction with each other by sharing knowledge, skills, abilities and materials. This paper reports an extended case study that investigated the influence of social interactions in an adaptive e-Learning environment, by analyzing the usage of social interaction features of a Social Personalized Adaptive E-Learning Environment (SPAEE), named Topolor, which strives to combine the advantages from both social e-Learning and adaptive e-Learning. We present the results of a quantitative case study that evaluates the perceived usefulness and ease of use. The results indicated high satisfaction from the students who were using Topolor for their study and helped us with the evaluation processes. Based on the results, we discuss the follow-up work plan for the further improvements for Topolor

IDR : a participatory methodology for interdisciplinary design in technology enhanced learning

One of the important themes that emerged from the CAL’07 conference was the failure of technology to bring about the expected disruptive effect to learning and teaching. We identify one of the causes as an inherent weakness in prevalent development methodologies. While the problem of designing technology for learning is irreducibly multi-dimensional, design processes often lack true interdisciplinarity. To address this problem we present IDR, a participatory methodology for interdisciplinary techno-pedagogical design, drawing on the design patterns tradition (Alexander, Silverstein & Ishikawa, 1977) and the design research paradigm (DiSessa & Cobb, 2004). We discuss the iterative development and use of our methodology by a pan-European project team of educational researchers, software developers and teachers. We reflect on our experiences of the participatory nature of pattern design and discuss how, as a distributed team, we developed a set of over 120 design patterns, created using our freely available open source web toolkit. Furthermore, we detail how our methodology is applicable to the wider community through a workshop model, which has been run and iteratively refined at five major international conferences, involving over 200 participants

SmartBook: The New Generation e-Book Meets University 2.0

This paper presents a vision for the future of the e-books as part of the growing collective intelligence. The vision entails further development of technologies that will facilitate the creation and use of a new generation of ‘smart’ books: e-books that are evolving, highly interactive, customisable, adaptable, intelligent, and furnished with a rich set of collaborative authoring and reading support services. The proposed set of tools will be integrated into an intelligent framework for collaborative book authoring and experiencing called SmartBook. The paper also discusses the opportunities to use SmartBook as a vehicle for building professional virtual communities of practice in the framework of a University 2.0 organization dedicated to industry-university cooperation

A Review of Personalised E-Learning: Towards Supporting Learner Diversity

The realisation of personalised e-learning to suit an individual learner’s diverse learning needs is a concept which has been explored for decades, at great expense, but is still not achievable by non-technical authors. This research reviews the area of personalised e-learning and notes some of the technological challenges which developers may encounter in creating authoring tools for personalised e-learning and some of the pedagogical challenges which authors may encounter when creating personalised e-learning activities to enhance the learning experience of their students. At present educators who wish to create personalised e-learning activities require the assistance of technical experts who are knowledgeable in the area. Even with the help of an expert the creation of personalised e-learning activities still remains a complex process to authors who are new to the concept of tailoring e-learning to suit learner diversity. Before the successful utilisation of adaptive authoring tools can be realised, academic authors need to learn how to effectively use these tools. All learners come to education with a diverse set of characteristics; educators need to decide which learner characteristic(s) they wish to focus on addressing through the use of personalised e-learning activities. Further investigation, evaluation and analyses of authoring tools is required before personalised e-learning to support learner diversity can be achieved by many academics. Research members of the AMAS (2013) project team are currently involved in developing an authoring tool for adaptive activities for e-learning

Third international workshop on Authoring of adaptive and adaptable educational hypermedia (A3EH), Amsterdam, 18-22 July, 2005

The A3EH follows a successful series of workshops on Adaptive and Adaptable Educational Hypermedia. This workshop focuses on models, design and authoring of AEH, on assessment of AEH, conversion between AEH and evaluation of AEH. The workshop has paper presentations, poster session and panel discussions