Drupal for Higher Education and Virtual Learning
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Drupal for Virtual LearningAnd Higher Education
Next generation virtual learning
Most Virtual Learning solutions include at least the following:
- a repository of learning objects: various resources used to build a course or a training
- an infrastructure for communication: email, chat, videoconferencing
Next generation virtual learning
Usually we get fast and scalable solution for these reqs: - from proprietary platforms - $$$$$- building up our own meshup solutions using open source technologies
The challenge
● A typical modern university VLE:● Must accomodate tens of thousands of users● Must store hundreds of thousands, maybe millions
of objects (not necessarily documents) together with semantic metadata
● Must deliver content over the net – distance learning, online courses
● Must integrate with academic regulations, has special workflows
● Must have excellent community features
Drupal
● Drupal is a solution already implemented in many universities
● Stands out as a higly flexible framework
● Is a platform for social web applications
● Semantic web ready
Next generation virtual learning
Recent solutions: Open Source, well financed, large support communities
Some examples:
Fedora Commons: http://www.fedora-commons.org/ An application providing the infrastructure to create huge repositories – Cornell University, DuraSpace Foundation
BigBlueButton: http://bigbluebutton.org/ A university oriented videoconferencing server based on several open source technologies (Flex, Asterisk, Red5 etc.)
Here comes the juice
● Fedora Commons and Drupal● Islandora: a set of Drupal modules developed at
Robertson Library at the University of Prince Edward Island: http://islandora.ca
● Fedora REST Api: a module developed by Don Gourley at Digital Humanities Observatory
● BigBlueButton and Drupal: http://drupal.org/project/bbb - sanduhrs from erdfisch.de. Still in development, but doing the job
What can we do with them?
Develop a Drupal based virtual leaning application for higher education or corporate training.
FEDORA COMMONS:Create huge repositories with thematic and semantically organized collections of resources:
- we're talking about millions of objects: documents, images, complex objects (several pdfs + images + xls files + whatever you need to store)
- store metadata, develop controlled vocabularies for your collections
- index and search with Apache Solr- get objects from the repostory into Drupal and do
whatever you want with them
What can we do with them?
Develop a Drupal based virtual leaning application for higher education or corporate training.
BigBlueButton
- Get 100 people together and do a videoconference delivering a training with full duplex communication and high quality VOIP- Broadcast whatever course materials you have and share desktops- Have user roles in the events: moderators, participants etc.- in the near future: record conferences
● A platform for creating large archives (repositories)
● We can store, access (with access policies) and manage any kind of resources
● It is extensible, it provides a set of APIs for developing tools, ingesting and retrieving data
● It is open source and has a big and growing community
http://encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org
http://dho.ie/drapier/ - Drupal and FC
Some technical details● FC is implemented by using Java services
(Tomcat)● Everything is a data object● Each data object can have datastreams● A datastream holds digital content or
metadata about the data object● Each data object may implement various
relationships to any number of other objects
Some technical details● Each data object is represented by a XML file● FC manages the XML: stores data about
● How to find components of the object (datastreams)
● The history of object's alterations● Access and use policies, checksums
● The whole deployment can be restored from a backup of these XML files
Digital objects - basic components
● PID: A persistent, unique identifier for the object.
● Object Properties: A set of system-defined descriptive properties that are necessary to manage and track the object in the repository.
● Datastream(s): The element in a Fedora digital object that represents a content item:
eg. Dublin Core metadata, high-res image, low-res image etc.
FOXML: a simple XML format that directly expresses the Fedora Digital Object Model
● Each data object is represented by a FOXML file
● FOXML files are also used to ingest or export objects
● The schema reflects the basic structure of a digital object
<digitalObject PID="uniqueID">
<!-- there are a set of core object properties --> <objectProperties> <property/> <property/> ... </objectProperties>
<!-- there can be zero or more datastreams --> <datastream> <datastreamVersion/> <datastreamVersion/> ... </datastream>
</digitalObject>
Fedora Commons has a steap learning curve, just like Drupal
Detailed documentation on:http://www.fedora-commons.org
● FC is a toolkit for building repositories● Needs some serious development effort to
build the data models● It is easier to work with it by using some of the
front-ends● Islandora: a front end based on Drupal● Fedora REST Api: an implementation of FC API's
allowing for custom development of FC front-ends and data consuming applications based on Drupal
Islandora
● Provides a basic front end to FC (there is still a lot of work to be done at FC level to create a new repository)
● Provides authentication and roles based on Drupal user tables
● Allows the creation of views from FC collections (no UI, just XSLT templates)
● Allows the ingestion of new objects into collection
● Integrates Apache SOLR search
Islandora
● Demo using Islandora VirtualBox appliance● Download it from: http://islandora.ca
● Local IP: 192.168.56.101● OpenSolaris: root/opensolaris● Islandora: admin/demo
Islandora● Pros
● Almost out of the box solution● It is pretty versatile for searching, browsing and
ingesting new objects● It is a very good starting point for developing FC
based applications with Drupal● Cons
● Does not store anything in Drupal tables, it just links to records.
● There is not so much integration with other Drupal modules like CCK, Taxonomy, Views
● Does not fully implement FC APIs, so extenting is an issue
Fedora REST API module
● More Drupal like approach contributed a few weeks ago
● Developed by Don Gourley – Digital Humanities Observatory, Ireland
● Still as CVS project application, I hope it will get on: http://drupal.org/node/793616
● Provides a full implementation of FC APIs, unlike a similar Drupal CVS application: http://drupal.org/node/771670
Fedora REST API module● What it does:
● Provides an interface to access all FC REST methods (more details in a moment)
● Implements a content type “fedora object”for representing a digital object from FC
● Hook implementations for mapping any digital object to Drupal nodes
● Admin interface for mass importing of objects from FC collections
● Basic tools for developing a fully integrated interface to DC:– Workflows– User access– Taxonomies, CCK etc
Fedora REST API module
● Two main Fedora Commons APIs● API-A: Fedora Access
– “fulfill a client's request for dissemination”– Methods for repository access, object access (find, get
history, get profile), datastream (retrieve actual content or metadata) etc.
● API-M: Fedora Manage– Create, modify, delete objects or components of digital
objects– Manage datastreams, relationships and objects
● Fedora REST API exposes a subset of API-A and API-M as a RESTful Web Service
Fedora REST API module
● A live implementation: http://dho.ie/drapier/ ● A local demo with FC demo collection – some
basic functions● Check Don's Git workspace:
http://github.com/dongourley/fedora_rest
Delivering training● BigBlueButton
BigBlueButton
● http://drupal.org/project/bbb● Content type to hold session/conference schedule● Implements BBB API: meeting intiation, status,
joining, reports
Solutions for a large scale app
● Repository: Fedora Commons● Repository front end: Drupal based front end
for Fedora Commons – Islandora/Fedora REST API
● Indexing and search: Apache Solr● Video conferencing: Big Blue Button● Virtual Learning Platform: Drupal