Dynamic Appearance Model Analysis Alternatives

							Dynamic Appearance Model:
Analysis & Alternatives
   Captain Peter Hope, MA
 Department of National Defence
       Scott Wolff, PhD
     Sun Microsystems, Inc.
         October 2003
Outline
 Dynamic Appearance Model (DAM) brief
 overview
 Business and SCORM drivers for DAM
 Use case
 Issues in implementing the DAM
 Way ahead/Next steps
Who Cares?
 Dynamic Appearance fits SOME
 business models
 Sharing, Reusing and Repurposing of
 content is LIMITED
 Distributed Content Repositories
 Granular SCOs
“Another Brick in the Wall”
Background
 2002 - DAM (Dynamic Appearance Model) white
 paper published by DND & Online-Learning
 DAM specifies mechanisms and proposes
 extensions to Share, Reuse & Repurpose content
   Separate content, organization & presentation

   Allow each to vary independently

   Addresses business needs to repurpose
    learning
   Addresses issues in learning effectiveness

 2001 - DND and Sun R&D Partnership to
 demonstrate feasibility of DAM
 <adlnav:presentation> element in SCORM 1.3
Business Drivers-Today
 Vendors develop and sell learning experiences,
 not learning objects
 These learning experiences tightly integrate
 content, organization & presentation
 Need to deliver branded content
 Need to deliver the same training in multiple
 formats on multiple platforms
 Accessibility is a legal requirement in some
 countries – W3C levels 1 & 2
 Today's integrated model limits the Sharing,
 Reusing and Repurposing of content
SCORM Drivers
 Reusability requires abstraction
   No specific pedagogical model presumed

   Need to reuse across training contexts

   Delivery to various platforms

 Look and feel must also be abstracted
   Appropriate presentation styling applied to
    SCO at learning time
   Presentation is separated from content

   Content vendor no longer controls all

    aspects of learning experience
Use Case
 Army, Navy, Air Force
 CLF/Section 508
 Levels, Language
 LINUX, Windows, PDA,…
Branding
SCORM/Web Issues
    SCORM client-side execution
       ECMAScript limitations and point fixes
       Results in fragility and expense
    Web Architecture Implications
       Users expect browser navigation to work
       Maintaining state with stateless and
        connectionless protocols
       Unfulfilled requests should return
        something!
SCORM Implementation Issues
 Multi-page SCOs
    First and last page
    Initialize() and Finish() threads to trigger
     navigation events
 Cross Domain Scripting
    ADL White paper published in October 2003
    See ADL Tech Team Presentation –
     McConomy @ 1030 today
Way Ahead
 Whitepaper options
    What content needs an Appearance?
    How is Appearance tied to content?
    What needs to be defined as Appearance?
 Prototype – University of Toronto/ATRC
    Limits of XML Style Sheet Transformations
    Limits of CSS
    SCORM 1.3 LMS
<adlnav:presentation>?
 Separate Content from Presentation
 Content Structure
 Style Sheets
 Learning Content Models
    Docbook
    QTI
Characteristics of Solution
 Basic Content Structure
    Granularity
    Single Source
 XSL Processing
    Multiple formats/platforms
    API
 Extensions?
    Navigation elements/AICC AGR
 Content Model or Markup Language?
Whitepapers
 Dynamic Appearance Model
    St-Pierre, Hope and Skublics
       http://www.online-learning.com/papers/SCORMModel.pdf

 Dynamic Appearance Model – Analysis
 of Alternatives
    St-Pierre, Hope, Fear, Hahn, & Wolff
       http://training.sun.com/US/images/pdf/DynamicAnalysis.pdf
Contacts

SUN Microsystems        DND - DLN Test Lab
  Scott.Wolff@Sun.com     Hope.ph@forces.gc.ca