Physics meets the Virtual University

1. Physics meetsthe Virtual University DCOMP 01 Meeting MIT June 25 2001 Geoffrey Fox Florida State University Department of Computer Science and CSIT (School of Computational Science and Information Technology) 400 Dirac Science Library Tallahassee Florida 32306-4120 fox@csit.fsu.edu physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

2. Distance and Web-based Education • http://aspen.csit.fsu.edu/collabtools • “From Computational Science to Internetics: Integration of Science with Computer Science”http://www.new-npac.org/users/fox/documents/internetics2 • Curriculum developed as web-pages: “Learning Objects” • Improving Standards enable higher quality authoring such as Macromedia Flash or Adobe Illustrator or nifty physics interactive simulations • Delivered at a distance (needs collaboration technology), in-class and/or asynchronously viewed by students in their own time • Learning Management Systems such as Blackboard offer • Student registration, Quizzes, Grading, Security • Database or better XML Storage • IMS and ADL standards allow reusability • Important implications for “business model for education” physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

3. 3-Tier Architecture for Education Portal ObjectRepository Database • Everything is an Object: Curriculum, Users, grades, computers – all are defined in XML • XML very important in online education as objects quite small, are naturally decentralized and have rich important metadata • There are several important Object Models: COM, CORBA, Java, ExcelWeb, flat file, Oracle Database …… • But model doesn’t matter!! XMLFile System(Web Site) Request Or Export/Import Information Middle Tier“Business Logic”dissociates User and Back End physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

4. Portals in Education and Training • We are discussing Web-based education or portals to a virtual university or virtual corporate training center • Merrill Lynch predicts that Enterprise Information portal market will be $15B by 2002 • So assume that we are building education portals in terms of “Distributed Educational Objects” -- this is not really an assumption but a statement as to “language used” • Portals are built as a Collaborative customizable set of XML components ( e.g. Display a thumbnail of the next web-page in lecture, give in-class quiz or run a Particular Multi-media clip ) physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

5. What is Web-based Collaboration? Web Site Specify Page Receive Identical Page WebPage WebPage WebPage • Collaboration means sharing objects (Web Page very important object) • Web-based Collaboration implies use of Web to share distributed objects accessible through the Web • Shared Web Pages; Resources accessed through Web Servers or Brokers; Client-side applications with programmatic interfaces such as Java Physics Simulations Shared Page Shared Pointer physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

6. Why use Distance Education and Training? • New and rapidly changing Academic Curriculum such as Computational Physics or Complex Systems suggest the use of distance education as it will allow a few experts to deliver instruction to more students and this addresses both • The shortage of trained faculty • Offering classes with small enrollments at one university • cost of developing new curriculumQUICKLY requires many students (say around 5-10 times traditional class) to amortize cost • Distance Education is technically sound based on web curricula-- both synchronously and asynchronously -- today with very robust clear implementations available over next few years • Both delivery mechanism and identification of knowledge nuggets (such as computational physics) that are smaller than or different in content from a traditional degree suggests different approaches to certification • Courses are given, graded etc. by multiple organizations -- University integrate degrees? • Similar arguments for distance training with relative importance of synchronous and asynchronous learning differing by customer group physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

7. The Virtual University • Motivated either by decreased cost or increased quality of learning environment • Will succeed due to market pressures (it will offer the best product) • Assume that as with text books, only a few pedagogically excellent teachers will produce lectures; only a few charismatic souls deliver them • “Centers of Excellence” (“Hermits Cave Virtual University”) are natural entities to produce and deliver classes supported by good technology and wonderful graphics • University acts as an integrator putting together a set of classes where it may only teach some 20% but acts as a mentor to all physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

8. Courses at Jackson State • Taught using Tango since fall 97 over Internet and defense high performance network DREN twice a week from Syracuse • Course material based on Syracuse Senior Undergraduate class CPS406(Web Technologies) and graduate classes CPS615/616/640(Base Computational science/Internetics) • Curricula, Homework, Grading, Facilities done by Syracuse • Students get JSU NOT Syracuse Credit • Jackson State major HBC University with many computer science graduates • Do not compete with base courses but offer addon courses with “leading edge” material (Web Technology, modern scientific computing) which give JSU (under)graduates skills that are important in their career • Fall 99 Semester CPS640 offered to 40 students in 5 distant places and separately 40 at Syracuse • Fall 2001 restart with “latest technology” (Access Grid, HearMe, Garnet) physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

9. Architecture of Tango Distance Education Share URL’s Audio Video ConferencingChat Rooms White Boards etc. JSU Web (Proxy)Server NPAC WebServer Student’s View ofCurriculum Page Teacher’s View ofCurriculum Page Java TangoServer HTTP Address at JSU ofCurriculum Page ……. Java Sockets ……. Java Control Clients Teacher/Lecturer at NPAC Participants at JSU All Curricula placed on the Web physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

10. > Two Shared Physics Simulations – SHO and Vector cross product> Chat Room> Audio video conferencing physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

11. What did this lead to? • Jackson State students got access to curricula that was not otherwise available to them • Developed quite good Information Technology and computational science curricula • Jackson State faculty acted as mentors in course and now teach some of material in their own courses and to other HBCU colleges • Make rapidly changing and important curricula available to an HBCU network -- could dramatically improve curricula opportunities for HBCU students • JSU has institutional commitment to area • Used in High School Java, DoD wide training and Winter 00 semester as part of ERDC Graduate Institute • Supports migrant teachers -- I have delivered course spring 00 semester from Syracuse, FSU and ERDC, Vicksburg physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

12. Saturday Java Academy http://old-npac.csit.fsu.edu/projects/k12javaspring99/ physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

13. Current Status and Futures • Commercial Systems such as Centra, WebEx, Anabas and Placeware offer similar functionality to our old system Tango for synchronous collaboration • Shared applications, chatroom, whiteboard, A/V conferencing • Blackboard, WebCT, Lotus offer learning management systems – need to switch to IMS, ADL standards; high-end authoring and XML based technology (not databases or files) • Access Grid (community e.g. classroom) and HearMe (desktop) are new internet audio-video systems which are be used with shared object systems • I develop research systems Gateway and Garnet for education and computational science portals • Feature hand-held and desktop clients, integrated collaboration and some “technical advances” – major use of XML, shared SVG • Peer to Peer Grids suggest decentralized architecture (http://www.jxta.org) physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

14. Commercial CollaborationSystems Centra PlaceWareWebEx physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

15. SVG Sharing PC to PDA Batik Viewer on PC PowerPoint can be converted to SVGvia Illustrator or Web export physicsvirtuniv mitjune01

16. Access Grid (Argonne, NCSA) and HearMe Presenter camera Presenter mic Ambient mic (tabletop) Audience camera Access Grid: CommunityHearMe: desktop integrates phonesand Internet Audio physicsvirtuniv mitjune01