Re: gbook

[Bruno Vernier <vernier@vc.bc.ca>]

On Thu, Dec 10, 1998 at 03:00:10PM -0500, Justin Maurer wrote:

> popping op. i also still have to learn xml (btw, i don't like IMS stuff.
> someone else can write that. i'll just have <assignment> <score> etc.
> tags.

Long live your freedom to do as you like :-)  

That includes making up your own private XML tags.  :-)

I hope at least a few people here are interested in a common set of XML tags
that might end up becoming the standard for educational software
import/export.  This will save us from having to write conversion programs
so that your Gbook will work with mark data produced by other commercial and
freeware programs.

The idea is that when a teacher wants to try out your program, they don't
need to start from scratch; they just use your program and point to their
XML standardized data and play with your program ... If they played with it
for 3 weeks, the work they would have done on it would be saved (in say
EDUML format) and then they try yet another gradebook or return to a
previous one without ever having to repeat the data. (no time wasted, no risk)

I could easily have my students produce a 100 gradebooks but none of them
will ever be used by any teacher unless they are compatible to a standard.
The trouble is that there is no standard.  So far, IMS is not a standard and
even if it were, it has a particular focus on distance education mainly.
This is why I am pushing for EDUML ; an educational specific XML set of tags.

Programmers knowingly or unknowingly choose between writing:

1. educational programs that store in EDUML (emerging education XML standard)

2. educational programs that store in some private format but do import and
   export in EDUML (advantage: freedom for programmer, possible gain in
   speed; disadvantage: can't work simultaneously with other EDUML compliant
   programs due to delay before data is exported again)

3. educational programs that store in some private format and have no
   provision for import/export in EDUML; (disadvantage: someone has to
   write a data converter or patch the program to import/export)
   
A teacher's point of view:
-------------------------

I work with administrative and educational programs from various companies
... none of which have any provision for communicating with the others.

As soon as we have a complete working set of EDUML tags (hopefully by the
end of this year), I will be converting all the data I work with into that
format ... writing or having students write the conversion programs from the
existing commercial programs into the EDUML standard.

Then I will rewrite my three programs (report card generator, + test
generators) to work natively with this format ... or at least to
import/export EDUML.

Finally, I will write and have my students write creative software that
displays, changes, manipulates EDUML data in various interesting and
hopefully useful ways... and then sit back (do workshops) and watch which
programs get actually used by the teachers I work with.

I respect and celebrate your freedom to start programming before EDUML comes
out, but remember that as a teacher, I don't want (just) more possibilities,
I want interoperability at long last!

Bruno