Some resolution seems finally to be on its way from the Blackboard Vs Desire2Learn patent infringement trial. The trial starts Feb 11, 2008 and will run for approximately 2 weeks.

Good luck Desire2Learn!

There was a time when all I spoke about was SVMs! That was a fun time and perhaps I should have continued my PHD and not gotten consumed by my day job (where I built a tool to translate content to the Blackboard XML import/export). Will I ever get over it????? Maybe if I complain more!!!

SVM’s are now easier than ever to use without having to implement the complex Mathematics yourself. Jeez — the Ruby and Python libs put SVMs at your fingertips. Check out this article on using SVM and Ruby to implement a SPAM filter. SVMs are great at complex classification eg document classification. This could be the most enlightening thing you read all year and the year is still young. Save yourself from the CRUD that is web development. Save yourself while you can!!!

Janison, an Australian company that builds Learning Management Systems will be teaming up with the University of Woollongong on an ARC grant to “create strategies and tools to help university teachers design effective online learning experiences“. Based on the previous output of the University of Woolongong (eg multimedia and learning design work), I look forward to the outcomes and tools. Its great to see new Australian developments in this space and competition is always a good thing. Educational Institutions need to take an active role in the design and development of learning tools instead of the rather passive installation and release of systems that look like they are from 1996.

I sadly encountered the XML Situps pic about a year and a half ago - It was funny but I could not laugh! You see I was knee deep in the middle of porting content from a proprietary (Coldfusion based LMS) to Blackboard via their IMS-CP format (a zip make up of a manifest/hierarchy and xml files for each tool/content type used in the course/unit). I still recall trying to port a Quiz with multiple choice questions to the IMS-QTI spec. Would you believe it if I told you that a single multiple choice question represented in the IMS-QTI xml format takes up 150 lines? Probably not!!!!!

So now I still think this is funny and I can finally laugh out loud: XML Situps!

Ok so Blackboard have launched a new site catering to extension developers called EduGarage. ….So why is it that when I read EduGarage, I actually think EduRage???????

Anyway the site looks good and I’m glad they went with Confluence and not Blackboard.

Finally got some time to take a look at the Facebook app catalogue. Lots of apps that have no use or would just get annoying. I did however come across CourseFeed that integrates with Blackboard to show course content, announcements and rosters.

… But your school/uni must be supported - there is a list of supported school which will hopefully grow.

Some useful features even if your school is not supported:

• Course Wall
• File storage
• Share Course posts (feeds) with other students
• Who’s Online - via Facebook Profile

Kinda best of Facebook social collab mixed with content from Blackboard. … So why is Blackboard not doing the social stuff be default! Why?

via Mfeldstein.com. ….so 2 Judges have now ruled that claims 1-35 are not valid….

I guess we’ll be seeing this more and more - Commercial LMS starting to package, support and enhance various open source products. In this case Angel has enhanced TiddlyWiki and released the enhancements back to the community. This is a step in a great direction and one that is at odds with edu patents. Blackboard already has Wiki and Blog support via the Learning Objects building blocks. I do feel that there is merit in integrating Blackboard with something like XWiki or Confluence - both of which have excellent plugin architectures. Confluence is commercial but is just too good to be ignored. Anyway more on plugin architectures later…

Spring Batch just got released. Spring Batch is able to monitor multi-step batch applications and take care of resource management. Great for processing large amounts of data, which I am fortunate not to be doing anymore.

BTW:

• The Blackboard import/export feature would benefit greatly from Spring Batch.

Stats on LMS satisfaction in organisations of varying size from an elearning Guild survey. Moodle, the open source alternative, scored exceedingly well. Blackboard, as expected hits that average mark with ease. Does being open source and free lend itself to a better satisfaction rating? I don’t think so because there are still elements of cost of ownership and support.

… and this quote is quite accurate: “the people who have to work with the LMS day-to-day give a much lower satisfaction number than the managers and directors”