the new choice on the menu is here

The Learning Design Editor is now well into its development phase with a final release scheduled for the turn of the year. In preparation, we currently have a NEW beta version available for download: v2beta-20041125. You will also need a recent copy of the Java 2 Runtime Environment (at least 1.4.2_05).

As yet there is no installer for the tool; instead the Learning Design Editor is provided as a zip archive which must be unpacked. Choose a directory to unpack to: for instance c:\apps\. When unpacked, a directory entitled "reload-editor-v2beta-20041125" is created and the main program file reload-editor.jar will appear in this directory. You should be able to launch the Learning Design Editor just by double clicking on this icon. (If not, try associating .jar files with the javaw.exe file. This is installed when you install the Java Runtime Environment and should be somewhere like: C:\ ... \j2re1.4.2_05\bin\javaw.exe).

To create a new Learning Design, click File, New, IMS Learning Design. The software works in a similar way to the existing Reload Metadata and Content Packaging editor. At least initially, you may wish to use the IMS Learning Design specification documents as a reference to help you understand the elements and how they relate to each other. You can download the Learning Design specification from the IMS web site at http://www.imsglobal.org/learningdesign/index.cfm. You will have to provide your name and email address to gain access. For brief and simplistic overviews, the Learning Design and LD Early Access may also be useful. You will be able to save the Learning Design you create, but it may not record all the information you input - treat the software as beta and do not enter any critical information in to the tool.

To have a look at a completed Learning Design, Within the LD specification examples archive (also available from the IMS site above, the Versailles example (4.2) provides an illustration of a typical LD file. The Versailles example uses only Level A of the Learning Design specification. Although the LD Editor does not yet offer support for Level B and C, it will merely ignore Level B and C elements and should load all IMS LD example manifests.

As this is not a proper installation of Reload, it will steal its settings from the installed version of Reload (if there is one), so you may see familiar items in your recently opened items list etc. The content packaging and metadata editor functionality of the existing tool will work in this version however, help files are not included in this release.

Although the tools are not yet at the stage where they can be used to create complete Learning Designs, the User Interface is now almost feature complete and you can save and load existing designs. By downloading the tools and exploring the Learning Design editor screens, potential users can familiarise themselves with the tools and start to think how they might utilise them to create Learning Designs or merely explore and familiarise themselves with the specification.

We are keen to hear what you think about the Learning Design Editor. How do you expect to use it - can you see how it all fits together?

Remember however that Reload has been funded to create a reference implementation of the LD specification. As such we are not (yet) focused on creating a sophisticated editing application. Rather, our focus is to provide an efficient means of creating an IMS LD manifest file with access to all the relevant elements and observing all the valid relationships which can be specified. By all means suggest ideas for how second generation User Interfaces might look, but don't expect us to create them at this stage. Let's walk before we can run.

 

The following is an extensive ToDo list showing our progress on the Learning Design Editor. The list actually appears longer than for the last beta - but that is because outstanding tasks are being granularised, and more clearly defined.

General

• All Items that reference a Resource will have a combo box populated with referenced Resources just like the CP Editor
• If you type in the Description box, then grey out the Resource/Params fields - or make the href point to the description file
• Hide the ItemModelType fields (class, parameters, identifier etc) in a sub-panel
• When deleting a Resource or Component, build up a list of things that reference it and warn the user
• For any Component, have a popup window that shows all the other objects that reference it and make it navigatable
• Externalise Strings
• Add Metadata to components (menu option via one button)
• Zip up the Learning Design
• Templates of pre-existing components and values
• For drag and drop of LD_Components for the Mac, may have to wrap the LD_Component in a wrapper class that implements Serializable with the LD_Component being a transient member.
• Persist the Norgie states
• Integrate Editor with Player
• For new LD, allow user to choose Level A, B or C
• Implement Level B
• Implement Level C
• Option to show/hide Identifiers
• Validate against Schema and/or CopperCore engine
  Warn user if anything is missing
• Drag and drop of tree nodes
• Cut/Copy/Paste/Up/Down of tree nodes
• Bind edit key commands and menu items to trees
• Implement "Sort" buttons
• - Implement Undo/Redo for component creation/deletion
• Persist the sub-panel open/closed states
• UOL href opens a file selector to select a LD imsmanifest.xml, which then is opened in a new LD Editor (read-only, just showing the activities and structures), from where one can choose the element (we store the IDREF). Perhaps a bookmarking mechanism to store favorites to LD Activities?
• Duration widgets in completion panels:
  "Duration: Specifies an amount of time: the duration of an event in relative terms (e.g. the duration given the start datetime of the run of a unit-of-learning. The format - also used in the W3C XML schema specification - is:
  PnYnMnDTnHnMnS where:
  P is the designator that must always be present.
  n is a variable where an integer is filled in.
  nY represents the number of years.
  nM represents the number of month.
  nD represents the number of days.
  T is the date/time separator which must always be present when representing time.
  nH is the number of hours.
  nM is the number of minutes.
  nS is the number of seconds.
  Example: P2Y0M1DT20H10M55S. Meaning that the duration is: 2 years and 0 month and 1 day and 20 hours and 10 minutes and 55 seconds.
  Limited forms of lexical production are also allowed: For example, a duration of 40 minutes is expressed as PT40M; a duration of 30 days is P30D."
  Perhaps find an easier way to add Resources without the current flow (which is - Import into Folder, Drag into manifest tree, reference as Resource). Bear in mind that Resources have to be parsed for file elements.

Roles Panel

• Adding a child Role should inherit properties from its parent (provide an option in the dialog)

Environments Panel

• Conference Editor Panel:
  Finish Roles Selector table and logic.
• Index Search Editor Panel
  Provide a table to add multiples of index-class, index-element and index-type-of-element objects
• Insert tree nodes at correct position
• Don't allow user to add the same EnvironmentRef more than once in the same Environment

Activities Panel

• Add/Remove sub-components
• Activity Structure Editor Panel
  Bind "Number to select", "Sort" and "Sequence" fields
  Add Learning Activity refs, Support Activity refs, UOL hrefs and Activity Structure refs
• Learning Activity Editor Panel:
  Activity Completion - implement "user choice/time limit"
• Support Activity Editor Panel:
  Activity Completion - implement "user choice/time limit"
• Activity Structure Editor Panel:
  Tree needs to be changed from a selector tree to one where you can add/remove/order the items
• Activity Structure Editor Panel:
  Allow user to optionally choose a UOL href instead of an Activity/Environment
• UOL href opens a file selector to select a LD imsmanifest.xml, which then is opened in a new LD Editor (read-only, just showing the activities and structures), from where one can choose the element (we store the IDREF). Perhaps a bookmarking mechanism to store favorites to LD Activities.

Method Panel

• Role Part Titles should be the <role-part> title, if not present then the referenced Role title or identifier
• Don't let user delete last Play, Act or RolePart
• Method Editor Panel:
  Method Completion - implement "user choice/time limit"
• Play Editor Panel:
  Play Completion - implement "user choice/time limit"
• Act Editor Panel:
  Act Completion - implement "user choice/time limit"
• Role Part Editor Panel:
  Allow user to optionally choose a UOL href instead of an Activity/Environment

Resources Panel

• Add File Resources to CP Resources and Parse
• Resource/File Editing Panels