don@novavax.UUCP (Don Joslyn) (11/19/88)
----------
What it is
----------
A computer program designed to emulate a traditional classroom on an
interactive multiuser computer system, allowing classes to be conducted with
online students.
----------------
Program Features
----------------
The program simulates a classroom by providing all the amenities one
would expect to find in a well equipped classroom. Some of the facilities
included are:
* A blackboard for the teacher to run lessons and answer
questions. (The medium for written and verbal communication.)
* A "slide projector" to display prepared course material.
Automatically display a sequence of files with student
responses controlling the presentation speed.
(Slides are displayed from saved UNIX* files.)
* Class roster and attendance list.
The teacher can restrict access to a session by user and/or
group.
* Session recording and playback.
Entire classes may be saved in a file for playback at
another time.
* Automatic note taking. (i.e. Save class material in a file.)
* Online tutorials, help and command menus.
* Execute UNIX commands with the results displayed on the
blackboard. A UNIX Shell may also be run on the blackboard.
* Teachers can give pop quizzes/tests and receive interactive
feedback from the students. (True/False, Multiple choice)
* Students can interactively ask questions by
"raising their hand."
* Preview/review of stored courses.
* Chat mode. A student may converse directly with the
instructor while the rest of the class "listens in".
* Allow a student to temporarily control the class.
* Online invitations. Invite students to join a class via
electronic mail.
* Multiple simultaneous classrooms. Separate classrooms may
be run at the same time.
------------------
Software included:
------------------
The ECR package includes several modules:
* ecrt - The teacher's version of the ECR program.
* ecr - The student's version of the ECR program.
* ecrn - A background program that will automatically
notify a student when class begins, allowing
the student to work on other tasks.
* ecrs - A status program that will display information
about each separate class that has been configured.
* ecrd - The ECR communications daemon. This program
handles the connections between the teacher and
students.
* ecrm - The ECR mail interface, called by sendmail, to route
mail to ECR classrooms.
-----------
Why use it?
-----------
The program can be used to conduct lectures, discussions and testing,
in an environment were it is difficult to assemble students in one location.
Great for domestic and international field based education.
The program can also be used to help students with UNIX related
problems by demonstrating UNIX commands on the blackboard.
-------------
What you need
-------------
The program requires a computer system running BSD UNIX
(Berkeley Distribution), or a version of UNIX similar to the BSD
implementation, with enough access to the system for all students to login.
ECR also works in a network environment.
The program has been tested on BSD 4.2, SUNOS 3.x,4.0, Ultrix 2.x, and UTX.
The program supports ascii terminals such as the vt100, or others supported by
termcap/terminfo and curses.
The program is written in C and uses curses, sockets, ptys and select.
--------------
What it is not
--------------
The program is not a course authoring system, it is a course delivery system.
-------------------------------------
For more information, please contact:
-------------------------------------
Don Joslyn, Academic Systems and Programming Manager
Nova University, Computer Center (Academic Computing Services)
3301 College Avenue, Fort Lauderdale, FL 33314 Phone: (305) 475-7678
UUCP: ...{gatech!uflorida,ucf-cs}!novavax!don
...{gatech!uflorida,ucf-cs}!novavax!dons3b1!don (Private)
* UNIX is a registered trademark of AT&T (Just in case you did not know :-)