E-learning Curve Blog at Edublogs

Digressing temporarily from philosophy, the gratis / libre debate, and the pros and cons of each approach, this post will focus on the range of tools that you need to develop e-learning content in a (relatively) open environment

The key to developing courseware in an open environment is to use a production model that liberates instructional design and content authoring from your final media outputs. In my view, this means taking an XML-based approach to your e-learning development environment.

I would suggest that you need tools and components the following tools to create an effective authoring and delivering system:

Content Creation Tools

• XMLmind XML Editor (XXE)
• GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP)
• DocBook DTD
• XSLT transformations and XS-FOP formatting object processors

Media Creation and Integration: OSS Tools

• Audacity
• Jahshaka
• Nvu
• OpenOffice.org
• GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP)

Media Creation and Integration: Proprietary Tools

• Microsoft Producer 2
• Windows Media Developer’s Kit

Content Delivery Platform

• Apache / MySQL / PHP
• Moodle

Optional Proprietary Tools

• Adobe Flash
• Roxio Easy Media Creator

I’ll be discussing developing a production model using this toolkit tomorrow.

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