Metacoon
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Metacoon is an online platform for learning, cooperative work and for producing learning material (authoring tools). The platform is opensource (it can be used by all educational institutions and can be advanced/adapted by them) and the authoring tools are freeware (licence free use also for commercial purpose)
Contents |
[edit] Development
Development started in 2001 at the Bauhaus University of Weimar. As of 2006, several universities and companies are cooperating for further development. Central functionality of Learning Management Systems are further developed by the CampusSource community (Campus Source Engine), in similar projects such as Saki and OLAT. Compared to other opensource systems a consequential interface design controlling of metacoon tools has lead to a pleasing and consistently usable user interface.
[edit] What is a Metacoon?
A metacoon platform consists of:
- A website.
- Entrance room (for all platform users)
- Any number of learning or working rooms
The system is adaptable - it is based on a modular design principle. Each learning/working room can be individually equipped with tools for learning, communication, cooperation and authoring (for instance for an individual course didactic). Therefore the system is not just used as a Learning Management System but also as:
- Virtual office.
- Platform for distributed R&D projects, or
- A community portal (like Interkulturelles-Portal).
On the learning platform any author can produce learning material with the metacoon authoring tools:
- Hypertexts: XML learning material pages can be produced with OpenOffice (having a metacoon plugin). This is very similar to Microsoft Word and is run locally on the PC of the author. Media (animations, figures, videos) and entries of the reference book of the platform (like glossary or the bibliography) can be included. The combination of many XML learning material pages to a whole course material (SCORM manifest ~ table of contents) is done with an authoring tool on the platform which is very similar to the Windows file manager.
- Video slide presentations and audio slide presentations
- Question & tests are produced with an authoring tool from the university of Chemnitz "elQuest", which is run locally on the authoring PC.
[edit] External links
- http://www.metacoon.net (Community, Demos, more informationen)
- http://www.campussource.de/software/metacoon (download of the opensource system)
[edit] Example installation
- http://buw.metacoon.net (learning management system of the Bauhaus-Universität Weimar)
