skip to main content
10.1145/1384271.1384326acmconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesiticseConference Proceedingsconference-collections
research-article

Distributed application launching for high quality graphics in synchronous distance education

Published:30 June 2008Publication History

ABSTRACT

Previous ITiCSE papers have reported on Network EducationWare (NEW), an open source software system that supports synchronous and asynchronous distance education easily and inexpensively via the Internet. This paper reports on an innovative capability recently added to NEW that enables simultaneous execution of applications on all participating computers in both Windows and Linux systems, and explains how we have used this capability to teach a course in Computer Graphics online. Teaching graphics in this way previously was impossible because transmitting the visual output of graphics programs in real time with good quality is too demanding for normal Internet connections. This problem was solved by using the NEW application launcher to invoke Java classes, provided by the instructor, on all student computers simultaneously. The capability works with modest Internet capacity and also is captured in recorded sessions for asynchronous use. We explain how the NEW capability works and describe its use in online teaching of Computer Graphics.

References

  1. Angel, E. Interactive Computer Graphics: A Top-Down Approach with OpenGL, Addison Wesley, 2003. Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  2. Chen, J. Guide to Graphics Software Tools, Springer Verlag, 2002. Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  3. Chen, J. and E.Wegman, Foundation of 3D Graphics Programming Using JOGL and Java3D, Springer Verlag, 2006. Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  4. Foley, J., A van Dam, S. Feiner and J. Hughes, Computer Graphics: Principles and Practice, Second Edition in C, Addison-Wesley, 1995. Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  5. Goodwin, C. and Bowman, M., Is the bottom line of online out of line? Calculating the total cost of online courses in Technology Curricula, Proceedings ASEE Annual Conference 2004 (Salt Lake City, UT, June 2004)Google ScholarGoogle Scholar
  6. Hearn, D. and M. Baker, Computer Graphics, C version, 2nd edition, Printice-Hall, 1996. Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  7. Macedonia, M. and Brutzman, D., Mbone Provides Audio and Video Across the Internet, IEEE Computer 27, 4 (Apr. 1994), 30--36 Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  8. Pullen, J., Synchronous Distance Education and the Internet, Proceedings Internet Society Annual Conference 1998 (Geneva, Switzerland, July 1998), published online at http://www.isoc.org/inet98/ proceedings/ 4b/4b_1.htmGoogle ScholarGoogle Scholar
  9. Pullen, J., The Internet lecture: converging teaching and technology, ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE) Bulletin Vol 32 No 3 (Sep. 2000), 101--104 Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  10. Pullen, J., Applicability Of Internet video In distance education For engineering, Proceedings IEEE Frontiers in Education 2001 (Reno, NV, October 2001), T2F-14-T2F-19, online at http://fie.engrng.pitt.edu/ fie2001/papers/1242.pdf Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  11. Pullen, J. and McAndrews, P., A Web portal for open-Source synchronous distance education, IASTED Journal on Advanced Technology for Learning 2,1 (Jan 2005), International Association of Science and technology for Development, Calgary, ABGoogle ScholarGoogle Scholar
  12. Pullen, J., Scaling up a distance education program in computer science, ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE) Bulletin 38, 3 (Sep 2006) 33--37 Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  13. Sloan Consortium, Sizing the Opportunity: The Quality and Extent of Online Education in the United States, 2002 and 2003, online at http://www.sloan-c.org/resources/ overview.aspGoogle ScholarGoogle Scholar
  14. Snow, C., Pullen, J. and McAndrews, P. (2005), An Open-Source Web-Based System for Synchronous Distance Education, IEEE Transactions on Education 48, 4 (Nov. 2005), 705--712 Google ScholarGoogle ScholarDigital LibraryDigital Library
  15. Wilson, J., After the Fall: Lessons of an Indulgent Era, plenary presentation, Distance Education 2003, University of Wisconsin, unpublished, available online at http://www.jackmwilson.com/ArticlesTalks/eLearning-Wisconsin2003.pptGoogle ScholarGoogle Scholar
  16. Woo, M., J. Neider, and T. Davis, OpenGL Programming Guide Version 2.1, Addison Wesley, 2007Google ScholarGoogle Scholar

Index Terms

  1. Distributed application launching for high quality graphics in synchronous distance education

      Recommendations

      Comments

      Login options

      Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

      Sign in
      • Published in

        cover image ACM Conferences
        ITiCSE '08: Proceedings of the 13th annual conference on Innovation and technology in computer science education
        June 2008
        394 pages
        ISBN:9781605580784
        DOI:10.1145/1384271

        Copyright © 2008 ACM

        Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

        Publisher

        Association for Computing Machinery

        New York, NY, United States

        Publication History

        • Published: 30 June 2008

        Permissions

        Request permissions about this article.

        Request Permissions

        Check for updates

        Qualifiers

        • research-article

        Acceptance Rates

        ITiCSE '08 Paper Acceptance Rate60of150submissions,40%Overall Acceptance Rate552of1,613submissions,34%

        Upcoming Conference

        ITiCSE 2024
      • Article Metrics

        • Downloads (Last 12 months)0
        • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)0

        Other Metrics

      PDF Format

      View or Download as a PDF file.

      PDF

      eReader

      View online with eReader.

      eReader