Flash For Learning

As I’ve been checking out ADL’s forums today, I revisited the thread where the questions about how to work with Flash Player 8’s security model originally came up.

Another user on the forum posted this link to Macromedia’s DevNet which details how to work around the various sandbox security settings in the new Flash player.

Awesome!

flash, security, scorm, flash player, macromedia, e-learning, development, javascript

This is going to be a major topic of discussion for the next several weeks, so hopefully here, among other places, we’ll have some solid answers to questions on how to best work with Flash Player 8 and your SCORM-conformant projects.

Josh wrote on the ADL Forums:

>My concern about the new security model is more based on the fact that I cannot test my SCORM courses for compliancy using the SCORM conformance test suite. I have a Flash course that communicates to the API wrapper using the Flash/Javascript Integration Kit. The Test Suite requires that it test a course that is running on the local file system, which is now restricted by Macromedia from making Javascript calls from Flash. > >When my course is running on a server, I can make all the JS to Flash calls I need, but if the course is running from the file system, I can’t make any if I use the Flash 8 plugin. So, I’m stuck in a cyclical bind where my courses work from a server, but I can’t test them in the Test Suite to verify that they are conformant. > >Does anybody know of a workaround for this?

My short answer is to downgrade the Flash Player to 7.0.19 to test your Flash 7 and below content, but that doesn’t necessarily undo the problems that a learner might have with the Flash Player 8 installed and the potential for your content to break.

Please comment here or in the ADL Forums to discuss this further…

flash, security, scorm, flash player, macromedia, e-learning, development, javascript

On Nov 9, 2005, at 5:31 PM, Flashcoder wrote:

Hi Aaron,

Just wondering if you know if Macromedia Shockwave 10 is SCORM 1.2 compliant? Or have any information on using Director content with SCORM/LMS.

P.S. I’m a long time developer using Director and Flash, but it’s the first time I have to deal with SCORM and LMS for the government who required that the project be SCORM 1.2 compliant.

Shockwave, out of the box, offers no support for SCORM 1.2. However, if you download the Plug-In Technology content example from ADL, there’s a Director example in there that will demonstrate how Director can work with a SCORM 2004 javascript API Wrapper.

If you have a SCORM 1.2 API Wrapper, you can basically replace the JavaScript calls that are in the Director file and “voila” — you’ll have Director working with SCORM 1.2 in no less than two minutes.

The link to the Plug-In Technologies content example is here:

http://www.adlnet.org/downloads/201.cfm

director, shockwave, scorm, development, macromedia, e-learning

I was just e-mailed a press release regarding a recent Advancing ADL through Global Collaboration Forum where a number of sessions were held discussing international direction and agreed action with regard to SCORM and other advanced distributed learning technologies.

The Melbourne Declaration summarises the outcomes of those discussions:

The U.S. Department of Defense sponsored the Advanced Distributed Learning (ADL) Initiative in 1997 with the goal of enabling the highest quality education and training, delivered anytime, anywhere. The ADL’s models are now widely adopted in many different contexts and sectors for implementing technology-based learning on a global scale.

In celebrating this achievement, the Melbourne Forum, Advancing ADL through Global Collaboration, endorses the following points as a means of creating and maintaining momentum for the further international advancement, development and deployment of advanced learning technology initiatives:

• Scalable and sustainable infrastructure is of critical importance in fulfilling the many visions for teaching, learning, education, training and performance support.
• Global interoperability based on open standards, is key to achieving scaleable and sustainable infrastructure.
• An international collaborative approach will optimise the advancement, development and maintenance of this infrastructure.
• The current ADL community has provided some of the foundation stones for building this infrastructure.
• The continuing involvement of the U.S. ADL Initiative will be critical to any collaborative venture.
• The formation of a global steward is an effective means to realise the above.

Actions:

• An international stewardship organisation shall be established and become fully functional within a three year period.
• The U.S. ADL Initiative in collaboration with the international community will convene, as soon as possible, an Interim Working Group to develop a planning framework and timetable for the creation and commissioning of the proposed international stewardship organisation.

So what does this mean for the future of SCORM?

Well, not being privvy to the background conversations that took place to draft this declaration, it’s pretty transparent that the US Department of Defense (DoD), which funds the ADL Initiative, doesn’t intend to give up SCORM and its related technologies. I think that this paves the road to further advance the big picture of creating a global interoperable infrastructure for advanced distributed learning.

If anyone remembers my Friday session at MAX 2005, I talked about looking at SCORM not as an ends for training and development, but as a means for interoperable communication so that one could create content that would run in any environment, free and clear of the server technologies used to facilitate the hosting environment

Given this context, the future for SCORM could be pretty bright.

You may have noticed that the term ADL is used quite a bit in the Melbourne Declaration. Having worked on the ADL Initiative for the past two years, I can say that Albert Ip’s discussion of the different meanings of “ADL” is meaningful. He writes:

Three meanings to the term “ADL” need to be clear to understand the “Melbourne Declaration”. ADL may refer to the US Department of Defence funded ADL initiative. The term may also mean the vision and/or infrastructure of advanced distributed learning. Yet another meaning may refer to the community which supported, adopted and have given input to the vision. At this point in time, it was agreed that the what as in “Stewardship of What” referred to in Robby [Robson]’s paper should be deferred. Instead, the discussion was focussed on creating a sustainable global stewardship.

e-learning, scorm, melbourne declaration