Since last June, one of the frequently asked questions among e-Learning designers and developers has been, “How do we get e-Learning onto the iPhone?” I have good news: The wait is over!
Recently Brad Crain, SumTotal® Systems Vice President and General Manager ToolBook, let me explore a soon-to-be-released update to one of the company's flagship products, ToolBook® Instructor™ 9.5. ToolBook Instructor is SumTotal's solution for producing interactive content, assessments, and software application simulations for the Web. This new version adds features that support mobile learning content and applications on the Apple® iPhone™ and iPod® touch.
Specifically, ToolBook Instructor 9.5 makes it very easy for developers to create online learning, reference material, tutorials, learning games, and other content for computers and devices running Apple's Safari™ Web browser. This includes Macintosh® and Windows® computers, as well as the iPhone and iPod touch. ToolBook Instructor already supports Internet Explorer®, Netscape® Navigator™, Firefox®, and Mozilla® browsers.
Why is this important? Think about the number of iPhone and iPod touch units that people already own and use at work. Think about the number of business people who will start using iPhones this June after Apple adds enterprise features required by corporate IT departments (support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, over-the-air push e-mail, contacts and calendars, remote wipe, and Cisco IPsec VPN). Now consider that Adobe® Flash® does not run on the iPhone, and may not do so for some time, if ever (judging by what Steve Jobs said about Flash last week).
Given this set of circumstances, SumTotal's release of the ToolBook update in “summer to fall of this year,” according to Brad Crain, will be well timed. In an unusual move (for the authoring tool world, anyway), SumTotal offers a subscription version of the current shipping product (9.0.1); subscribers will receive the update to 9.5 when it comes out.
This article will provide background information on ToolBook Instructor, mobile learning, the iPhone and iPod Touch, the Safari Web Browser, and a comprehensive look at the new features that will make it possible to develop ToolBook content for mobile devices running Safari.
An introduction to ToolBook
I provided an extensive overview of ToolBook 9 in my previous Learning Solutions article, A Courseware Authoring Tool Evolves: ToolBook Instructor 9, published June 11, 2007. This included the main features of ToolBook, but I'm going to run through some of the elements in the ToolBook authoring environment that are most relevant to the coming upgrade.
Figure 1 shows the ToolBook Instructor authoring environment with one of the SmartPages and a SmartStyle. SmartPages provides many page types, such as Menu, Bullets, Text, Multiple Choice Question, and so on. SmartStyles is a feature that makes available a wide variety of page styles and pre-defined common page types. The Catalog, on the left side of the screen, is a major feature of ToolBook Instructor, and has been for many past versions. It holds pre-programmed objects of various kinds (buttons, navigation tools, text fields, and so on) for designing applications. The small dialog box on the right is the Tool Palette, with which you draw objects if you don’t want to use the Catalog. In this case, the page is a size that is capable of displaying content to a standard Desktop PC at a resolution of 800 x 600 or greater.
More about the Catalog
The Catalog is organized by Categories, and it is easy for a developer to create custom Catalogs (Categories). Developers add objects to a ToolBook page by just dragging a selection from a Category of the Catalog. As shown in Figure 2, the available Categories include:
- Action Objects
- Buttons
- Text Fields
- Questions
- Styles
- Pages
- Media Players
- Draw Objects
The Actions Editor
The
Actions Editor, a visual programming tool for more complex interactions, first
appeared in earlier versions of ToolBook Instructor. It allows a developer to
set up scripting actions without writing any code. The developer can handle
events such as
The
interface of the Actions Editor has menus and a toolbar for adding interactive
behaviors to objects. Developers can create Action Sequences, behaviors that
ToolBook Instructor 9.5 carries out in a specified order. Action Sequences can
include prompting for user input, providing alerts, playing media, changing an
object’s properties, and specifying conditions for the execution of an action.
An Action Sequence for an object is triggered by some sort of event such as
Figure 3
shows the Actions Editor programming environment. In addition to the menus and
toolbar, an Actions Palette on the left side of the dialog box makes it
possible for developers to add a variety of actions by simply dragging the
action from the Actions Palette to the code window. The result is an Action
Sequence. In the example provided here, I've chosen an
More about SmartStyles and SmartPages
SmartStyles provides uniformity across the various methods available in previous versions of ToolBook for building an application, including Templates and the Book Specialist (now called the Book Wizard). In ToolBook Instructor 9.5, SmartStyles updates the older page types found in the Templates and Book Specialists of earlier versions of ToolBook. As in the currently shipping version of the product, SmartStyles makes it possible for developers to create their own new styles and page types as desired. If you add a new page to a book, that page will then use the book’s current style. If you want to restyle the entire book, simply add a new style from the Catalog.
ToolBook Instructor 9.5 has a Styles Category in the Catalog, containing the actual Smart Styles (SmartStyles is the feature, while a Smart Style is the individual style). The SmartPages feature provides a large variety of new page types (they call the actual pages Smart Pages). A Pages Category in the Catalog contains the various available page types. When you add a Smart Style to a book, ToolBook adds a background (called a Smart Background) to the book, and this background sets the graphic design for the book. As one element, the background contains a Navigation group with buttons styled to match the background graphic. Additionally, Title and Subtitle fields are available for text to display on all pages, formatted based upon the current style. For instance, one style could be Verdana while another style might switch the text formatting for these primary fields to Times New Roman.
These are the basic elements of ToolBook Instructor 9.5. Before going on to describe the specific features added to the product to support e-Learning on the iPhone and the iPod touch, I'm going to very briefly describe these devices within the context of mobile learning.
Mobile learning
Mobile communication devices have evolved over the past decade from being primarily (if not exclusively) designed for voice communication, to being Internet-enabled tools that provide interaction with Web applications in addition to their telephony functions. The first mobile data services fell short of the experience that users needed and wanted, and therefore failed to excite customers. As a result, developers are now focused on creating new, engaging mobile experiences that are more immediate and more desirable. Mobile devices now provide applications that range from simple games to sophisticated business applications, including e-Learning.
During the same period, we have seen significant advances in the ability of mobile devices to deliver e-learning content. A new term, m?Learning (mobile learning), describes these advances. The eLearning Guild's 360° Report on Mobile Learning (July, 2007), defined m-Learning as: “Any activity that allows individuals to be more productive when consuming, interacting with, or creating information, mediated through a compact digital portable device that the individual carries on a regular basis, has reliable connectivity, and fits in a pocket or purse.” Although mobile learning is a category within the broader fields of e-Learning and distance education, it is different in that it focuses on learning with mobile devices.
Introduction to mobile devices
A mobile device (also known as a handheld device or a handheld computer) is a pocket-sized computing device, and typically consists of a small visual display screen for user output and a miniature keyboard or touch screen for user input. Smartphones, iPods (portable media players), and PDAs (personal digital assistants) are examples of commonly used mobile devices. A smartphone (such as the iPhone, an Internet-enabled multimedia mobile phone from Apple) is a mobile phone with advanced capabilities beyond voice communication. These capabilities include e-mail, Web browsing, and local WiFi connectivity. Many smartphones have PC-like functionalities, including a complete operating system along with a standardized interface and platform for those who develop applications for the device.
The iPhone
Since June of last year, most attention to mobile devices has gone to the iPhone from Apple. (See Figure 4.) This mobile device comes in both an 8 GB and a 16 GB model. The iPhone combines three products – a mobile phone, a widescreen iPod with touch screen controls, and an Internet communications device with desktop-class e-mail, full-screen Web browsing, and applications that include Google Maps. It can connect directly to YouTube, and it can store and play back both audio and video Podcasts. The technical specs on this device include a screen resolution of 320 x 480, WiFi, and Bluetooth. For now, the iPhone's Safari browser connects to the Web via EDGE when WiFi isn't available; this could change, as the one thing business users (as opposed to enterprise IT managers) want most is 3G.
Adoption of the iPhone in the U.S. in the first nine months has been fast-paced. The iPhone already accounts for over 70% of Web connections from mobile devices, and 20% of Bank of America mobile banking transactions. This makes it more and more likely that the iPhone will also be the dominant m-Learning client.
Figure 4 The iPhone and its
interface
The iPod touch
The iPod touch is basically the same device as the iPhone, except that it does not have the phone feature, and so cannot connect via EDGE. The touch offers Internet connectivity via Wi-Fi, with the same 320 x 480 display found with the iPhone.
The Safari Web Browser
The iPhone features rich HTML e-mail and the Safari Web Browser. Safari is a highly evolved Web browser, designed specifically with mobile devices in mind. Google and Yahoo! Search are built right in, and the iPhone automatically syncs bookmarks from your Mac or PC. You can zoom in on a page by tapping the Multi-Touch touch screen display with your finger. Safari loads and draws pages faster than Firefox 2 and Opera 9 (as long as Safari is connecting via WiFi rather than via EDGE), and it executes JavaScript faster than Firefox 2 and Opera 9. Safari uses Apple’s QuickTime® 7 Player to deliver video and audio.
New features in ToolBook Instructor 9.5 for iPhone and iPod touch
In the past, developers have been able to use ToolBook Instructor to create powerful learning applications for delivery in native mode (CD-ROM or LAN) as well as in HTML. This release of ToolBook Instructor supports, through new SmartStyles, developing and deploying learning applications that are matched to the 320 x 480 screens on the iPhone and iPod touch.
The new SmartStyles include:
- Basic (iPhone Landscape)
- Basic (iPhone Portrait)
- Brushed Steel (iPhone Portrait)
- Soft Blue (iPhone Portrait)
- Solar (iPhone Landscape)
- Solar (iPhone Portrait)
Figure 5 shows the updated Styles Category of the Catalog as it appears with these new styles.
The Basic and Solar styles come in both a Portrait (320 x 416) and a Landscape (480 x 268) mode. Figure 6 shows the Basic style in Portrait mode while Figure 7 shows the Basic style in Landscape mode. The page Type in both instances is the Multiple Choice Question Page.
Options for Publishing ToolBook Instructor 9.5 Content for the iPhone and iPod touch
The ToolBook Instructor 9.5 export options include exports to the following Web Browsers:
- Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.5 SP1 and later
- Netscape Navigator 8.1.2 and later
- Firefox 1.5 and later
- Safari 3.0 and later
- Apple iPhone 1.1.2 and later (Mobile Safari)
Safari on the iPhone and iPod touch (or “Mobile Safari”) supports a “viewport” metatag (in HTML pages) that lets you define how to size and scale content. As a point of interest, ToolBook Instructor actually publishes content for the iPhone by using Ajax.
Figure 8 shows a sample lesson on Fraud Prevention, developed at 320 x 416 using the Basic for iPhone (Portrait) SmartStyle. This lesson was built without a menu, so you do not see the Menu button shown earlier in Figure 6.
At this size, this lesson will exactly fit in the iPhone’s Safari browser window. A learner can also view the lesson in a desktop browser window at this same size.
Figure 9 shows a desktop application that the developer resized for viewing on the iPhone and iPod touch. This is a fun application called ToolBookSlide and shows the versatility of ToolBook to create highly interactive content, learning games, and applications for the iPhone. The developer used the SmartStyles feature to do this. The application relies upon the touch abilities of the mobile devices described in this article. The user shuffles the tiles, and then clicks a tile next to the red space to move the tile, continuing to move tiles until the picture develops from the scrambled tiles. The game tracks the number of moves as well as the time, with the objective being to solve the puzzle a number of times, trying to beat previous moves and time.
Another option is to develop the “normal” lesson (for desktop and laptop browsers) and export it using the Internet Explorer, Netscape, Mozilla, iPhone, and Safari3 options. Then develop the iPhone lesson, export that product using the iPhone option, and then copy the contents of that iPhone folder into the iPhone folder for the “normal” lesson. When launched by any browser, code will check to see what the browser is, and launch the content from the appropriate folder.
Summary
You can download a preview of ToolBook Instructor 9.5, view a demonstration (http://www.toolbook.com/demos/iphone_howto_demo/1/index.html), and sign up for Webcasts (http://www.toolbook.com/preview/whatsnewpreview.php) on the product on the ToolBook Web site. The first Webcasts are on March 11 and March 13, so don't waste any time getting your name on the list.
ToolBook Instructor 9.5 shows tremendous potential as a tool to develop a wide variety of content for delivery to the rapidly growing mobile learning environment. Developers will benefit by not having to wait for Flash to be available on the iPhone and iPod touch (if it ever is), and not having to deal with coding and scripting through the complexities of the iPhone SDK. In addition, since the ToolBook e-Learning application resides on the server, there is nothing to store in the iPhone's limited memory and delivery of the instruction should be as rapid as with any other Web content. Finally, developers will be able to create lessons for all platforms, from desktop to mobile, with a single tool. Life doesn't get much better than that.
