cetis E-Learning and Service Orientation Scott Wilson

cetis Interoperability : Our Holy Grail New synergies from the combination of tools and functions Efficiencies gained from linking together processes and using automation Flexibility in the configuration of functions to match strategic objectives and priorities

cetis Experiences So Far… Black-box solutions for e-learning are inflexible and difficult to adapt to their context What should be basic integration problems have proven intractable and expensive, and often any solutions are unrepeatable Duplication and waste in R&D efforts, and difficulty in exploiting R&D outputs outside of incubation projects

cetis JISC Interoperability projects Lots of projects funded under MLE programmes aiming for interoperability Content-oriented projects were generally quite successful Integration projects were generally unsuccessful Where integration projects were successful, they were not repeatable outside the project

cetis Why unrepeatable? Various projects along lines of “Integrate System X with System Y” Eventually everything talks to everything else? But actually “Integrate X with Y in environment Z” So even replicating a previous pairwise integration often meant starting from scratch (cf SWaNI)

cetis Desirable outcomes Flexible solutions that can be suited to individual institutions without causing interoperability problems Integration that is affordable and repeatable R&D outcomes that can be shared outside of their incubator projects

cetis Integration Choices So how can we achieve integration? What does each approach afford us? Well, there are some common patterns…

cetis Information Portal Aggregate information from multiple sources into a single display Display divided into multiple zones each displaying information from different system Limited interaction between zones Enables ‘shallow’ rather than ‘deep’ integration

cetis Data Replication Data is replicated between multiple storage systems Business logic and presentation remains independent

cetis Shared Business Function Multiple applications share common business functions Presentation remains independent Data encapsulated by shared function E.g. D/COM and RMI

cetis Service Oriented Architecture Presentation and workflow constructed from multiple shared services Data and business function encapsulated in services Also known as “Enterprise service bus” architecture

cetis Distributed Business Process Business process coordinates activities across multiple systems Business process components manage execution of tasks that span existing applications Typical for building web applications over legacy systems

cetis Data Warehouse Integrate many data sources to provide enterprise-wide reporting Business and presentation remain independent Strategic but not operational integration

cetis Mix and match Using a Service Oriented Architecture to implement teaching and administration workflows as Distributed Business Processes, presented using an Information Portal

cetis Service Orientation A popular way to look at systems integration Concentrates on contracts between service Providers and service Consumers Separates service from implementation Many functions within an e-learning system can be ‘exported’ to services offered by the environment to applications

cetis SOA Myths SOA needs lots of complex WS-* specs –No it doesn’t. HTTP+XML can be used too, as can various levels of SOAP implementation SOA is new and untried –Its an approach that’s been around in some form for a long time –The technology used to realize SOA is mostly pre- existing SOA is all hype –Well, there is a fair amount of that…

cetis SOA benefits Platform vendor buy-in, with plenty of class libraries Lends itself easily to abstraction Enables flexibility, even with legacy assets Neutral with regard to platforms and languages Relatively intuitive

cetis The emergence of the e- Learning Framework An international effort to figure out SOA in the public education sectors

cetis The e-Learning Framework A Service-Oriented analysis of the educational problem space Backed up with technical specifications, R&D projects, and toolkits A place for us to work together, to identify issues, opportunities, priorities

cetis ELF myths ELF is an open-source LMS –The ELF provides a framework that can help when developing any kind of e-learning application, commercial or open-source To use ELF you need to use SOAP –Service orientation is an approach to system design, and isn’t based on any one technology binding

cetis More ELF myths… Using ELF means buying all new Web Services- capable systems –SOA enables existing investments in systems to be leveraged, regardless of their platform, by exposing functions as services ELF will give you everything you need –You still need applications… at least for now(!?) –Workflow? Security? Management?

cetis ELF Today

cetis What are Services? Functionally discrete patterns –Scope and definition –Patterns of implementation Port definitions –Abstract contract (UML) –API –Service bindings (WSDL, XML-RPC, HTTP+XML…)

cetis Learning Domain Services Functions that at the moment seem unique to the L&T domain Each function expressed as a service analysis, with links to specification and R&D activity Eventually, each service will have toolkits, specifications and implementation patterns

cetis Learning Domain Services Activity authoring and management Course/curriculum management and validation, Assessment, marking, and grading Sequencing/flow, tracking and reporting Personal development, competencies and e- Portfolios

cetis Common Services Functions that at this time seem to be shared by other domains, such as IT services, information environment, and e- science Effort may be lead by the e-learning sector, follow efforts lead by other sectors, or investigate in collaboration

cetis Common Services Wide range of functions: administrative, collaboration, information management, and some core middleware functions

cetis What are the bricks? Each ‘brick’ represents a discrete set of functions that can be exposed within an environment, such that applications such as authoring tools, learning tools etc can make use of them Each ‘brick’ defines one or more service ports

cetis Our plans Identify the most critical services –And the most ‘doable’ in terms of current knowledge and capability Build toolkits Develop expertise Demonstrate practical use in proof-of-concept applications and deployments Contribute to applicable standards Work with the developer community - both commercial vendors and open source

cetis Standards Standards already exist for some services Standards don’t exist for many services Where standards do exist, they aren’t always service-oriented Where standards don’t exist, there may be insufficient experience to create one

cetis What isn’t on the ELF diagram? Applications - there are no applications here. Just services that support applications ‘Fabric’ - some things are common to a whole swathe of services and cannot be easily encapsulated into discrete functions –Workflow –Security –Management

cetis Workflow How services fit within a flow of activity How services need to be able to respond to flows of action (‘workflow-aware’) Some services need pretty complex workflow behaviour: –Activation –Closedown –Monitoring –Intervention

cetis Security Authentication –Consumer to Provider (agent trust) –Provider to Consumer (service trust) –User to Provider via Consumer (user authn) Authorization –Client to Provider (agent access policy) –Provider to implementation (service entitlement) –User to implementation (user entitlement)

cetis Security (contd) Communication security –Eavesdropping/Replay attacks –Signing/Tamperproofing Non-repudiation –Timing –Sequencing Accountability and logging Privacy

cetis Management Configuration –Access –Performance –Feature activation/removal Deployment –Packaging –Live redeploy –Clustering, routing and forwarding Management –Monitoring –Upgrading

cetis Using ELF services in apps As well as the services in SOA, need to realise benefits in developing applications –After all, these services are meant to make writing/improving/adapting applications easier! There are two views of this…

cetis Using ELF Services ForumGroup PersonMembership Chat Resource List Workflow Presentation E-Learning Collaboration Application Security Configuration and Deployment

cetis Using ELF Services 2 ForumGroup PersonMembership Chat Resource List Workflow Presentation E-Learning Collaboration Application Security Configuration and Deployment

cetis Challenges Ahead We’ve made a pretty good start There’s a lot of work we could do - but what would be really useful?

cetis Challenges Get the basic technology right –Make things simple, but not simplistic –Enable different levels of technical sophistication, from very easy HTTP+XML to very tricky SOAP+WS-* as needed Show some of this stuff really working –Compelling and interesting demonstrators –Persuading vendors and OSS projects to take advantage of ELF toolkits

cetis Challenges (cont’d) Communicate the ideas –Developers mostly get it … some managers get it… but a lot of people don’t Get the factoring of services right Start thinking about the hard problems –Security, workflow, management are all issues that aren’t going away!