WebCT Vista PowerLinks Reporting Interfaces John Hallett Senior Product Manager WebCT, Inc.

Overview WebCT contains vast amounts of data Prior to WebCT Vista, this data was stored in a distributed, flat file database This made correlation and detailed data analysis almost impossible

Overview WebCT Vista introduced an SQL database server With that, detailed analysis became possible, but there was still a problem

Overview The Vista data schema is not exactly “intuitive” The DB is designed for functionality and performance, not for data extraction Relevant information can be spread out among many, many tables And the table schema can change from version to version

Overview The Vista Reporting Interfaces solve these problems by abstracting away from direct DB access The result is a set of “safe” database views containing the most relevant data all in one place

Why is this important?

Details The Vista Reporting Interfaces provide seven tables 5 are live views, 2 are extracts

Details RPT_PERSON Contains information on users: –IDs (Login, person, and IMS) –Name (First, last, prefix, suffix) –Active/Inactive flag

Details RPT_LEARNING_CONTEXT Contains information on LCs (E.g. Course): –IDs (LC, Parent and IMS) –Name, type, # of childern –Start/end dates, last archived date, templates –# of members, path

Details RPT_LEARNING_CONTEXT_SIZE Adds up data size in a given LC –ID –Size of templates –Size of non-template files

Details RPT_MEMBER Contains information on memberships (enrollments): –Three columns: Person, LC, Role

Details RPT_TEMPLATE Contains information on template contents: –ID –Counts of all major Learning Objects in use (quiz, questions, assignments, discussions, etc)

Details RPT_TRACKING All tracked events –User, LC, event type, time, dwell time, target name This can be a very large table Unlike the tracking tool itself, tracked events are not filtered by role (so it is possible to see designer actions)

Details RPT_GRADEBOOK All grades, every student, every course Calculated columns are presented as a formula

Details RPT_TEMPLATE and RPT_LEARNING_CONTEXT_SIZE are extracts, and must be scheduled via the UI

Details

It all comes together

Vista Enrollment by Department

It all comes together Vista Tool Usage by Department

It all comes together Average Final Grade vs Vista Sessions

Questions?

Thank you For more info, please contact me: John Hallett Senior Product Manager WebCT, Inc