Customizing LearnLinc

This chapter explains the types of customizations that can be made to the LearnLinc server, the Virtual Campus, and the Virtual Classroom.

In this chapter you will learn how to:

• Add streaming video to your server

• Translate the Virtual Campus

• Change the Virtual Campus graphics

• Remove access to certain Virtual Campus functions

• Make changes to Virtual Campus text

• Change the Virtual Campus desktop bitmap

• Enable instructors and students to show their pictures in the LearnLinc palette

• Upload instructor and student pictures to the LearnLinc server

• Create a custom client installation for Virtual Classroom customizations In addition, this chapter answers the following questions:

1. Why customize?

2. What additional components can I install on the LearnLinc server?

3. What areas of LearnLinc can I translate?

4. What features can I customize?

5. What is the process for developing and implementing changes to the Virtual Campus?

6. How do I distribute changes to the Virtual Classroom?

7. Where are the student and instructor pictures that display in the palette stored?

What You Need to Know Before Reading This Chapter

To benefit from the information in this chapter, you should have a basic understanding of the following concepts:

Key Concepts

Review the following concepts to ensure that you understand the types of customizations that can be made to the LearnLinc environment. Specifically, you need to know:

• Why Customize?

• Streaming Video

• Areas of LearnLinc That Can Be Localized

• Features That Can Be Customized in the Virtual Campus

• A Suggested Process for Developing and Implementing Virtual Campus Customizations

• Features That Can Be Customized in the Virtual Classroom

• Distributing Customizations to the Virtual Classroom Why Customize?

While LearnLinc is a full featured environment that can be installed and used “as is”, your organization may have specific training needs or goals that require some customization of the LearnLinc server, Virtual Campus web site, or Virtual Classroom environment. Wherever possible, we have provided you with easy access to customization information and tools.

Streaming Video

One of the most popular additions to the LearnLinc environment is Streaming Video. Streaming video is prerecorded or live video that users view as it is downloading to their computers.

Prerecorded streamed video clips are stored on a web server or other accessible location.

When you access a streamed video file it begins to play almost immediately, and continues to download and store the remainder of the file as you are playing it. Using prerecorded streamed video files helps you to avoid long waits while you download media files.

Creating a LearnLinc environment “Overview: Creating a LearnLinc Environment” on page 26.

Using LearnLinc “Overview: Using LearnLinc” on page 32.

Live streamed video is captured by encoder software on your computer, sent to a server, and then sent to individuals who have requested to see the streamed video. Streaming live video is bandwidth efficient, but only provides a one-way video solution. In LearnLinc classes, the instructor can use streamed video to send his or her live image to the class in real time–

however, the students in the class cannot send their video images.

To add live streaming video to your LearnLinc environment you must add a streaming video server to your LearnLinc server, or another server that all LearnLinc users will be able to access, and purchase streaming video licenses for your LearnLinc server. LearnLinc 4.5 supports the use of Microsoft Netshow Server 3.0 or Real Video Server 4.0. Additionally, you must provide a second computer for your instructor to capture his or her video image and run the encoder software. The encoder computer connects to the streaming video server to distribute the instructor’s live video image to the class.

Areas of LearnLinc That Can Be Localized

LearnLinc 4.5 supports full localization of the LearnLinc Client software. Localized versions of LearnLinc allow you to use up to two languages in class at one time. Please contact LearnLinc for more information on localized LearnLinc software.

You can also localize the text of the LearnLinc Virtual Campus. Refer to Localizing the Virtual Campus on page 109 for instructions.

Features That Can Be Customized in the Virtual Campus

You can make any or all of the following changes to the Virtual Campus:

• replace border graphics with your organization’s logo or artwork

• remove access to certain functionality, such as the user directory

• add custom functionality

Streaming video is highly compressed. The compression process can take up to 30 seconds, which will result in a 30 second delay between when an instructor speaks and when the students hear him or her.

A Suggested Process for Developing and Implementing Virtual Campus Customizations

Once your Virtual Campus is in use, we suggest that you do not modify it directly. If you modify the Virtual Campus directly, you may accidentally “break” parts of the campus, causing your users to miss classes or be denied access to course resources or other information.

We recommend that you create a duplicate of your Virtual Campus, and store it on a separate LearnLinc server for further development and testing. You can use the Administration tool export and import features to put a copy of your LearnLinc Name Service database on the duplicate server, so that you can make and test changes in a simulation of your actual LearnLinc environment, without compromising your live LearnLinc server.

Features That Can Be Customized in the Virtual Classroom You can make any or all of the following changes to the Virtual Classroom:

• display users’ pictures in the LearnLinc palette

• change the LearnLinc Virtual Classroom desktop background bitmap

• change the default instructor and student bitmaps (for users who do not have their own pictures uploaded to the server)

• change the default page that displays when the synchronized web browser launches

• change the default feedback answers

Distributing Customizations to the Virtual Classroom

While displaying users’ pictures in the LearnLinc palette does not require any changes to the LearnLinc classroom software, all other customizations to the Virtual Classroom do. Because these customizations require that you add to or update files in the LearnLinc classroom software installation, you must create a customized installation and distribute to your users

Detailed Directions

The following step-by-step instructions describe the processes for customizing your LearnLinc environment, specifically:

• Adding Streaming Video to Your LearnLinc Server

• Removing Access to Virtual Campus Functions

• Modifying the Virtual Campus Download Page

• Localizing the Virtual Campus

• Making Changes to the Text in the Virtual Campus

• Removing Access to Virtual Campus Functions

• Enabling Instructors and Students to Show their Pictures in the LearnLinc Palette

• Changing the Default Instructor and Student Pictures in the LearnLinc Palette

• Changing the Virtual Classroom Desktop Background Bitmap

• Changing the Default Page that Displays when the Synchronized Web Browser Launches

• Changing the Default Feedback Answers for all Your LearnLinc Users

• Creating a Custom Installation for the LearnLinc Classroom Software Adding Streaming Video to Your LearnLinc Server

The following is a overview of the process of adding live streaming video to LearnLinc. For specific directions, please refer to your NetShow 3.0 or Real Video 4.0 documentation.

1. Purchase and install LearnLinc streaming video licences on your LearnLinc server.

2. Install the Netshow or Real Video server software on a LearnLinc server or another server.

3. Set up a second computer next to the instructor who wishes to use live streaming video.

The second computer must be next to the instructor to capture his or her video and have video capture hardware and software installed on it.

4. Install the encoder software on the second computer.

5. Test to make sure that streaming video is working outside of the LearnLinc environment.

6. Schedule a data only class that has the application “Streaming Video” in its autostart list.

7. Tell the class instructor to:

a. Join the class.

b. Select Tools > Class > Suspend Audio/Video to stop any other conferencing in use.

c. Enter the URL for the NetShow or Real Video server in the Streaming Video text box d. Click Go!.

The students can hear and see the instructor in their video windows.

Quick Steps

1. Install streaming video licences on your LearnLinc server.

1. Install Netshow or Real Video server.

2. Set up a second computer next to the instructor with the encoder software.

3. Schedule a data only class with the application

“Streaming Video” in its autostart list.

4. Tell the instructor to enter the URL for the Netshow or Real Video server in the streaming video text box and click Go!.

Removing Access to Virtual Campus Functions

You can prevent your users from accessing features in the Virtual Campus by removing links to those features. The following sections describe the processes for removing access to the user account creation, guest course catalog, and user directory features.

User account creation

1. Locate the file “default.asp” on your LearnLinc server.

By default, the file is located in “C:\Program Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb”.

2. Open the file in Windows® NotePad, Microsoft Visual InterDev™ or another editor.

3. Comment out the following lines by placing HTML comment markers at the beginning and end of the following lines. The beginning “” comment lines have already been added to the following example, in bold text.

<!-- <tr>

<img src="images/newperson.gif" alt="<%= String108 %>"

border="0" width=32 height=32 align=absmiddle>

</a>

4. Save and close the page.

Do not delete the page account.asp from the server.

Quick Steps

1. Locate and open the file

“default.asp” on your LearnLinc server.

2. Comment out the lines that create the link to the user account creation page.

Guest Course Catalog

1. Locate the file default.asp on your LearnLinc server.

By default, the file is located in “C:\Program Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb”.

2. Open the file in Windows® NotePad, Microsoft Visual InterDev™ or another editor.

<!-- <tr>

<img src="images/course.gif" alt="<%= String110 %>" border="0"

width=32 height=32 align=absmiddle>

4. Save and close the page.

Do not delete the page GuestCatalog.asp from the server.

Quick Steps

1. Locate and open the file

“default.asp” on your LearnLinc server.

2. Comment out the lines that create the link to the guest course catalog page.

User Directory

1. Locate the file navigate.asp on your LearnLinc server.

By default, the file is located in “C:\Program Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb”.

2. Open the file in Windows® NotePad, Microsoft Visual InterDev™ or another editor.

<!-- <a HREF="directory.asp" target="main" onMouseOver="mOver(2)"

onMouseOut="mOut(2)">

<img SRC="<%=I18NDir%>/directory_i.GIF" BORDER="0" alt=""></

a><BR> -->

4. Save and close the page.

Note that users can still see profile pages for students and instructors with whom they are taking courses.

Modifying the Virtual Campus Download Page

1. Determine which installation option you wish to keep on the page.

2. Locate the file “download.asp” on the LearnLinc server.

By default, the file is located in “C:\Program Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb.

3. Open the file in Windows® NotePad, Microsoft Visual InterDev™ or another editor.

4. Comment out the following lines by placing HTML comment markers at the beginning and end of the following lines. The beginning “” comment lines have already been added to the following example, in bold text. (Note that the code already contains other lines that have comment tags as well.)

Do not delete the page directory.asp from the server.

Quick Steps

1. Locate and open the file

“default.asp” on your LearnLinc server.

2. Comment out the lines that create the link to the user directory page.

Quick Steps

1. Determine which installation option you wish to keep.

2. Locate and open the file

“download.asp” on the LearnLinc server.

3. Comment out the lines for the options you do not wish to display.

Advanced–Multimedia content

<!-- <table>

<tr>

<%= String220 %></font>

<tr>

' This is for Internet Explorer only If theBrowser = "MSIE" Then

' This one is for netscape only

</td>

</tr>

</table>

<br> -->

Typical

<!-- <table>

<tr>

' This is for Internet Explorer only If theBrowser = "MSIE" Then

' This one is for netscape only

<td>

Custom

<!-- <table>

<tr>

' This is for Internet Explorer only If theBrowser = "MSIE" Then

<td>

<a href="IEInst.asp?Title=<%= Server.URLEncode(String212)

%>&Link=CC">

<%= String226 %>

</a>

</td>

<% Else

' This one is for netscape only

<td>

<a href="NSInst.asp?Title=<%= Server.URLEncode(String212)

%>&Link=CC">

<%= String227 %>

</a>

</td>

<% End If %>

</tr>

</table>

</td>

</tr> -->

Localizing the Virtual Campus

1. Create a new folder on your LearnLinc server, under the “language” folder. Name the folder so that it indicates the language your are adding, for example “Español” or “Deutsche”.

By default, the “language” folder is located in “C:\Program Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb\”.

2. Copy the contents of the folder “English” and paste them into your new folder.

3. Locate the file “words.inc” in the “language” folder.

The information in this file enables a language selection drop down box and button on the welcome page of the Virtual Campus.

4. Open the file using Windows NotePad or another text editor.

5. After <%, start a new line, and replace the existing text with the following, where

languagename is the name you want to appear in the language selection drop down box, and foldername is the name of the folder you created in step 1.

Dim I18NDir

Select Case Session(“Language”) Case “languagename”

I18NDir = "language/languagename"

%><%

Case Else

I18NDir = "language/English"

%><%

End Select

sub LanguageSelectBox

<option <% if (Session("Language")="languagename") then Response.write ("Selected") %>>languagename</option>

<option <% if (Session("Language")="English" or Session("Language")="") then Response.write LearnLinc server under the

“language” folder.

2. Name the folder for the language you are adding to the campus.

3. Copy the contents of the folder “English” to your new folder.

4. Locate and open the file

“words.inc” in the

“language” folder.

5. Add the script in step 5, right.

• To translate the text for your localized version of the Virtual Campus, follow the directions in the section “Making Changes to the Text in the Virtual Campus” on page 110.

• To replace the tabs and buttons in the Virtual Campus with translated versions, follow the directions in the section “Changing the Button Graphics in the Virtual Campus” on page 113.

• To translate the Virtual Campus help pages and Quick Tutorial pages, locate the folders

“help” and “tutorial” under the folder for your language translation. Translate the text in each HTML file directly. A working knowledge of HTML is necessary to translate the HTML files.

Making Changes to the Text in the Virtual Campus 1. Locate the file “words.txt” on your LearnLinc server.

By default, the English version of this file is located in “C:\Program

Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb\language\English”. If you are localizing your Virtual Campus, and you have created a folder for another language, locate the copy of the file “words.txt” under the that folder.

2. Open the file in a text editor, such as Microsoft® Write.

(Note that the file may be too large to open in Windows® Notepad.) 3. Locate the text you wish to change.

The text entries are organized by the name of the web page on which they display.

If you are upgrading your Virtual Campus from a version that has already been translated, locate the file “error.inc” in the previous version and copy and paste its contents at the top of the file words.txt. Delete the lines 'ErrorMsg001' to 'String307' that were

included in words.txt, and translate all the lines after the comment 'Words Added For LearnLinc 4.0'.

Quick Steps

1. Locate and open the file

“words.txt” on your LearnLinc server.

2. Edit the text you wish to change by finding its string and editing the text after the equal sign (=),

4. Edit the text after the equal sign (=).

• Be sure to enclose the text with double quotes.

• To display a space between sentences in the Virtual Campus, enter two spaces in the text file.

If you want the text you are entering to display in quotes in the Virtual Campus, be sure to use single quotes ( ‘ ) around that text.

Changing Virtual Campus Graphics

You can change the image on the Virtual Campus welcome page, the border graphics, and the button graphics in the Virtual Campus.

Changing the Welcome Page Graphic

1. Create a graphic to replace the default graphic and name it “welcome.jpg”.

The graphic must be:

• 300 x 285 pixels (height x width)

• saved in jpeg (.jpg) format.

2. Locate the original file “welcome.jpg” on your LearnLinc server.

By default, the file is located in “C:\Program Files\LearnLinc\LearnLincServer\LLWeb\language”.

3. Copy your graphic to the “language” folder.

The “Confirm file replace” dialog displays.

4. Click Yes to replace the file.

In document Advanced (Page 121-148)