GB2534390A

GB2534390A - Learning management or information delivery system

Info

Publication number: GB2534390A
Application number: GB1501034.1A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Roy Buff Timothy; Russell Papworth Graham; Charles Mackman Alexander
Original assignee: CM GROUP Ltd
Current assignee: CM GROUP Ltd
Priority date: 2015-01-21
Filing date: 2015-01-21
Publication date: 2016-07-27
Also published as: GB201501034D0

Abstract

Disclosed is a method of modelling a system that delivers information to a group of users. The method starts by defining for a group of users the maximum number or expected concurrent number of users. The method then defines an expected geographical location of the users, allocates the size of the computing resources for the users, including the communication bandwidth, storage size, RAM allocation and processor power. The bandwidth allocated is that required to deliver the information to a user in a usable form, the information including audio, audio-visual and text content. On the basis of this information the likely data output demand to be provided to the user is estimated. This estimate is compared with the amount of computing recourse allocated to the group of users to derive a metric of how well the computer recourse has been tailored to the expected demand. The method may be used to model a learning or training deliver system. The method may use a graphical user interface showing the locations of physical hosts is used to allocate the computing resources and the data stores.

Description

LEARNING MANAGEMENT OR INFORMATION DELIVERY SYSTEM

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

This disclosure relates to a learning management system or to an information delivery system, and to a method of configuring and/or administering a learning management system or an information deli very system.

BACKGROUND

Learning management systems are known in which various learning materials, e.g. courses, in the form of one or more of text, audio and video can be delivered to one or more individuals for them to review and to learn from. Furthermore, such learning management systems may keep a record of the materials that such a user has reviewed, and any certificates of competency or test scores resulting from tests relating to such materials. However, such learning management systems tend to be relatively expensive and organisation centric in that the learning management software is generally installed on one or more servers located behind an organisation's firewall which are arranged to distribute the materials created by or bought by that organisation to users connected to that organisation's local area network.

S UMMARY

In accordance with the present disclosure there is provided a computer implemented learning management system or information delivery system which can run on or be hosted on one or more computing entities which may be provided within a hosted environment. Such a hosted environment may be offered by one or more data centre operators provided at one or more geographic locations outside of an organisation's own computing domain, i.e. outside of an organisation's firewall. Such a hosted environment may be referred to as "in the cloud" indicating internet style delivery to users and may comprise virtualised server farms (potentially owned by a 3rd party) offering scalability and redundancy.

An organisation can therefore rent the learning management system and computer infrastructure from such a data centre operator and learning management system software provider. These may be different entities. In such an arrangement the organisation may generate and host its own learning materials, and/or it may buy in learning materials from one or more learning content providers. Learning content may be provided as textual material, audio material, audio-visual material, interactive material such as computer programmes or audio-visual material having a decision structure therein such that various decisions made within delivery of the material affect the content displayed to a user. Furthermore, an organisational user may define their computing requirements, and hence costs of the service, in order to achieve a balance between service level and cost.

There is further provided an administration system to set up the functionality of the learning management or information delivery system. The administration system may allow an organisational user to control the amount of computer resource that they pay for, and control the performance of the learning management system in terms of its delivery of the learning material to individuals. Furthermore an interface may be provided such that cost and performance can be estimated prior to deployment of the learning management system. Such an estimate may take account of an expected number of concurrent users, and the data type of the material that is to be delivered. Data type takes account of whether the material is text, audio, or video. It also takes account of whether the material is available for download to a user's individual device/machine, or whether such material is only available for streaming to a machine or device such that the chances of it being maliciously copied are significantly reduced. The estimate of performance may also take account of one or more of bandwidth, latency, and server resource, such as amount of CPU time, amount of Random access memory that has been allocated, amount of long term storage (Hard disk or similar) that has been allocated, and speed of these components.

Additionally or alternatively the administration functionality may enable users to be associated with specific hardware. This is advantageous as it enables the likelihood of successful delivery of training or other information to be health checked prior to trying to deliver the material. For example there is little point in trying to present training material designed for a high definition large display to a user using a device with a small and/or low resolution screen. Thus there is a possibility to inhibit delivery of unsuitable material and to replace it with material more suitable for the user's device to deliver.

Additionally or alternatively the administration function may hold encryption data specifying whether material can be sent to a user in the plain or whether encryption must he applied. The encryption technique may also be specified. A user may he inhibited from holding a document in its entirety and parts may need to be deleted before other parts can be downloaded. The encryption engine may also specify the download of security software to verify the status of the device's operating system to ensure that it has not been compromised by malicious software and/or that it is at an expected location.

DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

The present invention will now be described, by way of non-limiting example only, with reference to the accompanying figures, in which: Figure I schematically illustrates a computing host connected to a plurality of organisational users, each of which has departmental and individual users; Figure 2 is a mall representing the geographical distribution of several data centres Di -D5, and several users XI -X3 belonging to a first organisation and Y I -Y2 belonging to a second organisation; Figure 3 is an example of a system administrator graphical user interface allowing an inexperienced administrator to set the performance of an organisation's learning management system (or indeed any other hosted service) organised in accordance with the teachings of the present disclosure; Figure 4 schematically illustrates the organisation of data within a data store; and Figure 5 schematically illustrates a user interface presented to an individual user to allow them to interact with the learning management system to select courses, to monitor their progress, and to export their records if desired.

DESCRIPTION OF EXAMPLE EMBODIMENTS

Figure 1 schematically illustrates the interconnections between one or more computing entities 2 and 4 and various organisational users 10, 12 and 14. The organisational users 10, 12 and 14 may be wholly independent organisations each of which desires access to a hosted software service, such as in this example a hosted learning management service. Alternatively, one or more of the organisational entities may be different departments within a same organisation or within a same group of companies. Each organisational entity may have sub-organisations associated with it and each ultimately has a plurality of individual users represented as users 20, 22, and 24 for the first organisational entity -10.

The organisational entities may he of any size, and thus may span the range from individual one man organisations, to small and medium enterprises, and up to large corporates or government departments. Consequently each organisation may have different skill sets and competencies concerning the ability of them to control and deliver their own computing infrastructure and each organisation may have different competencies concerning its ability to create learning materials or to distribute other materials. Furthermore each organisation may require different learning materials. Thus, a medical organisation is likely to require significantly different learning materials from, say, an accounting organisation. Each organisation will require the learning materials they have paid for to be kept private to them, and not to be accessible by other organisations or users. Similarly, the user records pertaining to each individual within an organisation need to be stored securely and with the correct permissions such that only authorised users can have access to an individual's records, and that the records cannot be misappropriated by or read by non-authorised persons.

Each organisation 10, 12 and 14 is connected via a data link to the hosting computing entities of which two entities 2 and 4 are shown. The data links 30, 32 and 34 may comprise any suitable data link, such as a virtual private network tunnel, but for ease of delivery the data links preferably comprise at least one web link to a suitable interface or portal associated with the software service hosted by the computing entities 2 and 4. Use of a browser driven connection removes the need for the corporate entities 10, 12 and 14 to install specific clients upon the computers of their user base, and also means that the content can be delivered to a wide variety of user computing platforms, such as desktop PCs, laptop PCs, tablets, phones, personal audio players and so on. This approach significantly reduces the cost of deployment of the service amongst the user base, and can facilitate the introduction of a BYOD (bring your own device) culture if an organisation so wishes. It also means that access to the hosting entities may be more easily controlled by a corporate entity which may decide to set up specific firewall rules for communication between its own local area network and the remote computing entities 2 and 4.

Each host 2 and 4 may comprise one or more data processors and associated storage. The computing entities may, for example, comprise server farms and network attached storage within a data centre. The data centre operator may choose to provide resilience in its organisation by mirroring its server farm to other servers at the same geographical location or to other servers at a different geographical location. The location of the physical computing entities is generally largely irrelevant to the organisational users, in as far as they are concerned they are just receiving a software service from the "cloud" 40.

Some users may wish to have the option to tailor the service that they receive, and thereby to control the costs associated with that service. Furthermore some users may have restrictions upon where their data can be stored. Thus, one might suppose that an organisation concerned in the production of armaments for, for example, a first country would not he permitted to store training materials related to the production and maintenance of those armaments on a server based in a different country which might be considered to be a military or political threat to the first country. This situation will be described more fully, with respect to Figure 2, which is an arbitrary map where the shape of each country 40, 42, 44, 46, 48, 50 and 52 is deliberately intended to hear no resemblance to the actual shape of any of the countries of the world. In this example, the learning management system is available as a distributed service which may be hosted across any one of the data centres Dl, D2, D3, D4, and D5. As can he seen, data centres DI and D2 are located in country 40. Data centre D3 is located in country 44. Data centre D4 is located in country 50 and data centre D5 is located in country 52.

A user XI, may not particularly care about the sensitivity of its training materials, perhaps because they are largely generic, industry standard or open source. Therefore its choice of data centre may be determined solely on cost and bandwidth to deliver its materials. Therefore, user X1 has a choice of data centres DI and D2 within its own jurisdiction. Furthermore, user Xl is located relatively close to data centre DI, and therefore this might generally be considered to be the prime data centre to which it should attach in order to store its learning material and user records. User X2 is located in the same country 50 as data centre D4. However user X2 is clearly much closer to the data centre D5 located in country 52 than it is to the data centre D4. Thus if issues of data security, and in particular storage of data in a separate jurisdiction, are not an issue then user X2 would probably connect to data centre D5. However if some of the learning materials are of a sensitive nature, then user X2 may be required to connect to data centre D4. Alternatively, if user X2 was for example an organisation that cooperated with or was a subsidiary or subcontractor to organisation Xl, then organisation X2 may be required to store its data, or at least some of its data in data centres Dl or D2. User X3 located in country 46 has no data centres within that country available to it, and therefore it has to pick one of the other data centres based on issues such as, without limitation, cost, geopolitical issues and data sovereignty rules. User Yl located in country 42 may find itself in a country which is surrounded by generally hostile neighbours, but where it is supported by the government in country 52. Therefore, user Yl may depending on the nature of its material, choose to connect to data centre D5 purely for political reasons. However, it might also have the opportunity to connect to data centre D4, or indeed any one of data centres DI, D2 and D3 if the materials that it stores are not of a sensitive nature. User Y2 is in a similar position to user X1, and is quite likely to connect to data centre D5 as its closest geographical centre unless there are confidentiality issues requiring it to connect to one of the other data centres.

Thus, in general, any one of the users may be given an opportunity to connect to any one of the data centres, and/or for various reasons may be desiring not to connect to a particular data centre. The relative locations between users and data centres, and the intervening infrastructure may have delivery implications and/or cost implications. Furthermore each country or region within a country may have infrastructural differences. Thus, for example, a user located in a city may have access to state of the art fibre optic broadband. However, a user located in a relatively rural environment may be restricted to slower technologies, such as DSL and ADSL technologies. However, in such an arrangement additional bandwidth may be obtained by purchasing additional lines and sending data in parallel over these different communication paths, but this incurs a further cost.

Generally, the data routing between a given user and a data processing centre can be estimated or calculated based on knowledge of the tariffs of various service providers located between the user and the data centre and involved in transport of such data. These tariffs are advantageously maintained in a data base such that estimates of bandwidth versus cost are available to persons administering the learning management software on behalf of a corporate entity.

Advantageously each corporate entity is able to specify the sort of data that it expects its users to require as part of their training. Thus, each entity can decide whether it is delivering its material in text, video, audio, or possibly similar courses that may combine several of these forms via different delivery mechanisms. With this information, and a knowledge of how much material it wishes to deliver, the organisation can select an appropriate amount of storage. This may be done automatically by a set-up wizard or similar software operating as part of the learning management software, or it may be done by an administrator via a graphical user interface, GUI, for example of the type shown in Figure 3. Thus, a user may initially he presented with a map, such as that shown in Figure 2, where they specify which data centre a given entity wishes to connect to. They are then taken to the administrator GUI of Figure 3 where they can select the amount of CPU time or processor power that they think they need, the amount of bulk data storage they require, the amount of RAM they wish allocated to their server(s) and their bandwidth that they wish to purchase via use of sliders 60, 62, 64 and 68 of the GUI. Based on this information, together with an estimate of the number of concurrent users that the system is expected to support a set up algorithm can calculate an expected cost, such as an annual cost, and an estimate of goodness. The estimate of goodness may be displayed by a suitable graphical element 70. The estimate of goodness indicates whether, on a statistical basis, the bulk of individual users are likely to find the learning management system performance poor, good or excellent. These qualitative indications take account of the number of users, the bandwidth, and the type of material that on average is to be delivered to a user to provide the indication of whether performance is likely to be acceptable. Thus, if an organisation picks a large amount of processing power, a large amount of storage, a large amount of RAM and a large amount of bandwidth, and furthermore has decided to connect to its local data centre which is located in a city, then it should have the infrastructure to deliver large amounts of video content to its users simultaneously. However this may also come at an undesirable cost. The system administrator may then choose to trade off performance against budget and reduce the bandwidth. In so doing the cost may come down but similarly the performance may degrade. They are given the option to exercise a choice as to how poor they are prepared to allow the user experience to be.

The system administrator GUI can also inform an administrator of when the system performance is always likely to be poor. Thus, if user X3 turns out to be located in a rural area and chooses to connect to data centre D4 which may be on another continent then there is the risk that bandwidth is always going to he limited. This may not he a problem if the learning material is generally textual and has been allowed for downloading such that local caches may be kept on a user's device. In such circumstances performance is likely to be good to excellent. However, if the learning material has been prepared in high quality video format and local caching has been disabled or inhibited such that the content must always be streamed live, then the performance is likely to he always poor. However the administrator may be able to improve performance by buying more communication channels, and/or by instructing a format change or quality change (such as reduction in resolution or displayed area) to be performed at delivery, and/or by allowing the materials to be stored in a different data centre, for example data centre D3 which may be able to support a greater data throughput to user X3. Furthermore, the system administrator for an organisation may be able to specify whether the entire administration connects to a specific server or servers, or whether only sub groups within the organisation connect to one server, and other sub groups within the organisation connect to a different server. This may be achieved by use of the radio buttons 70 shown in Figure 3 taking the administrator to a second menu where they can specify sub groups' connections to the individual servers or data processing centres.

Each system administrator may also be able to define where data can be geographically stored even if they have chosen to allow their data to be stored upon multiple computing entities located in data centres across several jurisdictions.

Figure 4 shows schematically data organisation within a data store. The data store, generally designated 80, is portioned, either logically, physically and/or by encryption into sub regions 82 and 84 belonging to different organisations designated organisation 1 and organisation N. Referring to the data space 82 allocated to organisation 1, its administrator may have chosen to sub divide that space into spaces 84 allocated to a first department and 86 allocated to a second department. The data space 84 allocated to the first department contains training or other deliverable materials, "deliverable materials 1", to be provided to users within that department. It also contains user records, designated "user records I ", pertaining to each of the users within department 1. It also has various control fields, such as a geographical control field which indicates which countries the information "deliverable materials 1 " may be stored in, and which countries that information cannot be stored in. Thus in this example the deliverable materials I may he stored in the USA, but cannot he stored in France or Germany. This may relate, for example to differences in regulatory regimes between the USA and the European Union.

Similarly, department 2 has its own store of deliverable materials, its own set of user records, and its own control fields. In this example the deliverable materials, designated deliverable materials 2, can be stored in France and Germany but not in the USA. This again may be as a consequence of different regulatory regimes.

Each individual user has their own individualised training record. Each record may simply list which courses they have completed, or it may list the materials that they could choose to do and provide an indication of which materials they have done, not started, or which are partially completed. An example of such a record as presented to a user over a graphical user interface is illustrated in Figure 5. Thus the user can confirm that the record pertains to them, but virtue of reference to their name and/or other identifying materials. They are also presented with a list of training modules which they have access to, together with a status indicator or whether these training modules have been done, not started, or are partially done. Thus, in this example training modules TEXT1 and AUDIO1 are done. Similarly training module VIDE01 has been done. Modules VIDEO2, TEXT2 and AUDIOS have not been started and module AUDIO2 is 60% complete. If any competency exams or certificates result from completing such modules, then the results of these exams or certificates may also be stored within the user record within the learning management system. Users may also be able to self-certify their competencies as a result of courses or experience gained outside of their organisation. Thus, a user could self-certify a particular skill level based on courses they have done either in their own time, or with a previous employer. This may be of benefit to their own current employer when trying to assess the skills base of its workforce in relation to a potentially new undertaking.

A disadvantage with known learning management systems is that the learning record for a given user is held within a dedicated server within a company's own computing infrastructure. It is therefore often difficult if not impossible for a user to be able to present their own learning management record to a further organisation, for example to obtain further accreditation by showing that various competencies have already been achieved, or to demonstrate to a potential future employer that they have achieved specific competencies. However in the context of a hosted service the organisation may choose to enable users to edit their own user records to self-certify their own training, to upload supporting documentation if appropriate, and also to export their records such that they can be provided to third parties. Exporting such a record may include the steps of printing the record to hard copy or a suitable electronic transfer medium such as PDF, or it may include exporting the record and appropriate certificates in a computer readable and potentially extensible format, for example XML, JSON (Javascript Object Notation) or other suitable transfer mechanisms. The exported records may also be signed with a digital signature provided by a trusted computing entity in order to provide confidence to a recipient of the record that the record has not been fabricated outside of the learning management system and presented to them falsely.

The controlladministration interface may also allow the administrator to associate devices with users such that materials are only delivered to a specified device in a format suitable for that device. Similarly encryption may be associated with a user and/or their devices. Decryption of data may require the device to be in specified locations, such as a user's home or office to guard against use of a stolen device before the decryption key is delivered or a decryption engine is enabled.

It is thus possible to provide a distributed and scalable learning management system in which individual users can maintain their training record and potentially export it. It is also possible to provide a configuration tool such that organisations buying such a learning management service, or indeed any other hosted service, can specify the data centres that they wish to use, specify geographical restrictions upon where data can be stored, and specify storage and bandwidth requirements by way of a user interface. This allows nontechnical users control over the performance and cost of the service and also enables them to respond to user feedback to increase or decrease storage (hard-disk and/or RAM), bandwidth and processor power as appropriate. It also enables companies to identify when their learning management system expectations are inappropriate and to adapt or modify the content that they wish to deliver or the computing infrastructure that they wish to use in order to ensure that a sufficient level of performance is delivered from day one, thereby preventing users from becoming disillusioned with the learning management system as of its outset.

Claims

CLAIMS1. A computer implemented method of delivering information to at least one user, the method comprising modelling or predicting performance of the computer system delivering the information to the user, the method including the steps of: a) defining for a group of users a value representing a maximum number of users or an expected concurrent number of users; b) defining an expected geographical location for the group of users; c) allocating a size of computing resource for the group of users, where the size of the computing resource comprises at least one of a communications bandwidth, a storage size, RAM allocation and processor power; d) allocating a bandwidth required to deliver the information to a user in a usable form, where the information comprises at least of audio content, audio-visual content, and textual material, and f) on the basis of this information estimating a likely data output demand to be provided to the group of users, and comparing this demand with the amount of computing resource allocated to the group of users to derive a metric of how well the computer resource has been tailored to the expected demand.
2. A method as claimed in claim 1 where the method further comprises using a graphical user interface showing the locations of physical hosts for the computing resource, and allocating computing resource to the group of users by way of the graphical user interface.
3. A method as claimed in claim 2 where the graphical user interface further shows a representation of the relative geographical positions of the physical hosts, and a person configuring the computer resource can specify the location of specific data stores that are to store specific items or classes of information.
4. A method as claimed in claim 3, where the method further comprises estimating at least one of a bandwidth, latency or cost for transferring data from a data store to a user within the group of users.
5. A method as claimed in any preceding claim where the method forms a component within or part of a learning management system, and the learning management system includes a user record pertaining to at least one user within the group of users, and a user can access their respective record to perform at least one of: a) read their record; b) modify their record; c) copy their record; d) export their record; e) grant access to a specified entity to the record.
A method as claimed in any preceding claim including the step of maintaining a record of the competency of at least one user.
7. A method as claimed in any preceding claim, further comprising keeping a list of devices associated with a user.
8. A method as claimed in claim 7 further comprising tailoring material such that it is suitable for display or review on a user's device, taking account of the characteristics of such a device.
9. A method as claimed in any preceding claim further comprising associating an encryption status with a user or their device(s).
10. A method of delivering information to a user, the method comprising associating one or more devices with a user and prior to delivering information checking whether the information is in a format suitable for a user's device.
I I. A method as claimed in claim 10 further comprising modifying the content of the information if it is unsuitable for delivery to the device.
12. A method of delivering information to a user, the method including associating encryption rules with a user or a device, and applying such rules prior to sending information to a user or delivering a decryption key to a user.
13. A computer readable set of instructions for instructing a computer to perform the method of any of claims 1 to 12.