FORGE Toolkit: Leveraging Distributed Systems in eLearning Platforms

Abstract

While more and more services become virtualized and always accessible in our society, laboratories supporting computer science (CS) lectures have mainly remained offline and class-based. This apparent abnormality is due to several limiting factors, discussed in the literature, such as the high cost of deploying and maintaining computer network testbeds and the lack of standardization for the presentation of eLearning platforms. In this paper, we present the FORGE toolkit, which leverages experimentation facilities currently deployed in international initiatives for the development of e-learning materials. Thus, we solve the institutional challenge mentioned in the ACM/IEEE 2013 CS curricula concerning the access and maintenance of specialized and heterogeneous hardware thanks to a seamless integration with the networking test-bed community. Moreover, this project builds an ecosystem, where teaching and educational materials, tools, and experiments are available under open scheme and policies. We demonstrate how it already meets most of the requirements from the network and communication component of CS 2013 and some of the labs of the Cisco academy. Finally, we present experience reports illustrating the potential benefits of this framework based on the first deployments in four post-graduate courses in prestigious institutions around the world.INDEX TERMS eLearning, networking, testbeds.

An integrated P2P framework for E-learning

“…Global Environment for Network Infrastructure [12] and Future Internet Research and Experiments [21] are two important learning projects which focused on near-ubiquitous availability of heterogeneous test-beds for carrying out experiments on future internet technologies for learning. FORGE [29] toolkit leveraged both FIRE and GENI for developing learning material to provide an eco-system for teaching and self-learning using tools and experiments available under open policies. Teaching and experiments related to computer science courses in universities Seattle project [4] offered access to Planet Lab for deploying and test student assignments.…”

Characterization of the impact on the society of the local cisco networking academy of ITSA in Barranquilla

“…One of the factors that have the most impact on the correct delivery of the Cisco Academy curriculum, and which is vital for the success of the program, is the infrastructure of the physical laboratories. In this sense, the impact of the FORGE toolkit, which takes advantage of the laboratory infrastructures to facilitate the development of e-learning materials [16]. Another research measured the impact of the Cisco Networking Academy on higher education programs in Malaysia [17].…”

Design of Heterogeneous Data Exchange Technology for Teaching Resources Based on ICMPv6

“…The packet propagation time refers to the round-trip time of the signal used to transmit data in the link, which is generally related to the speed of light. Jourjon et al [7] pointed out that the waiting time of a packet refers to the waiting time in the buffer before the packet is sent. It is mainly generated by the resource contention process of packets in the intermediate routers and switches.…”