Learning in the cloud: a new challenge for a global teaching system in optics and photonics

Abstract

Nowadays, it is assumed of many applications, companies and parts of the society to be always available online. However, according to [Times, Oct, 31 2011], 73% of the world population do not use the internet and thus aren't "online" at all. The most common reasons for not being "online" are expensive personal computer equipment and high costs for data connections, especially in developing countries that comprise most of the world's population (e.g. parts of Africa, Asia, Central and South America). However it seems that these countries are leap-frogging the "PC and landline" age and moving directly to the "mobile" age. Decreasing prices for smart phones with internet connectivity and PC-like operating systems make it more affordable for these parts of the world population to join the "always-online" community. Storing learning content in a way accessible to everyone, including mobile and smart phones, seems therefore to be beneficial. This way, learning content can be accessed by personal computers as well as by mobile and smart phones and thus be accessible for a big range of devices and users. A new trend in the Internet technologies is to go to "the cloud". This paper discusses the changes, challenges and risks of storing learning content in the "cloud". The experiences were gathered during the evaluation of the necessary changes in order to make our solutions and systems "cloud-ready".

Research on System Architecture to Provide Maximum Security, End User Device Independency and User Centric Control over Content in Cloud

“…Mobile learning, through the use of mobile technology, will allow citizens of the world to access learning materials and information from anywhere and at anytime. This idea will literally come true only after a worldwide successful implementation of presentation of device independent learning content (Christ & Feisst, 2010) which should be prepared and saved in the cloud server before (Sultana et al, 2013). Here the cloud services such as Software as a Service (SaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) provide Application and Storage space for the learning content in the cloud.…”