Media and Presentation

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Last updated: Jun 11, 2005Version comment
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This session discussed media management and presentation tools for
Sakai mentioning, in particular, the Almagest Media Repository
developed at Princeton University.

General Comments

The session drew about 25 people. Several image tools were
cited in the discussion and are referenced below. Particular
attention was paid to the Twin Peaks tool developed by
Indiana University for Sakai which makes it easy to make
references to items in University library (or other) resources that
can be seen through a common search. It was noted that using
such a tool to reference content in a media repository would be
a powerful thing. Later it was learned that
Image Search Extensions have been added to
the Twin Peaks by Jeff Kahn at MIT.
Jeff Kahn has agreed to share code with Princeton/Davis
to explore possible integration into the Princeton media
repository known as Almagest.

Almagest

Almagest then became the next big item of
discussion. The audience was interested in both its media
presentation capabilities as well as its ability to manage and
display extensive contextual information useful in teaching.
The session ran two hours as several people stayed on to see
a demonstration of Almagest. Features noted in response to
audience

  • Multimedia and document support
  • Blackboard Building Block plugin
  • Immediate presentation Annotation
  • Presentation cropping/zooming
  • Drag and Drop "lecture" building
  • On the fly lecture changes
    -image zooming
    -image ordering
    -database drill-down

Collaboration on Image Use

A particularly interesting discussion ensued following the
Twin Peaks discussion when it was suggested that there coule be a
research potential with respect to how the community
uses the same image. Could one do an Amazon like search of
references to like images and other images linked or
sought in the same context?

Integration

Also discussed was how tightly integrated a tool like Almagest
would need to be with a system like Sakai. The Blackboard
plugin was determined to be extremely useful even though it
does not directly integrate Almagest with the Blackboard CMS.
People felt it would be enough to be able to launch a tool like
Almagest but that it would be additionally meaningful if the content
in the Almagest repository could be easily accessed from
within other Sakai tools a-la Twin Peaks...and linked into tools
such as assignments, announcements, Test and Quiz and
discussions.

Tools referenced