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Course Platform Evaluation Report

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Products

OLAT 3.2

University of Zurich: http://www.olat.org
The development of OLAT is led and funded mainly by the University of Zürich (Switzerland). Official support for OLAT is available at the Multimedia & e-Learning Center www.id.unizh.ch/mels for Swiss university members. Commercial support is available through goodsolutions.
Last major evaluation update: September 2005

About product
OLAT initially started as a student project at the University of Zürich in the year 1999. OLAT was the winner of the medida prix http://www.medidaprix.org/ and was then consolidated as a university project.

About producer
The development of OLAT is led and funded mainly by the University of Zürich (Switzerland). Official support for OLAT is available at the Multimedia & e-Learning Center www.id.unizh.ch/mels for Swiss university members. Commercial support is available through goodsolutions.

Strengths

  • Intuitive to use for course authors and students
  • Any user can create ad-hoc working groups with common file storage, discussion forum, chat, mail and announcement tools.
  • Completely frame-free design.
  • The look-and-feel is CSS controlled, and widely customizable.
  • Clean and well documented technical architecture.
  • Professional services are available from the company goodsolutions GmbH.

Weaknesses

  • No tool to search for keywords in course content and discussion forums
  • Browser bookmarks and browser back button don't work.
  • Rather small contributing community and just a handful of productive installations.
  • Lack of API's or plugin interfaces. To extend the system the original source code has to be modified.

General
Multilinguality
Available languages: German, French, Italian, English. It is up to the students to configure their preferred language in the personal settings. Help files are not available in all languages.

Student's Environment
Ease of Use
The student's environment is intuitive, nice looking and easy to use. Drawbacks: Some very common browser functionalities (back-button, browser bookmarks) don't work.

Some users may have difficulty understanding the different types of content links (catalogue, courses, learning resources).

uses browser functionality
Back and reload buttons don't work.
browser bookmarks
Browser bookmarks don't work.
URL access possible
Yes
in-system bookmarks
Only short-cuts to courses or buddygroups
print current page
Works fine, Olat uses no frames. There is also a (per page) print view that hides the navigation.
save page on local disk
Works fine, Olat uses no frames.
find word in current page
Works fine.
no frames
Olat is completely frame-free for all users.
scalable font
Yes. In addition to browser-based font scaling, Olat allows users to define a default font size (small/normal/large).
Compliant with common web technology
Olat has been designed to work with all important web browsers running on any operating system. During the test, no severe browser incompatibilities or style sheet issues were observed.
Firefox 1 ok
Yes
IE 6 ok
Yes
Safari ok
Yes
Functional environment
Nice:
  • Students can create their own ad-hoc working groups (buddygroups), and decide who can be a member (by invitation). Tools in a buddygroup: announcements, send e-mail to members, shared document folder, discussion forum, text chat.
  • Shared document folders are available on a course or group level. Students can subscribe to a folder to be notified of changes. Files can be hierarchically organized, moved, copied, up-/downloaded, zipped and unzipped. Files can be accessed through web up/download or through WebDAV.
  • Private document folders are available.
  • Other available tools: student annotations, surveys, assignments, selective release of content.
Missing:
  • Full text search tool (that searches at least in content pages and the discussion forum)
  • Calendar tool
keyword search
No search tool available.
configurable environment
Limited but sufficient. Students can change interface language, font size and chat/who-is-online visibility.
effective navigation aids
Usual hierachical navigation. Missing: previous/next page button.
context sensitive help
Available but incomplete.
Collection of Tools
Announcements, buddygroups, private/shareable document repositories, student annotations, surveys, assignments, selective release of content

Tutoring and Didactics
Ease of use
The tutoring environment is easy and intuitive to use. A short training session will be sufficient to get the tutors started.
Communication
The most important communication tools are available.

Basic forum functionalities:
Supported: very basic wiki-like formatting (url, bold, italic, smileys), thread sorting by various criteria, email notification on forum level.
Not supported: attachments (workaround shared folder), advanced formatting like lists, math formulas, view all message bodies in a thread at once.

forum threaded
Yes
forum searchable
No
private workgroup forums
Yes - in buddygroups
internal mailing system
There is no internal messaging system. Users can send regular emails using a form.
mailing system interoperable with emails
Partly - internally sent messages are sent as regular emails.
chat
Available
whiteboard with integr. chat
No
Instant Messaging
Yes
Student management
Students usually enroll themselves. The course visibility can public, or defined very specifically with boolean expressions.
class enrollment by tutor
Courses can be public, or restricted to student groups (boolean expressions on AAI and other attributes).
class enrollment by student
Usually students enroll themselves in a course.
tutors can build groups
Yes
students can build groups
Yes - ad-hoc buddygroups
Activity tracking
There is no online graphical or statistical evaluation tool. Very detailed evaluations can be done manually by downloading the class access log file, and evaluating it using a spreadsheet or a statistics tool.
individual page/tool access
Graphical/statistical evaluation must be done manually by downloading the access log file.
class page/tool access
Graphical/statistical evaluation must be done manually by downloading the access log file.
tracking of individual activity in forum
Graphical/statistical evaluation must be done manually by downloading the access log file.
tracking of class activity in forum
Graphical/statistical evaluation must be done manually by downloading the access log file.
individual performance in tests
Yes, every student can see personal performance/results in tests.
class performance in tests
yes
class assignment performance
yes

Course Development
Ease of Use
Designing a course and adding content is relatively easy. There's a built-in JavaScript based HTML editor, that allows to create and edit simple HTML pages. Pre-existing HTML pages can be uploaded and reused without modifications.
  • Linking to any content page or tool in a course is possible, even from external websites.
can define course structure
Yes
up/download of resources and content
HTTP-Upload and WebDAV supported
Hypertext linking
Course authors can link to any content page or tool in a course (externally: https://www.olat.unizh.ch/olat/auth/repo/go?rid=154173444&par=71757604224511, internally: olatcmd/gotonode/71757604224511)
Flexible Development Framework
Basically, content pages are static HTML pages. If more dynamic and intelligent content is needed, OLAT allows to tunnel through an external website, and display it's content in the Olat content pane. With tunneling, virtually any content can be visually seamlessly integrated in an Olat course. The drawbacks of tunneling is that the course authors have to handle static and dynamic content differently, and that external web servers need to be set up and maintained.
extensible architecture
On source code level anything can be added. (A plugin interface is in preparation.)
support for client side scripting
Yes
support for server side scripting
No. Dynamic content has to be run on an external website, and it's content has to be fed (tunneled) into the content pane on an Olat course.
server side scripting API
No
custom navigation scheme
No
Developers support
The system is well documented, and developers usually provide answers to support requests within hours.
basic manual/tutorial for authors
Available as context sensitive online help and as complete user manual
advanced manual for programmers
Technical documentation: http://www.olat.org/docu/
complete documentation of APIs
-
responsive support
Yes
online user forums
Yes: www.olat.org
Compatibility with common web authoring tools
Standard HTML content can be uploaded and used in a course. All local references to media files and other html pages work.

Problems:

  • The Olat navigation is not properly updated, when clicking on links between local html pages.
  • Local css might conflict with system css.
  • Background images in local css don't work.
compatible with standard web content
Standard html pages can be uploaded, including css and embedded media.
Assessment
The testing environment only offers 2 question types: multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank tests. However, the multiple-choice editor/engine is very flexible and allows to set many attributes and settings: visual appearance, possible number of attempts, time limitations, randomizations, hints, correct solutions or specific feedback.

There is no API that allows to extend the assessment engine with new question types (extension needs to be done in the source code).

Online Quiz Editor
Available
Offline Quiz Editor
Yes, any IMS QTI editor
Broad Range of Quiz Types
Multiple choice and fill-in-the-blank test
Extensible Quiz Engine
No
Support for e-learning standards
IMS-CP and IMS-QTI import supported. IMS-CP can also be exported. SCORM support is finished and will be officially released in Sept '05.
SCORM package import
Not yet officially (SCORM support is finished and will be released in Sept '05.)
IMS-CP import/export
IMS-CP import and export supported
IMS-QTI import/export
IMS-QTI import supported
Adaptable look and feel
The layout and look-and-feel can be adapted by applying a custom CSS.
course level look-and-feel
Look-and-feel customizable by CSS. Shared CSS planned in future releases
multiple corporate identities
No

System & Administration
System management
Based on scalable J2EE servlet architecture
Performance
Based on scalable J2EE servlet architecture
Security
-
Administration
No virtual servers possible on a single installation. A complete technical documentation is available online http://www.olat.org/docu/
One server - multiple institutions/faculties
Not supported
Flexible Authentication Scheme
SWITCH AAI interoperability implemented
Documentation
Yes. See http://www.olat.org/docu/