Concept: Course Sections and Formats

Before you build the actual Course Content sections, consider your audience. Consider how they are connected to your server and what kinds of helper technology they have included with their web browsers.

If everyone has a high-speed connection to your server, then large graphic, audio or video content may be appropriate. If, however, the students will connect through modems over the public Internet, perhaps simple HTML pages or content authored in FlexTraining should be used for course material.

Also, what kind of file formats are your students set up to handle? If they do not have Audio Player plug-ins installed with their web browsers, they will not be able to hear your audio content no matter how fast it loads. The same goes for video files and animation technology such as Macromedia’s ShockWave.

The simplest course content for a web browser to handle is basic HTML, which you can build with any HTML editor, such as Front Page, DreamWeaver or even Microsoft Word.

Working with Content Sections

You should identify or build your course content pages or documents, or build screens and lessons in FlexAuthoring, before continuing. These pages or documents may be on your server, or anywhere on the Internet or your Intranet.

You access the Content Sections tools from the “Build Courses – Table Method” screen. When you click on the number that represents the number of sections for a given course, the content builder frameset will open up.

The bottom frame provides details for the sections that have already been defined. These details include the Title, the Location and filename, and the Type of content that make up each course section.

Begin by choosing a Course Section from the list in the upper-right frame.

The list of Sections will start out empty before you have defined any section content. Each entry will say “CREATE CONTENT FOR THIS SECTION.” The number of entries in the list will be the number of Course Sections you defined in your lesson plan for this course.

Training

Fifty-three comments were submitted regarding ITS standards and interoperability tests. The commenters expressed concern about requiring the use of ITS standards and interoperability tests prematurely, the impact on legacy systems of requiring ITS standards, and confusion regarding the term ''adopted by the DOT.''

In response to the comments, the FHWA has significantly modified the final rule to eliminate reference to the use of standards and interoperability tests prior to adoption in § 940.11(f). Section 940.11(g) addresses the applicability of standards to legacy systems. It is not the intent of the DOT to formally adopt any standard before the standard is mature; and also, not all ITS standards should, or will, be formally adopted by the DOT. Formal adoption of a standard means that the DOT will go through the rulemaking process, including a period of public comment, for all standards that are considered candidates for adoption.

The DOT has developed a set of criteria to determine when a standard could be considered for formal adoption. These criteria include, at a minimum, the following elements:

1. The standard has been approved by a Standard Development Organization (SDO).

2. The standard has been successfully tested in real world applications as appropriate.

3. The standard has received some degree of acceptance by the community served by the standard.

4. Products exist to implement the standard.

5. There is adequate documentation to support the use of the standard.

6. There is training available in the use of the standard where applicable.

E-Learning Software Components

Online Training

Working with Content Sections

Training