The Web as an Education and Training Platform
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The Web is a decentralized, network of computer networks that allows members to communicate with one another through data links. Though still limited in the kind and speed of user interaction, it is an ideal vehicle for studies and training. It will be more compelling for training when major facilities are set up for testing what is trained and when it is capable of handling large quantities of real-time data. Brandon Hall answers a variety of questions about Web-based training. Among other things, he discusses advantages and disadvantages of the Web and the use of CD-ROMs in training.
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You can think of the Web as an enhancement of your own computer. Just with the use of hyperlinks, for instance, you can access data from other computers in the network and multiply your effective storage capacity many-fold. Yet the procedure still feels like what you do in your own operating system -- like calling for a file located on your CD-ROM, hard drive, or floppy drive; processing the data; etc.
Limitations
Unfortunately, access to information through the links is still limited by your computer, by the limits of its parts. You can't do better than what's given by the bandwidth of your modem, the power and speed of your processor, the resolution of your display system, and the quality of your browser. Within these limits, the easier it is to acquire or transmit the data, the more like working on a stand-alone system the process becomes and, in effect, the more powerful your computer becomes.
Effort Sharing
In a similar way, a stand-alone computer could be made even more powerful by sharing processing tasks with other systems, though we seldom use it this way. Distributing the processing load among several machines running concurrently can decrease the running time and possibly solve problems that otherwise wouldn't have a timely solution. This would involve some form of parallel computing, or distributed processing.
This capability could be particularly helpful when investigating or training subtle skills, because processing places heavy demands on the computer. Due to the complexity of the settings of such skills, a stand-alone computer could easily be overwhelmed by the amount of computing required to simulate the dynamics. But if the work is shared with other computers, the results could be much improved. An example of an organization that shares the processing load among multiple stations is the SAGE system.
Greatly Extended Use
Enhanced computer capability provides the hope for extended in-the-classroom study and training of skills, despite the tunnel effect produced by your hardware. But the capability calls for standards of cooperation and/or quid pro quo among the participants, as well as technical considerations in distributed program design. It may also require the use of supercomputers strategically located in the network to accommodate the information traffic.
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The Internet itself has problems. For all parties to be able to participate in the study and training of skills, differences in computer capability among users call for program simplifications and compensating mechanisms. But you mustn't simplify to the point where utility is lost, so this can eliminate potential applications. Careful analysis of the circumstances is required to ensure that quality isn't sacrificed. Adjustments and/or agreements need to be made as to how the workload is to be distributed. Much work remains to be done in this connection.
More basically, the nature of the Internet is still fluid, and this raises questions: What program development system should be used for the Web. Should it be Java? Visual Basic? Should we stick with HTML? HTML enhanced with XML?...What?
The major problem in developing applications for the Web is to create platform-independent software so that every Web user has access to your application. One possibility is to use Java as the program development tool.
An important characteristic of Java is that it is compiled into a byte code (rather than basic machine code). Byte code is a transitional representation that's interpreted by a virtual machine, so-called -- i.e., a program executing on a real machine. Provided with an interpreter for the particular platform in use, any Java code distributed over the Internet will run on the machine.
An interpreter is a program that interprets each line of code of a program as the program runs. Using its own dictionary, it reads the code and converts it on-the-spot into the language of the computer on which the program is running. This requires that it "knows" both languages. The interpreted version of the code actually operates your computer. And of course you need a separate interpreter for each language.
While similar to Java in certain basic respects (like in its object-oriented programming or in its encapsulated units of code), Visual Basic is different in that it doesn't work through a virtual machine. It lacks that Internet advantage. On the other hand, it provides the means to let you develop a graphics user interface with relative ease and with relatively little code, whereas Java can be cumbersome in this regard, if not difficult.
Despite these advantages, HTML remains, and will likely continue to be, the Internet language of choice.
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It's predicted that the Internet will be a more intelligent network, and that communication will take place between people -- by voice, say -- rather than between devices, as it is today -- presumably like a telephone network. The number of subscribers to the Net, together with the complexity of their Web sites, will no doubt continue to increase, and the bandwidth will increase to accommodate them. But real-time data transmission must avoid unpleasant delays in voice production.
What, exactly, the Internet will ultimately look like is anybody's guess, but its structure will no doubt be driven both by advances in technology and by the demands of its subscribers on how it is to be used. It will also be affected -- perhaps badly, but maybe even intelligently! -- by policy decisions made by governments around the world.
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