[LON-CAPA-users] New Content/Problem Editor - Input needed NOW

[Mills, Douglas G]

For the sake of discussion, I'll argue that for you, Ray, as a power user,
you 're more like Gerd, at whose facility with the colorful editor I have
already marveled. If the point of Gerd's question is how do we design
something that will simplify introducing new users to the power of
Lon-Capa, I think there are things that can be done in perhaps creating a
"simple editor" (maybe the colorful editor is still available as an
"easter egg" for the users that love it and again, please never ever
remove the ability to edit xml!). Start from scratch and hit the needs of
80% of new users with enough Lon-Capa options to give them a taste of why
they'd want to move from Blackboard or whatever but not so much that they
think "but I could never do that."

Doug

Douglas Mills
Director of Instructional Technologies
Department of Chemistry
University of Illinois
dmills at illinois.edu
(217) 244-5739







On 10/9/14, 12:36 PM, "Raymond Batchelor" <batchelo at sfu.ca> wrote:

>I absolutely LOVE the 'colorful' editor.  I use it interchangeably with
>the XML editor -- all of the time.
>It is wonderful because it contains so much built-in contextual help and
>produces correct xml, from which one may model (or correct) their own xml
>editing.
>
>At this stage I have to multi-task and I don't spend a large amounts of
>time coding resources, but have to pop in and out of resource editing at
>random times to create specific new resources or fix code.
>The EDIT mode reminds me of many things I have forgotten and teaches me
>things I have never learned.
>
>It is foundational.
>
>The way it works is logical and simple.
>Perhaps some things could be done, visually, to make its function and
>purpose clearer to users.
>
>For example the colors, borders, separation and layout chosen for
>outlining certain blocks or options might not be distinctive enough.
>(<part></part> comes to mind.)
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>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Gerd Kortemeyer" <korte at lite.msu.edu>
>To: "Discussion list for LON-CAPA users"
><lon-capa-users at mail.lon-capa.org>
>Sent: Thursday, 9 October, 2014 10:09:25
>Subject: [LON-CAPA-users] New Content/Problem Editor - Input needed NOW
>
>Hi,
>
>We are trying to figure out how the next generation content/problem
>editor should work, and we really need input.
>
>1) We notice that the colorful editor is not used very often. Apart from
>the psychedelic colors, why is that? What¹s the problem with it?
>
>2) Is there anything good about the colorful editor?
>
>3) We always hear ³WYSIWYG,² but when you really think about it, that¹s
>quite impossible: LON-CAPA problems have deep structure, and there is a
>lot that ³you do not see,² but that¹s important: parameters, scripts, Š
>how would ³WYSIWYG" look in this scenario?
>
>4) Think about the whole workflow of authoring problems: What is
>important? What do you need? How can the whole process of authoring be
>streamlined?
>
>5) Do you know of any editor on the web that is approximately doing what
>we need? Some good design examples for us to look at?
>
>Anyway, please discuss on the list now. We do not have the developer
>capacity to allow us the luxury of going down the wrong track.
>
>- Gerd.
>_______________________________________________
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>
>-- 
>Ray
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