2. Introduction of the ILIAS Web-based
Content Development and Learning Management System
ILIAS (Integriertes
Lern-, Informations- und Arbeitskooperations System
= Integrated Learning-, Information and Co-Operative Work-System) is a
web-based content development and distance learning system has been
developed by the University of Cologne since 1997 in the VIRTUS project.
This L(C)MS has been specifically developed for higher education institutions
and continually improved, the latest version is 3.6).
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ILIAS is applied widely in more than 70 higher education institution of 18
countries (see:
Installations and Examples, 2006. 04. 05)
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Comparison and testing of several L(C)MSs shows that ILIAS is competitive with
the best profit-oriented L(C)MSs available on the market.
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ILIAS is available as an open
source software (downloadable from
http://www.ilias.de/ios/source.html) under the GNU General Public License (GPL). Universities,
educational institutions, private and public companies, and every interested
person may use the system free of charge and contribute to its further
development. Software environment necessary to run ILIAS could also be
developed with free, open source program packages (LINUX, MySQL etc..),
though the system runs on Windows NT, 200x and XP, too.
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ILIAS Version 3 is design keeps in mind the up-to-date layer model. Its
modular and object-oriented system architecture guarantees its
implementation and tailoring into the IT system of any higher education
institution.
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ILIAS is compatible with the international e-learning standards (SCORM and AICC)
and handles metadata by the LOM standard.
"ILIAS is a powerful web-based learning management system that allows
users to create, edit and publish learning and teaching material in an
integrated system with their normal web browsers. Tools for cooperative
working and communication are included as well. "
"The current
version of ILIAS offers the following features:
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Personal desktop for each user with information about last visited
courses, new mail or forum entries
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Learning environment with personal annotations, test, glossary, print
function, search engine and download
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SCORM 1.2 and AICC compliance
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Course management system
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Communication features like mail system, forums and chat
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Group system for collaborative work and
organizing users and resources
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Integrated authoring environment (Editor) to create courses even
without any HTML knowledge
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Support of metadata for all levels of learning objects
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Context-sensitive help system for learners and authors
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User and system administration interface"
Dennis Gabor College first started to use ILIAS
in Hungary, few other institutes and firms have been interested
in it until now.
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