[Dspace-general] Re: Submit A ToolBook Tutorial?

[Scott Yeadon]

Marty,

Unless the tutorial is browser-based (I'm guessing it's not since it's a CD product) you're unlikely to be able to just pop it into DSpace and use it. You *could* archive the CD image and then somehow have a "View Item" link in the item JSP that mounts the CD image for reading but the CD image certainly isn't archive quality material (beyond meeting the ISO layout anyway) so I wouldn't advise doing this.

The way I would do it is to put all the separate files into DSpace for preservation and present all the materials in the CD tutorial context via a layer above DSpace (what we've been calling the "presentation" layer). It's not a small amount of work, but if you're after longer-than-CD-term storage, the ability to use the individual objects in different ways in the future, and support more granular discovery of materials then that's one way to go.

If the tutorial uses proprietary file formats or was built using a specific tool (the exes and dlls are not a good sign), dividing it into its components may be more difficult and you may need to do some format comversions along the way. If the product is a tutorial (so possibly a short-lived learning tool?) there may be a  question mark over whether it needs preserving in the long-term, in which case you wouldn't go to the trouble of making it archive quality and probably not put it in DSpace.

We're actually about to start a demonstrator project to look at the very problem you've raised. We're taking a CD product created through a proprietary tool, disaggregating it (with format conversions), recording the object relationships, storing the objects and relationship information (most likely RDF) in DSpace and providing a rudimentary presentation facility.  This will allow running a website that mimics the CD direct from DSpace, can generate a website from DSpace for deployment elsewhere and can create a CD version. We'll be releasing information on what we do during and after the project which should be complete early in the new year but hopefully a prototype will be available by Xmas. The aim is that processes and any XML markup used is generic and can be re-used for clients with similar requirements.

Scott.


From: courtois at ksu.edu
To: dspace-general at mit.edu
Cc: dspace-theses at mit.edu
Subject: [Dspace-general] Submit A ToolBook Tutorial?
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One of the grad students in our pilot project wants to submit a tutorial
created with ToolBook along with her dissertation.  The tutorial is on
a CD and consists of about 200 files of different formats: avi, wav,
exe, tbk, dll, etc.

Is there a way to submit this to DSpace without submitting each file
individually, e.g., could we copy files to a directory?  If we can get
all the files into DSpace, would a user be able to run the tutorial,
i.e., start the application, from within DSpace?  Niether of these
options seem like realistic alternatives, but please let me know if I'm
missing something.

I'm thinking our best bet might be to submit a text document that has
instructions on how to obtain a copy of the CD via mail or download.

Thanks for your help,

Marty

Martin Courtois
Instructional Technology Assistance Center
Kansas State University'
Manhattan KS 66506
courtois at ksu.edu
785-537-2049