Information For Learning Object eXchange (ILOX)

David Massart, EUN

Licensed under IMS LODE License

• Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 United States License

• Notification of patent claims• Sharing of derivative works with the IMS LODE

Community• http://www.imsglobal.org/lode/lode_license.html

Disclaimer

The work described in this presentation is partially supported by the European Community eContentplus programme - project ASPECT: Adopting Standards and Specifications for Educational Content (Grant agreement number ECP-2007-EDU-417008). The author is solely responsible for the content of this presentation. It does not represent the opinion of the European Community and the European Community is not responsible for any use that might be made of information contained therein.

Outline

• Materialization• Functional Requirements for Bibliographic

Records (FRBR)• FRBR & LOM• Describing LOs at Different FRBR Levels• Metadata description in practice• Handling LOM (instead of LOs)• Discussion: ILOX versus OAI-ORE

Materialization x• An abstraction mechanism (conceptual

modeling) • The relationship between a class of categories

(e.g., a book) and a class of more concrete objects (e.g., a book copy)

Materialization (cont.)

• Supports some sort of attribute-propagation mechanism

• I.e., many attributes of the more abstract class are naturally applicable to the more concrete class

• E.g., the title of a book applies to all its copies

Functional Requirements for Bibliographic Records – FRBR [fɝbɚ]

FRBR Is an Example of Materialization

Learning Object Copies

FRBR and LOM

• Some LOM data elements are typical of one FRBR aspect of learning objects

• Some LOM data elements are potentially relevant to describe more than one FRBR aspect

• Other LOM elements do not describe any FRBR aspect of learning objects

• In principle, all LOM data elements being optional, a LOM instance can be used to describe any of the 4 FRBR aspects of a learning object

FRBR and LOM

Describing LOs at Different FRBR Levels

• General Principle• Describing a learning object as a– FRBR Work– FRBR Expression– FRBR Manifestation– FRBR Item

General Principle

• Describe each FRBR level with– Optional Identifier– Level-specific metadata (e.g., LOM, DC, …)– Additional level specific information (when

needed)– Information about the direct lower FRBR level

Describing an LO as a FRBR Work

Describing with Metadata

Work-Level Metadata

• Metadata elements typical of a work• LOM examples:– General.Title– General.Description– Educational– Classification

Description Facets

• Content Provider Metadata• Folksonomies• Translation

• NOTE: Will require a controlled vocabulary

License as a Facet

• Identifier: A URI (e.g., http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/be/)• Description: Metadata (e.g., lom.rights or a DREL expression)

License Facet

• Can be present at any FRBR-level• License applied to an object at one level– Applies to all its materialization at the lowest

levels– Unless it is overridden at a lower level

• Note that more than one license can apply to the same object (i.e., a facet is not a key – It is possible to have more than one license facet)

Describing an LO as a FRBR Expression

Expression-Level Metadata

• Metadata elements typical of an Expression• LOM examples:– General.language– Life-cycle

Describing an LO as a FRBR Manifestation

Manifestation Names & <Parameters>

• Preview (will require best practice)• Thumbnail of <Mime Type image/xxxx>• Metadata in <URI of the schema>• Experience (as rendered in my user interface –

“remote play”)• Package in <format>

Package in <format>

• Vocabulary: http://imsglobal.org/vdex/imscp_terms_resource.xml

• Note: Look at W3C HTTP Content Negotiation for compression, encodings

Manifestation-Level Metadata

• Metadata elements typical of a Manifestation• LOM examples: All the technical elements but

location

Describing an LO as a FRBR Item

Item Location

• URI (resolvable location: e.g., a URL or a persistent identifier for a copy of the LO - handle, DOI, PURL)• Description: Metadata (optional)

Item-Level Metadata

• Metadata elements typical of an Item• LOM example: Technical.location

Digital Right Management @ LRE

Digital Right Management @ LRE

LRE DRM and Item Location

• How does the Requestor find the LRE DRM Service? item.location.URI• How does it select the relevant context? item.location.description

Metadata Description In Practice

• Best practice rather than strict rules• Selecting the right level• What goes in a description depends on:– The context: Harvesting, search, publishing– The selected FRBR level: Work, expression,

manifestation, item– The informational needs

Selecting The Right Level

• Work: One result entry by learning object (LO): No immediate distinction between the LO versions

• Expression: One result entry by LO version: No immediate distinction between the different formats of a given LO version

• Manifestation: One result entry by LO format: No immediate distinction between the different copies of an LO.

• Item: One result entry by LO copy

What Goes In A Description: Context

• Harvesting: Full metadata record(s) attached to the selected level

• Publishing: Full metadata record(s) attached to the selected level

• Search: Metadata elements relevant to the selected levels

What Goes In A Description:FRBR Level

What Goes In A Description:FRBR Level

What Goes In A Description:FRBR Level

What Goes In A Description:FRBR Level

What Goes In A Description:FRBR Level (cont.)

Selected Level /Description

Work Expression Manifestation Item

Work Work Expression Manifestation Item

Expression N/A Work + Expression

Manifestation Item

Manifestation N/A N/A Work + Expression + Manifestation

Item

Item N/A N/A N/A Work + Expression + Manifestation + Item

What Goes In A Description: Informational Needs

Handling LOM (instead of LOs)

• Work– Meta-metadata.identifier– Meta-metadata.contribute

• Expression– Meta-metadata.language

• Manifestation– Meta-metadata.schema

ILOX versus OAI-ORE

• OAI-ORE and ILOX are orthogonal• Conceptually, – OAI-ORE implements the “Aggregation”

abstraction mechanism– ILOX implements the “Materialization” abstraction

mechanism• They can be combined: E.g., materialization of

aggregation

Kill (more than) Two Birds With One Stone

ILOX is a conceptually clean solution for1. Selecting from several LO versions2. Selecting from several package formats3. Attaching licenses to the right level4. Handling an LO description split into several

metadata instances5. Providing the appropriate amount of information

in search results6. Supporting DRM approaches