Moodle Hosting: Why every business using Moodle needs a Moodle Partner

August 24th, 2010

This summer I have been on my soapbox, helping my clients (both current and prospective) convince their clients of the soundness of hosting their Moodle sites with a certified Partner/Moodle host.  I am not a Moodle Partner, nor do I want to become one, so I have nothing invested in my recommendation except doing a good deed.  And, of course, I don’t want to create content on sites that are not hosted by Moodle Partners. 

Why? 

The reasons your business should host its Moodle site with a certified Moodle Partner: 

  • They know Moodle and everything in the Moodle universe.
  • Partners not only know how to run cron jobs and back-up the database, but they do it.  I am told that these tasks, with any web application, can be tricky, time-consuming, and dangerous.  Luckily, I’ll never have to worry about them.
  • Partners provide the proper bandwidth and storage (although these do vary amongst the Partners) to run Moodle.  A $7.95/month hosting plan at HappyMamaHost.com isn’t going to be sufficient.
  • Partners know Moodle; what it can do, what it can’t do, and what it might do in the future.
  • Partners know what third-party modules are out there, what problems they solve, and how to install them so they’ll work on your site.  You won’t have to spend dozens of hours searching for a solution that might not exist or might be well-known in the community. 
  • Using Moodle for business usually requires a little extra support, such as single sign-on capability, e-commerce functionality, and perhaps a greater level of security for privacy reasons.  No one will be able to integrate these applications better or faster (which is usually cheaper) than a Partner.
  • HappyMamaHost.com doesn’t help you with any of the above, at least not for free. 

A few examples of why this Moodle knowledge, expertise, and technical support matters: 

  • Last winter, Moodle sites around the globe were upgraded for security reasons.  All admins were required to create new passwords, with some serious specifications.  If your site is hosted by a Partner, chances are this upgrade was done for you.  If your site is hosted at HappyMamaHost.com, chances are you weren’t even aware of the security risk.  It’s guaranteed that they didn’t do the upgrade for you. 
  • If you have a WordPress site, you’ll notice that annoying little button that says “Version 3.01 is available; please upgrade now”.  You probably also know that upgrading without first backing things up can be very risky.  Not all of your plug-ins will work.  Some content might be lost.  The same is true for Moodle, but HappyMamaHost.com will surely have that same little button this winter on Moodle installations “Moodle 2.0 is available; please upgrade now”.  That will be disastrous if you don’t know how to do a major upgrade!   
  • I spoke of impossibly slow load times due to bandwidth issues in Getting Started with Moodle.  Storage requirements (for your actual course content) can become quite large, too, if you have more than a course or two.  By the time you upgrade to greater bandwidth and more GB of storage with HappyMamaHost.com, you might exceed the cost of hosting with a Partner. 
  • I have one client who must have web meeting functionality in his Moodle courses.  I have many others who are considering it.  I poked around and compared prices, options, and Moodle integration ability.  I was still not sure, so I asked my Partners.  They gave me the real run-down on which applications required coding and which installed as easy as 1-2-3.  We settled on DimDim.  All I had to do was ask “hey, can you install some sort of web meeting application on the site?” 

If you’re still not convinced that it is penny wise, pound foolish to not host with a Partner, what else can I do to change your mind?  I am willing to jump up and down…

One caveat: I would like to say that I worked with one web host (in Eastern Europe) who didn’t know Moodle at all, wasn’t a Partner, but still maintained a well-run Moodle site.  I’m sure there are others like him around the world, and I don’t want to be disparaging of their service or efforts.  I’m also sure that they are not the mass-sellers of discounted hosting plans, which is really what I want you to steer clear of.

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Measuring Up – How does Moodle Compare to Other LMS?

August 20th, 2010

I would love to do a comparison of several different LMS by features, just like you might do when considering a new refrigerator at Sears.  The problem I’m having – and the problem I’ve had for years – is that it is just about impossible to get an unguided, leave-me-alone and let-me-think demonstration of many of these LMS. 

Some of them have “demos” which are really sales pitch videos.  I want to click on things myself.  How will I ever know how “easy” or “powerful” it is if I can’t put fingers to keyboard?  Others have free trial downloads that work for a short time.  All of them (except Moodle) require me to enter so much information about myself that even my mother would blush.  And as soon as I do that, I am “on the list”.  I get phone calls and endless emails, none of which I want. 

Yesterday I canceled the download of a “free trial” of one LMS authoring tool (because it was 22 GIGAbytes!) and still received three unsolicited emails within two hours.  

So, while I had envisioned an organized comparison chart of features, I’ve settled on something else.  How about a comprehensive list of what you should know about this product before you sink your fortune and reputation into it, and ways to go about gaining that knowledge? 

What to look for: 

  • Number of options that are built in to the application.  These should be easily turned on and off, and not require hours of code modification.  Compile a list that is specific about what features and functions are built in to this LMS and how many require customization.  Then, rate those features according to how important they are to your business.
  • Scalability.  This means that while you have only a dozen students right now, you should be able to easily upgrade to hundreds.  It can also indicate your ability to go from two courses to fifty without having to rewrite the LMS itself.  Ask about upgrades in hosting bandwidth and LMS capacity.
  • Ability to upgrade.  Let’s face it.  In the technology world, “old” is five years.  Could you even imagine the functionality of an iPad 10 years ago?  A decade ago we thought hand-held PDAs were “the future”.  It is folly to assume that a state of the art LMS today will be anything other than a beta-max a few years from now.  Your LMS needs to be robust.  Find out how easy it is to upgrade this LMS, how long it will take, and what it will cost.
  • Integrations with social media.  Every day I see reputable articles on the important role of social media in learning; e-Learning is way more than old training material converted to run on the Internet.  These integrations should be built in to the LMS and be turned on or off with a few clicks.
  • Integrations with common applications such as PayPal, DimDim, and single sign on authentication.  You could add YouTube and many other sites to this list.  These integrations should be built in to the LMS and be turned on or off with a few clicks. 
  • Ease of use.  This isn’t just how easy it is for you to get reports.  It’s how easy it is for teachers or trainers to add content, monitor courses, interact with students, and do what teachers do.  It’s also about how easily the students – adults in business settings – are able to gain access to the content, navigate about, share their experiences, and still do their “regular jobs”.  Will you and your employees be able to add or edit content, change features, and generate reports – or will you be forever in the clutches of the software developer? 

Ways to find the above information and to avoid the sales pitches: 

  • Real demos, where you can see actual examples of content and features that work. Search “[lms name] demo”.
  • Sandboxes and/or trial versions where you can create (and break) things as a student, a teacher, and an administrator.  Search “[lms name] sandbox”.
  • Real user reviews, preferably from a community forum for that LMS application where issues, fixes, bugs, and wish lists are posted.  You can learn a lot by reading these forums.  If you can’t find a direct link to the community forums from the LMS commercial website, try typing a question into your search engine such as “Does Moodle accept credit cards”.
  • Visible Pricing, either bottom line or ballpark (for the more creative stuff).  Obtain quick quotes for the base application, hosting, development, and user support.  Then compare your options based on your total price.  Remember to get pricing for scalability, upgrades, and integrations with other applications. Ask about SDKs and free plug-ins.  What does it cost to install those free applications? 

While custom homes and custom-made suits are usually nice things, in the software world “custom” can be a euphemism for “we don’t actually have anything written; you’re going to pay for all of our trial and error”.  Custom software is not the same thing as software that has many options. Custom software is rarely scalable, rarely upgradeable.  What you want is an LMS with many options that will offer you flexibility and autonomy for a long time to come.

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Open Source vs. Proprietary: What does it mean to a small business?

August 13th, 2010

Most conversations I have with potential clients include this question: “If Moodle is free, what am I paying you for”.  I wrote the answer to that in a previous post.  I promised to explain what “free” means, how that applies to Open Source Software, and what difference it makes to a small business owner. 

Open source software is that which has unencrypted code – meaning that anyone can see the source files (where the software program exists), and freely modify it.  Open source software is usually free of charge, and usually comes with no guarantees that it will work as described.  This might sound horrifying to you, but most of us have experienced bugs, poor support, and even fatal errors with software that was proprietary and cost a lot of money.  Proprietary software has encrypted code; if you look at the program files all you’ll see are a bunch of symbols and you are not allowed by law to modify them even if you could figure out how.  The free in open source refers to freedom of use, not cost.  Contrary to popular belief, open source software is still “copyrighted” in most cases, which does more to protect the users than the creators.  That’s a good thing.

Why would you want to use open source vs. something that was “guaranteed”?  Well, here’s a perfect example.  I am so used to going into the source files of Moodle and WordPress (both open source with strong communities of developers and users), to change colors, images, and strings of text that I found myself staring at my Microsoft Outlook the other day, wondering how to do the same thing.  I wanted to use the “out of office assistant” but I didn’t want the subject of the email to read “Out of Office Reply”.  If Outlook was an open source application, I would find that string in the code and change it to something else, such as “Thank you for contacting us”.  This does not take a genius to accomplish.  It’s really simple; but it is impossible to do in a proprietary application such as Outlook.  Moodle and WordPress (as I have them installed with reliable hosts and responsible web companies looking after them) are far less quirky (for me) than Outlook. In my eBook, Moodle e-Learning: Questions and Simple Answers about Online Training, I tell the tale of the proprietary LMS software that promised to do everything but did nothing.  I couldn’t get my $5000 back, even with an attorney! So “guarantees” mean nothing to me.  

Now, you may be thinking “I don’t want to make modifications”, but you probably do want those changes made, even if you’re not the one doing it.  Your web designer, for instance, makes changes to existing code all the time.  When you say “I want that color to be a little brighter” or “Can you change the font to Arial?”, you are asking him to modify the code.  This is relatively easy in Moodle, WordPress, Drupal, and all open source applications…it can not be done in proprietary software unless the creators built in a button to change the color or font.  In order to make those “little” changes that you have probably become accustomed to (if you have a website), you would have to go through a lot bigger effort and spend a lot more money if you are modifying proprietary software.  That is, if it could even be done at all.

Some software companies, like Apple and Articulate, have proprietary software as the core and offer software development kits (SDK) so that the community can create “applications” that integrate perfectly with their software.  This results in some really cool stuff, as most of you know. 

As a business owner, you should investigate all of your options for whatever functionality you desire.  Sometimes, a proprietary application will be the best solution for your needs.  Chances are, unless you are a giant business, you will have to settle for the out-of-the-box applications if you go the proprietary route.  If you want more flexibility, open source will likely be your best solution in the long run. Before deciding on any application, you should obtain actual user reviews, with specific ratings on function, support, scalability, and anything else that matters to you.  You can find very reliable reviews of an exhaustive list of open source software at SourceForge.net.  This is where I was able to find Moodle, the LMS I strongly recommend for small and medium businesses, authors, trainers, consultants, and other entrepreneurs who want to offer online training to clients and employees.

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Creating Purpose-Objectives-Goals for a Business Training Course

August 3rd, 2010

In my post on creating course outlines, I wrote that two pages in any course should be the Purpose-Objectives-Goals (POG) page and the Summary page. That sounds simple enough, right? Well, maybe not…

What is the POG for a business training course? Is it the same as it would be for a university course? Does it come from the business case for delivering the training? Is it related to the mission of the business?

Let’s start with some assumptions:

  • Business training differs from academic education (note the different uses of “training” and “education”).
  • Academic education seeks to impart not just information to students, but to equip them to think about new scenarios, to integrate ideas, and to build upon their education as they experience life. This is done through a foundation of knowledge. We don’t simply learn that “2+2=4”, but why it’s so.
  • Business training, while sometimes is for the sole enrichment of employees, is usually targeted to improve a business metric. Or, it is intended to be.

A while back, I wrote a post on assessing the effectiveness of business training. I have observed a huge gap between the intended or desired outcome of business training and what it actually delivers. My “hypothesis” (which I have empirical evidence to support) is that this gap exists because of three things:

  • The lack of proper evaluation of training effectiveness
  • The failure to align training objectives with business objectives
  • The failure to create and deliver training to the objectives, if they had been aligned in the first place

The first item is discussed in the post; the third item is a deeper subject known as instructional design. This post addresses the second item, aligning training objectives with those of the business.

So, how do you align training goals and objectives with the goals and objectives of your business?

  1. First, understand your business goals and objectives. Where are your “problem areas”? What do you want to improve? Where do you want to reduce risk? Some likely business examples:
    • prevent accidents
    • reduce errors
    • improve customer service
    • improve efficiency
    • reduce waste
    • improve communication
    • reduce time to market
    • leverage knowledge
    • protect intellectual property
    • improve work environment (physical)
    • improve quality of work (emotional)
    • increase promotion opportunities
    • increase market share
    • reduce redundancy/confusion from department to department
  2. Second, understand to at least some degree, who in the organization can affect these goals. Your delivery driver might have a strong influence on several goals, but she isn’t going to have anything to do with reducing the time to market of a new product. A RACI chart would be a useful tool for this.
  3. Based on the RACI chart, decide what level of training should be provided to each position in topics aimed at achieving each goal. Bloom’s rose would be a great reference for this.
  4. Determine what those topics, tools, and methods are. You will need to seek the assistance of subject matter experts to accomplish this.
  5. Create a curriculum (map out all of the training).
  6. Write a POG for each course in that curriculum. Please note that the terminology can be highly variable.. I’ve seen many instances where Goals were defined as more general than Objectives. Still others use them interchangeably or use completely different terminology. It doesn’t matter. The important things are that you use the terminology consistently, in a manner that your students understand, and that these three words combine to define the scope of the course.

Purpose (a.k.a. Aim): These statements should be formulated with phrases similar to these: “to provide an overview of…”, “to provide the framework for…”, “an in-depth discussion of…”, “to advance the knowledge from Course 101”, “to apply knowledge to field examples in…”.

While Control Charts have a solid history of use in manufacturing, they are excellent tools for use in monitoring and controlling transactional processes as well. This course demonstrates the construction and use of control charts, providing both scenarios and corresponding example control charts.

(Learning) Objectives: These are essentially from Bloom’s categories (Cognitive domain) and more specific than the purpose of the course. There are usually a few objectives.

1. Explain the purpose and proper use of control charts.
2. Introduce the six basic types of control charts.
3. Provide examples of how control charts can help stop trends and identify potential problems in the processes.

Goals (a.k.a. Learning outcomes): SMART goals directly related to the objectives.

It is important that you leave this course knowing:
1. Which type of control chart is best suited to different situations.
2. How to construct and use a control chart.
3. How control charts fit into larger quality initiatives.

These examples are taken from the SPC 101 course at BeeLearn.com. They are not perfect. Yours probably won’t be, either. But, they are “good enough” to define the scope of the course, set expectations, and to build content around.

The Summary page of every course should tie back to the POG. The course exams and activities should be built in support of the POG. The content should be built to the POG. If you do this, you’ll have created a course that serves a purpose; to make your business stronger by providing training that is aligned with and effective at meeting your goals and objectives.

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Working Together: Course Merchant

July 23rd, 2010

From the July 2010 issue of Penny For Your Thoughts newsletter…

There is no limit to the good things I can say to a prospective client about Moodle.  But my endless ranting of Moodle’s virtues comes to a screeching halt when I hear the question “Does Moodle have a shopping cart?”  Some times, that question is disguised innocently in the discussion of the prospect’s eLearning needs.  “I’d like to offer discounts” or “What about site membership?”. 

Gulp.  No, I’m sorry, Moodle can’t really do that.

For my clients – all of whom are businesses – this can be a show stopper.  But no longer!

I found out about Course Merchant through the forums at Moodle for Business Uses.  When a client recently had some questions about discounts, memberships – all those dreaded topics – I dug a little deeper.  What I found:

  • A product that provides solutions to every eCommerce problem I’ve faced
  • A great demo of the shopping cart, with various options
  • It was easy and it worked!

…and best of all…

  • A detailed, honest response to my email inquiry outlining specific issues we had.  I wrote that email at midnight and the response was in my inbox the next morning. 

Course Merchant not only offers a much needed solution to those of us who use Moodle for Business, they do so at an affordable price!  The set-up and first year’s costs run around $1000; $350 each year after that. 

 As if this isn’t exciting enough, they have just released the beta version of a new product for Affiliate Marketing.

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If Moodle is Free, Why Am I Paying You?

July 20th, 2010

One common question I get is “If Moodle is free, why is it going to cost me so much money?” 

Well, Moodle is free, but learning how to use it can take a long time.  Knowing how to create good training can take a lot longer.  You can invest the time to learn all the various aspects of training design and online technology, or you can hire someone who already knows. 

Moodle is “open source software”, which follows a different business model than “proprietary software”.  Both models require that someone - somewhere in the chain - has the skill to put together all of the elements.  This adds cost (because very few of us work for free), somewhere in the value chain, regardless of the model.  The open source software model isn’t about offering free software; it’s about free access to the software code. 

What you’re paying for is the expertise (mostly) and time associated with installation, maintenance, hosting, content development, and usage of Moodle.  

While someone who is proficient in computer applications might get the knack of the technical side of Moodle (or any other software application) in a few weeks, there’s no guarantee that he can design training that won’t bore the socks off people.  

On the other hand, someone who is a vibrant speaker or nurturing teacher might struggle mightily to figure out how to upload files or create online training courses.  Like anything else, merging these skills will take time, people…and money. 

The Moodle Community, just like those of other open source applications (such as WordPress), not only shares information (and code) freely, it is a thriving commercial entity where knowing Moodle is a useful job skill.  Individuals are hired by businesses (large and small), by academic institutions, and even governments, to design Moodle training, maintain Moodle installations, etc.  Small businesses all over the world take part in various ways, from obtaining Partner certification, to hosting, to theme design, to code customization, to course development activities.  The business model is built on trust and cooperation, not industrial espionage and law suits. 

What you pay for when you choose to become a member of the Moodle Community (a very wise choice!) includes:

  • Expert and worry-free Installation, Hosting, Maintenance of your Moodle site.
  • A deeply involved community where help is usually a forum-post away, if you want to “do it yourself”… if you have the time, skill, and desire to learn how.
  • Content development - the design and creation of your Moodle courses - if you don’t want to do it yourself. 
  • Training of your personnel as Moodle Teachers and Administrators (if you want) and/or someone to do this for you.
  • Third party plug-ins, custom code development, and modifications if what you want/need isn’t freely available.  Moodle Partners, Moodle Course Developers, and members of the Community usually know what’s out there already. 

Stay tuned for future posts on Open Source vs. Proprietary: What does it mean? and spotlights on members of the Moodle Community Working Together.

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Free Market Competition: The Good, the Bad, the Dilemma

July 14th, 2010

Most people who follow Moodle news know that Blackboard has just acquired two very popular online collaboration providers, Elluminate and Wimba.  Some fear that this is an attempt to reduce the options for those of us seeking such features for our Moodle sites.  I think that’s entirely possible; I also think it’s terribly flattering.  To be perceived as a market threat by one of the Big Boys means “you’ve made it”!

I believe in free market enterprise (for the most part).  Sadly, like everything else that is good, a free market allows some not-so-nice people to get away with nasty things.  Such is the price of freedom.  I once subcontracted with a consulting company that bought up all of their competitors.  Not only did they eliminate the people who had built those companies (and their reputations), they eliminated the brands themselves.  It’s OK to acquire another company for its talent and processes.  It’s not OK to erase all evidence of that company’s past and claim their successes as your own.  But what are you going to do?  It’s not illegal to be a snake.  Well, it sometimes becomes illegal after the first snake has bitten everyone…

The only thing you can do is to stick to your own values, be guided by your own principles, and band together with others who feel the same way.  In this case, I don’t think “fight fire with fire” is the right thing to do.  I think “fight fire with water” – or “take the high road” or some other lesson your grandmother taught you – might be more appropriate.  As this post by a Moodle Partner so eloquently describes it, we are part of an ecosystem; the Moodle community is a strong force in that ecosystem.  I believe it is to our collective advantage to avoid the Nash Equilibrium when choosing our partners and our objectives.  We can each try to take the whole prize (like the consulting firm I worked for), we can fall victim to the Prisoner’s Dilemma, or we can improve our lot as a whole, ensuring long and fulfilling lives for Moodle and our own pursuits.

It is in this spirit that I’ve decided to write a series of posts that will focus attention on those who develop and provide Moodle-specific plug-ins and/or work with Moodle for small business users to solve our unique needs. Not all of them are free and some are even “competitors”, but they can all be trusted in a dark alley. 

My first post in this series, Working Together, will be about Course Merchant.  Last week I sent them an email at midnight (my time).  When I sat down at my computer the next morning, I had a very detailed (and very helpful) response to some tricky questions.  I’ll tell you more about those questions – and their service in general – within the week.

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A Few Words About: Course Outlines

July 13th, 2010

A few words about...One of the very first steps to take when writing a book, an essay, or a training course is to create an outline.  You may have had this as an assignment in grade school.  I did.  I found writing outlines to be a very natural task but I realize that for many, it is as daunting as an accounting balance sheet is to me.  (Daunting is an understatement). 

No matter how difficult it is for you to create a course outline, or how convoluted your process is to do it, I can guarantee you three things:  it will get easier, it will save you lots of time and confusion, and you will end up with a better product in the end.  It might even make the difference between finishing the course (or book, essay, etc.) and never having anything more than a pile of ideas. 

There are many ways to go about creating an outline; in fact, I do it differently, depending upon how organized my thoughts are to begin with.  What you want to end up with is a list of topics/pages in the same order that the reader will be viewing the material.  Some ways to do this include: 

  • Jot down topics on a piece of paper – or each topic on one sticky note.  Move them around until the flow feels comfortable to you.
  • Start with a really high-level overview of the subject, adding detail to each section until you’re at a “chapter” or “sub-section” level.
  • If it helps you in the process, make note of what types of things you would include in that section – everything from jokes to examples to activities that you’d like to use to illustrate the point.  These things will not end up in the final outline, but they can be helpful in the organization process.
  • Alternatively, you could list everything in the world you ever wanted to say about this subject; then start crossing things off as redundant or outside the scope of the course.
  • Speaking of scope, it is usually a good idea to have your Purpose-Objectives-Goals (POG) written first, but not always.  If you’re writing a training curriculum where the same subject might be delivered on many levels to different people with different objectives, it might be easier to create the “complete set” that you can later choose from for each audience’s needs.
  • Prioritize the topics. Don’t try to include every topic or every example on the subject.  Not everything has equal importance for this audience.

Regardless of how you start out - with lots of detail, with nothing but ideas on individual scraps of paper, or an organized breakdown of major topics - your outline should look something like this one from one of my Moodle courses.  It should be targeted to your audience; what they need to know, how they best learn it, and how much time you have to spend with them (face to face or virtually). 

As many years as I’ve been doing this, I almost never get it “right” the first time.  You should expect to rearrange, add to, and subtract from, your first draft.  Don’t be discouraged by this and don’t be afraid to ask for help.  Ask your friends, co-workers, and family members to run through it with you.  Even someone who has no idea what you’re talking about can be helpful in assessing continuity and flow.  And of course, you can always seek help from your course designer!

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In the News: Moodle 2.0

June 30th, 2010

From the June 2010 issue of Penny For Your Thoughts newsletter…

Moodle 2.0 (scheduled for release next month) is a big change from version 1.9x. I’ve had a chance to play around with it for a couple of weeks now, and the one thing that strikes me hardest is this: a lot of what I thought would be easier, isn’t. I thought it would be more “intuitive” or easier for a novice to create content. It isn’t. I think this is a good thing. Over the past 30 years I’ve seen some really great software applications die because some easier (albeit mediocre) version came out. Easy is usually at odds with powerful; it might be easier to create charts in that oh-so-popular spreadsheet program, but most of what comes out is junk. What we want is an LMS application that is powerful in its ability to produce high quality output, yet easy for the student to use. So far it seems that Moodle is more powerful… on the creation side and easier on the student side.

One of the best new features of 2.0 is the ability to create conditions for every page or activity created. It is possible to build a complex relationship amongst pages and activities within a course, such that each appears only when other conditions (grades) have been achieved. While this is a very cool thing to do, and truly an enhancement to the instructional design capabilities of Moodle, it is certainly not easier. To use this feature effectively will require even more planning and an even deeper understanding of how people learn.

A new block, Private Files, promises to make the students’ lives a lot easier. It provides a place for storage and retrieval of one’s own personal files within any Moodle course (or site). I can see this as being huge for on-the-go learning, especially for mobile devices without the storage capacity of laptops and desktops. The students will be able to access their work from anywhere and have a super reliable storage medium.

I am continuing to work through the “new Moodle” with a fine tooth comb and will be regularly posting reviews of each feature (new and lost) over the next few weeks. I had been waiting for the new release to do some long-overdue upgrading of my existing courses (first written in 1.6). That was really just an excuse to procrastinate because I never upgrade to anything new when it first comes out! It will be awhile before we know which modules and plug-ins will work with 2.0, what new ones will be released, and just how to use them all to our advantage. Keep up to date on my Moodle 2.0 reviews by following me.

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A Few Words About: Formatting Your Content

June 30th, 2010

From the May 2010 issue of Penny For Your Thoughts newsletter…

When preparing materials to give to your newly hired course designer, ask her (or him!) what format is best. You may not realize it, but building a course in an LMS application such as Moodle can not be accomplished by simple “copy/paste” or “upload” of an entire file. Each page is actually a web page, written in HTML just like this newsletter, a WordPress site, and any number of other web applications that you may have seen or even used.

HTML doesn’t like special characters (like the apostrophe I just typed) or formatting symbols used by Word. They may look ok when you paste them in, but on the user’s screen, they’ll show up as little rectangles instead of punctuation; you’ve seen them before, I’m sure. Or, maybe you thought someone went wild with the ampersand. That’s what happens when you copy directly into an HTML editor from another application with its own formatting. PowerPoint has another whole set of problematic formatting and PDF isn’t without quirks.

So, before you go through the effort of nicely formatting something, ask your designer what will work best for her. Most of the formatting I receive has to be completely scrubbed out and redone.

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Posted in A Few Words About...(Tips), eLearning 101, eLearning for Business

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