Texas online tutorial for high school students: track.uttelecampus.org
UI Design
Had to fit in pre-developed objects
Huge cascading menu structure
- coded in Flash to show dynamic icons
- made it hideable because it's big
Asynchronous Application
- sends stuff to .net through Flash, allows for heavy loads on single server
- "pseudo asynchronicity"
Questions and Answers in XML, pulled in to .swf when it loads, but separate file on server (this is particularly important w.r.t. answers, as students can't just save the .swf file and have the answers) - only saves to server when user saves or submits
Flash Menu
- allows students to check off tutorials they've read
- menu maintains state, without cookies
javascript sends info to .net, Flash middleware does it
How does student store info?
- profile saved to server
- but only when they save, not every time they do something (e.g. answer a question)
Remoting
- web services: one to submit, one to keep session active
UI Example
- using screenshot thumbnails to explain how menu worked
- no time for user testing
More Info
Web services/SOAP in .net used for queueing
- keeps server running nicely
PowerGrep + regular expressions used to update parts of old code
Helps to have people with overlapping talent areas
A lot of planning done up-front before coding began
- meeting almost every day in the beginning
- also only project the team worked on
Flash converts to text only menu as an accessibility option with less functionality
- moving toward making content accessible as well
Using Flash-specific fonts can fix issues with ISO characters picked up from XML
Online tutoring account available
- people in Boston use online whiteboard to help students through assessment tests