Content area
Full text
Abstract: The paper presents the main characteristics of a cloud-based e-learning system, by comparing it to other e-learning architectures like service-oriented architecture, event driven architecture, distributed computer. The first part of the paper shows these architectures and the way they fit to e-learning systems. The second part describes the main technologies that are used for developing such systems, while the third part is dedicated to e-learning databases. Finally, the last section takes an overview of the specialized e-learning functionalities that cloud computing brings.
In this paper we clarify why cloud computing isn't a simple user-client architecture, why the security reaches a high level in cloud computing and why it is so important to keep all the users' needs in a pool of resource data. An important part of the paper is where we deal with cloud computing weaknesses and how they affect the e-learning process. The main problems are the internet access, students and professors' data that is kept on suppliers' servers. Overall one should be able to distinguish an authentic cloud computing e-learning system by its functionalities, availability, portability and, of course, interface.
E-learning systems use all the advantages of a cloud computing architecture: the infrastructure, the platform and the services, and the paper details all these components that lead to a cloud e-learning architecture. The characteristics of a e-learning system in cloud may differ depending on the type of cloud architecture: public, private or hybrid. Moreover, from this point the philosophy and the implementation of the system take different turns.
Keywords: Cloud Computing, E-learning, database
I. E-LEARNING ARCHITECTURES
The mainly architectures that are used for developing an e-learning system are cloud computing, service-oriented architecture, distributed computing or event driven architecture. The ideal architecture would combine all of these architectures' advantages and integrate them in cloud environment. A service oriented learning platform can encapsulate each course and each exam as a web service that can be accessed world wide if the security protocols are passed. For extra protection, each service can have its own encrypted password that the student gets to have if he passes the previous exam.
Distributed e-learning also offers advantages in terms of security if data regarding courses, exams, students and teachers is stored on separate servers and the...