Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
his or her best interest, a user is required to choose one recommendation out
of the list to meet his or her requirement.
On the other hand, the proactive approach is to learn user preferences
for providing recommendations without user enquiry. So, the user is not
required to provide explicit feedback to the system to drive the current rec-
ommendation process. In particular, proactive systems provide users with
recommendations that the user may choose to select or ignore. An example
of the proactive system is the recommendation engine at Amazon.com [33].
17.3.3 Client Side versus Server Side
Personalization approaches can be classified based on the approaches that
have been designed to run on the client side or on the server side. On the
client side, data is only available to describe the individual user, thus only
the individual approach can be applied on the client side. On the server side,
the Web site has the ability to collect data from all users. Thus, both the indi-
vidual and collaborative approaches can be applied.
In addition, server side approaches, in general, only have access to interac-
tions of users with content being put on their own Web site. On the contrary,
client side approaches can access data regarding the individuals' interactions
with multiple Web sites. Given these characteristics, most client side approaches
are aimed at personalized searches across multiple repositories [44].
To sum up the above analysis, personalization can be delivered in many
different ways. Actually, a number of mixed approaches to personalization
have also been proposed. These mixed approaches have been developed
based on each of the recommended technology deficiencies that are difficult
to overcome within the boundaries of a single recommendation approach.
17.4 E-Learning Standards
To provide personalized learning materials, e-learning standards play a
significant role. E-learning standards not only enhance interoperability,
but also provide a framework for designing personalized course mate-
rials. In this section, the major organizations for e-learning standards
development and the standards' characteristics are discussed. Moreover,
an overview of SCORM, a popular e-learning standard, is provided at the
end of this section.
As e-learning has become popular in the past decade, recently researchers
in this area are concerned about the issues of inflexibility of course develop-
ment. The core problem is that the development of course materials is costly,
time consuming, and not reusable. The researches showed that the most
efficient way to address this problem is to break a course down into smaller,
