Well, as you can see, there could be at least some interest in an instructor-led Delphi course. It seems like Eddie and/or Dr. Bob would be interested in setting something up; either could probably do a fine job. Maybe you should both do it :-)
I'm not exactly sure where to go next, but I'll offer a couple thoughts. I'm certainly willing to help a little bit and to lend my 2 cents worth, but it would ultimately not be my project ... I want to be the one *enrolled* in the course, not putting it together :-) Perhaps it would be best to start with something fairly small, like six weeks, and see how it goes. In this brave new world of eLearning there's at least two ways you could set things up. First, you could create your own course management system on the web--there's open source stuff out there that works fine. You would need a way to deliver content to students (including the possibility of sending materials through the mail or telling people to buy something commercially available). Content could include not only text but also other media, e.g., flash demonstrations of how to do something (I'd love to hear lectures, while watching how to do things a la Camtasia Studio presentations ... but that's just me). You'll also need ways to keep in close contact with your students (like e-mail), and for students to be able to keep in contact with each other--esp. if they would be expected to work together. I think some folks in the position of leading this sort of thing might have students post everything (other than homework) in a public discussion-list style forum, so responses are visible to everyone. Finally, you'll want an easy way for students to submit projects to you. One could get by with something as simple as a password protected website, e-mail, and public discussion group, though typical courses are set up in slightly more sophisticated ways. You also need a way to accept people's money :-) The second way to set up a course management system would be to offer a class/workshop through some other organized provider. My own university allows for such things through its extension services--participants pay tuition to the university, the instructor gets to use the university's infrastructure (course management system, server, etc.), and the instructor gets a cut of the money that comes in. It's like you would have outsourced all the non-instructional tasks, in exchange for the university taking a large cut of the proceeds. If one of you decided to pursue this latter option, via my university, I could make the initial contacts for you and gather more info. To those of you who mentioned resources like delphi.about.com, yes, I'm quite familiar with them. It's a terrific site ... but I'm looking for something a little different, with the guidance and interaction you get in a real course. Finally, as far as topics could go, I'm a little less certain. My own interests lie in developing general applications as freeware/shareware + education-related apps, so I think it would be fun and valuable to have a course centered on creating basic versions of common types of applications from scratch, via Delphi, e.g., word processor, web browser, e-mail client, spreadsheet, etc. But that's just me ... People with aspirations of working for someone else, for example, need to understand a whole lot about databases ... and then there's things like component creation, more on OOP, or working with the Windows API, or ..? I hope this is enough to get someone started. Think also about where you could, essentially, advertise to get students. And think about all that money you might make--especially after you've taught your workshop a couple times & the effort on your part has decreased a lot! Let me know when I should register :-) Al _______________________________________________ Delphi mailing list -> [email protected] http://www.elists.org/mailman/listinfo/delphi
