> The NZ Ministry of Education is funding a trial that incorporates a > test WikiEducator instance into a single sign on infrastructure for a > cluster of schools here. I'm a fan of lightweight mechanisms like > OpenID which I hope the WE community may adopt, since we are not as > strict about "identity" as some organizations.
Thanks Jim, that's good to know. And I hear what you say about the OPen ID, which probably won't take long to put in place. But if you look at this continuum we're in, on one side we are looking for a basic ID, so we don't have to sign in to a web site all the time. That's not really a federated ID as Middleware-heads mean it. At the top level, in each country, a federated ID looks (as a NZealander) something like this. http://www.dia.govt.nz/diawebsite.nsf/wpg_URL/Services-Identity-Verification-Service-Questions-and-Answers?OpenDocument In the developed world, this is usually seperated between the .gov and.edu. But you can see that this ID could be used for all "service providers" in NZ. So the trial you mention is quite unnecessary. It's already been proved. I find it amusing that one could use it already to apply for a student loan (as the example explains). This will have you saying "what this to do with WE?". The point here is that we have governments offering National ID's, when so many people want access to international databases. That link I pointed you at (the aaf one) shows the Aussies duplicating in the unis, what has already been done in the gov space (like igovt). As the aaf matures, sometime next year they will be thinking how to federate with unis globally. My discussions with terena will include how this may be done across the euro and u.s. unis, and what 'services' an ID may offer access to. > > > So we have a catch 22. Communities like wikipedia and wikiedicator. > > i.e. passionate people who prefer to use one tool to produce open > > content often duplicate wonderful stuff in their attempts to acheive > > their related visions. Rarely do they have an opportunity to > > contemplate what other ICT services may be identified which could be > > shared between communities. (I noticed the Connexions Google group as > > another duplication) Meanwhile, the Middleware guys who must allocate > > resources, and try and figure out what service may be demanded and > > when, are simply bamboozled. > > I think duplication isn't quite the right word. I believe the > different communities have different cultures and appeal to different > users. I see the work I'm doing to allow interchange of resources > between WikiEducator and Connexions as benefiting each. Given content > in open formats, the platform(s) for editing and distribution is(are) > a matter of convenience. The data (OER in this case) is the key. No, I think the word duplication is right. The problem we all have is this idea of thinking a domain represents a community. I understand we can't help it. I'm used to thinking in terms of mastheads. In publishing for most of my media working life, the key has been to recompile the same content for lots of individual outputs for different communities (and usually wrap advertising around it). I also appreciate that we should believe that "data is the key". I just wish i could. Let me give you an example. Read that discussion Valerie started about using merlot to promote WE. http://groups.google.com/group/wikieducator/browse_thread/thread/6fd6d3fc55ed8e0f/63e7d5f686f39d3e?hl=en#63e7d5f686f39d3e You can see valerie's approach - duplicate WE resources within Merlot. And you can see mine. Sign an MOU, put a link from the partner community links to the WE home page. Between the two there's probably a shade of grey which works better. You see I think WE has something very special, and it's the thing which every lifelong learner hankers after in a world of teaching institutions. Community. (it also helps to have a fast forworder like Wayne) Let me add one more point, about communication. We are supposed to see the WE and Connexions community stick to their own Google group. Why? If we are supposed to be working together why wouldn't we share a comms space. This the crux of what I'm trying to encourage. Just because you might have different mastheads doesn't mean you should share the same comms tools, because while we all drown in data, the communication between domains is so limited. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "WikiEducator" group. To visit wikieducator: http://www.wikieducator.org To visit the discussion forum: http://groups.google.com/group/wikieducator To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]
