Auburn University Launches Instruction-On-Demand With New Digital Media Classroom Heart of System is Network Connection's Cheetah Video Server
ATLANTA, Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- The Network Connection, Inc. (Nasdaq: TNCX - news; TNCi), announced today the recent opening of a technology-rich digital media (DM) classroom for instruction-on-demand at Auburn University Montgomery (AUM).
The heart of AUM's DM System, in Room 201 Goodwyn Hall, is a Cheetah digital server designed and produced by TNCi. The Cheetah digital server is a 45 gigabyte machine that will accommodate up to 150 client stations (streams) and will hold 36 hours (expandable to 150 hours) of digitized video or audio. The digital video signals are full-motion video, very nearly the same quality as television or VHS video, displayed on a full screen.
The Cheetah server is an on-demand server that will service all clients with simultaneous transmission. If there is a student at each of the 20 client stations in the DM classroom, each student could be working on the same (or different) digitized video or audio program(s) at the same time, and at their own pace. One student can begin work at 10 a.m., while other students can begin at various intervals throughout the morning. All students would enjoy immediate access to the same program and at whatever place in that program they wanted to begin.
Classroom stations are equipped with high-grade earphones with microphones for vocal responses and recording. Each station is capable of accessing information from the Cheetah server, software, CD-ROMs, the Internet, the AUM mail system and other AUM servers.
The Cheetah server can also be accessed from any classroom on campus that has a computer network linkup. Similar DM classrooms are being planned for the Library Computer Lab, AUM Computer Lab, Communications Lab and Room 219 Liberal Arts.
The DM classroom offers numerous instruction-on-demand opportunities. The system will accommodate presentations of taped speeches, role-playing situations, interviews, medical practicums, feature films, stage plays, documentaries and lectures. Because of digital capabilities, specific sessions can be reviewed as often as necessary and video/audio can be frozen by frame for intense analysis. Accompanying windows will allow students to access outlines of major points, exercises or analyses of tests. The windows can also contain notes and questions.
''The Cheetah server delivering interactive digital video/audio is the closest thing to instruction-on-demand that has yet been designed,'' says Nick Gerogiannis, Head of the AUM Department of International Studies. ''The benefits of this to working students is obvious; quality instruction is available to students at times convenient to their schedules and at a pace appropriate to their skills.'' |
