ARNES 2014 Conference – Transfering Knowledge (28. 5. 2014)
The exchange of knowledge had already gone beyond the walls of classic classrooms in the previous century, but modern technology with its rapid advances provides ever simpler and more efficient methods for transferring knowledge. In today’s world, learning is thus no longer the exclusive domain of nurseries, schools and universities. Technology goes hand in hand with research institutes, museums, galleries and other organizations, for which it provides a means for sharing their content and accumulated knowledge. Technology nowadays allows us to overcome our physical limitations as well as the limits in our understanding of the exchange of knowledge, since we no longer think of the global classroom simply in terms of overcoming borders, but also from the point of view of target audiences that might be interested in our content.
Conference programme*
Delegate registration 8:00–9:30
Plenary talks (Hall A, B, C, Hotel Kompas) 9:30–11:00
ARNES 2014 Conference Opening
The digital assessment process in Norwegian Universities – from analogue to electronic examinations in the digital era, Freddy Barstad, National Coordinator for Digital Assessment, eCampus – UNINETT AS
Today’s assessment practices in higher education in Norway are a far cry from the digital advancements that are being developed and embraced in other areas of society. The digital “natives” who attend higher education institutions in Norway today study and learn with their laptops/mobiles but when they turn up for their long-awaited examination, they are required to reproduce their knowledge with pen and paper. Academics eagerly wait for the students’ papers to arrive by snail mail, and spend their time interpreting the illegible hand writing while administrators spend their days counting, copying, double-checking, packing, and sending examination papers from student to examiner. This talk looks at the projects that have been initiated at a national and a local level which focus on the transformation of the traditional paper-based assessment process in place today to an end-to-end digital process. By establishing a National Project for Digital Assessment in Higher Education and inviting all state owned universities to participate in a joint collaboration, the project’s goal is to share challenges and results and establish cooperation between the universities. The response to this invitation has been overwhelming, and 76 named resources representing 27 different higher education institutions are now participating in this national project. The technological perspective of the project has been a high priority from day one, and the project has taken a leading role in work related to the technological aspects of the digital assessment process. The presentation will focus particularly on these areas, and the perspective of succeeding in with a national project and joint collaboration in a broad scale.
- A joint collaboration including most Norwegian Universities
- The use of an innovative public procurement process – in collaboration with vendor market
- How digital solutions might influence new ways of learning and assessment
- Solving legal issues
- Establishing a national service platform for integration
Freddy Barstad is an experienced manager and ICT-strategist, with 20 years of experience working with ICT in government, the public sector and as a consultant; he has spent the last 11 years in higher education.
Integrating vox.arnes.si services into the educational process, Benjamin Lesjak, IPRID
ARNES’ vox.arnes.si videoconferencing service can be integrated into regular teaching and collaboration processes, especially distance teaching implementations, remote meetings, guest lectures, distance student thesis examinations or for extending target audiences to those who cannot attend in person. The vox.arnes.si service is very robust and provides an acceptable and intelligible connection even in borderline conditions. It is, however, especially useful because of the content distribution possibilities and additional communications channels that it provides to videoconference participants in addition to video and audio. Various examples of best practice for using the vox.arnes.si services will be shown along with practical demonstrations as well as participant and/or student responses to using videoconferencing in education.
Benjamin Lesjak is a senior lecturer at the University of Primorska Faculty of Management. In his work, teaching, research and various projects he combines knowledge from the fields of law, information technology and management. He educates parents, teachers and children at the Centre for a Safer Internet – Safe.si, heads his own institute for legal solutions at the information society in Maribor and collaborates with larger higher education institutions on subjects involving law, ICT and the information society. His special focus is on e-commerce, privacy protection, public data, e-communications and e-education.
Plenary talks (Hall A, B, C, Hotel Kompas) 11:30–13:15
Building a MOOC platform: challenges and solutions, Dmitry Filatov, iversity
MOOCs (Massive Online Open Courses) have gained incredible popularity, and their effects have been felt by hundreds of institutions and millions of users all around the world. New learning approaches bring new technological challenges. A modern MOOC platform is not just a set of standard CMS blocks like embedded videos, discussion forums and wiki pages. It requires brand new features and technologies, like reliable peer review algorithms, adaptive learning and remote proctored exams. Many of these features are still in the experimental phase and will evolve in unpredictable directions.
Dmitry Filatov is the CTO (Chief Technology Officer) at iversity.org, Europe’s leading online platform for higher education courses (MOOCs). After earning a degree in IT and Computer Science at Saint-Petersburg State University in Russia, Dmitry went on to become the CTO and founder of BusinessMedia Software from 2003-2011, the CEO of his own start-up, DrinCash Ltd., from 2011-2012, and the Product and Project Manager for IZITEQ B.V. Dmitry joined iversity in 2013. Owing to his years of experience in product development management and backend and frontend coding, he is a results-oriented expert in complex web-based systems. His fields of interest include effective technology management, big data, NLP, mobile apps(iOS) and HA infrastructure.
The first time is the hardest: CARNet Moodle MOOC, Gordana Jugo, CARNet
In January 2014, CARNet launched its first massive open online course for the professional development of teachers – Moodle MOOC, which were attended by more than 400 participants from Croatia and the wider region. Learn how the CARNet team transformed an online course for a group of 15 participants into a massive course for over 400 participants, and how the course has been received by the participants, more than 70% of whom had never participated in a MOOC before. (Presentation in Croatian language.)
Gordana Jugo is the Head of Service for Educational Technologies in CARNet and is responsible for training and support in technology supported teaching for educators at all educational levels. Her work in the development and implementation of educational programmes is enriched with the use of innovative pedagogical and technological possibilities. Gordana is an advocate of open educational resources (OER) and the open source movement. She holds a Master of Educational Technology degree from the University of British Columbia, Canada. Gordana is a project manager on the Comenius project AMORES with the motto “discovering a love for literature through digital collaboration and creativity”.
How we set-up a MOOC on the safe use of the Internet and modern technologies, Domen Božeglav, ARNES, Radovan Kranjc, ZRSŠ
The Internet and modern technological solutions are now part of virtually every step of our lives and we often forget about the risks their use exposes us to. In collaboration with several institutions, ARNES has thus prepared a web course to educate users about the dangers they are exposed to when using the Web and technology in general. Through the use of video lectures and quizzes it will also give you the knowledge necessary to protect your devices, personal data, health and the environment. The lecture will examine how the course was set-up in a web classroom environment and alert you to several key pitfalls one is exposed to when using the internet and modern technologies.
Domen Božeglav has been working at ARNES for more than a decade and is also a member of the SAFE-SI safe internet and modern technology use info point. In his free time he is a passionate runner.
Radovan Krajnc, educational adviser for computers and information technology at the National Education Institute of the Republic of Slovenia, is always living life on the edge, striking a balance between his job, hobbies and professional development.
Plenary talks (Hall A, B, C, Hotel Kompas) 14:45–16:15
Research and Education Networks and Global Learning Initiatives, Domenico Vicinanza, DANTE
Research and Education Networks (NRENs and GEANT) are playing an increasing role in knowledge sharing, and their mandate and presence are definitely growing in the education landscape. This talk will explore the possibilities and opportunities offered by initiatives such as Global Classroom, iversity and MOOCs, and discuss the role of R&E networking in Europe. From building distributed architecture to sharing experiences, to providing models for sustainable education, NRENs are called today to a meet the ambitious demands of a crucial community: schools and higher education.
Domenico Vicinanza works at DANTE, Cambridge, UK as network services product manager and arts and humanities manager. He received his MSc and PhD degrees in Physics and he is a professional music composer. He worked for more than 15 years as a researcher and lecturer in universities and music conservatoires in Europe and as a scientific associate at CERN in Geneva. His background includes computing grid sites management, R&D for particle physics detectors, marketing and product management, lecturing and coaching. He is also involved in the application of distributed computing and advanced networking technologies to music and visual arts as the technical coordinator of the ASTRA (Ancient instrument Sound/Timbre Reconstruction Application) and Lost Sounds Orchestra projects for the reconstruction of musical instruments on GÉANT and EUMEDCONNECT.
From (your) Joomla to ARNES Splet (WordPress): why, who and how, Miloš Gajić, ARNES
ARNES Splet (WordPress) is ARNES’ answer to the increasing number of problems in developing web pages for the organizations that we host and, especially, the need for their complex and continuous maintenance. In this lecture we will demonstrate how we help our users achieve an effective web presence by developing new pages and migrating existing ones to the ARNES Splet service.
Miloš Gajić has worked for ARNES since 2008. He is employed in the user technical assistance department where he is mostly involved in development, testing, system support and educating users about the virtual server hosting service.
WordPress and Joomla – A Direct Comparison, Marko Lampret, Lampret.net
Judging by web surveys, WordPress and Joomla are among the favourite open source CMS solutions, so before developing a web page one is often faced with the challenge of which of the two to use. In the past Joomla was often held to be the better choice for developing advanced web pages, and WordPress as a solution for simpler ones and blogs. This is no longer true and WordPress’s growing market share has made it a serious alternative to Joomla.
In this lecture we will use practical examples to demonstrate the key advantages of the WordPress system which boasts simple management and maintenance as well as numerous options for extending web pages’ functionality.
As a freelancer, Marko Lampret is involved with the development of web pages using open source CMS solutions, especially Joomla and WordPress. Over the past decade he has often been responsible for the technical aspect of Slovenian schools’, kindergartens’ and libraries’ web pages in cooperation with ARNES.
Plenary talks (Hall A, B, C, Hotel Kompas) 16:30–18:15
ARNES – Under the Hood, Klemen Andreuzzi, ARNES
In order to provide high availability for ICT services it is necessary to take care of quite a few details that are usually invisible to the end user. One of these is redundancy i.e. having backup resources available at both hardware and service levels. An example of this is having dual power supplies, hosting more important servers in two physically discrete locations, etc. In this lecture we will look at the typical equipment and support service implementation required for the uninterrupted operation of our services.
Klemen Andreuzzi has a degree from the Faculty of Computer and Information Science. He has been with ARNES for the past 7 years and is employed in the field of system administration. He puts his extensive knowledge to use in developing the most advanced solutions (DNS, e-mail, firewalls, load balancing, high availability systems, optimizations, etc.) In his free time he devotes himself to computer graphics and computer vision.
Action and Reaction – New ARNES Services: ARNES Razglas and ARNES Analitika, Jasmina Mesić, SI-CERT, ARNES
We will introduce ARNES’ two new services which will enable faster, more efficient and, above all, more quantifiable communication with target audiences. The ARNES Razglas service will simplify the management of various mailing lists and contact administration. Its key advantage is rapid and efficient notification, since your news article or invitation can reach a number of precisely selected e-mail addresses with one click. Action! The effects of your communication can be measured with ARNES Analitika which provides insight into data about your website’s visitors. See which topics and news stories they read, where they come from, how they get lost, and shape your web content accordingly. Reaction!
Jasmina Mešić works at ARNES and is the coordinator for national public awareness about the information technology programme called Safe on the Internet. She has a degree in media communications from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in Maribor.
Why I only ever use ARNES Mapa, Jure Kumer, OŠ Poljane nad Škofjo Loko, Jure Švent, Arnes
ARNES Mapa is one of ARNES’ experimental cloud services which provides users with storage and universal access to files regardless of their location or the device they are currently using. The service provides automatic file synchronization between all the user’s devices as well as file sharing with selected friends or, indeed, anyone. Some of you may already know about it and use it – for others this presentation might be all that is needed to get started. Regardless of which group you fall into, the new functions we will demonstrate on this occasion will no doubt pleasantly surprise you. We can already reveal that the updates will enhance and extend the possibilities for collaboration between web and mobile users. The second part of the presentation will demonstrate a practical use case illustrating how ARNES Mapa can be used as a learning tool in school.
Jure Kumer is a computer fan and teacher at the Poljane nad Škofjo Loko Elementary School. He received his degree from the Faculty of Education in Ljubljana.
Jure Švent has a bachelor’s degree in economics, and experience in the fields of education, information technology and marketing. At ARNES he is a product manager for existing and future services in the System Applications Support group. His primary responsibilities are services visibility and the ongoing improvement of users’ experience.
Your Cloud, Jure Kranjc, ARNES
ARNES’ custom server service extends the possibilities of migrating services and infrastructure to a safe and reliable cloud hosted by ARNES. You can now manage the hosting of powerful servers that can run various operating systems and advanced applications yourself using a simple web interface. Maintenance of the supporting infrastructure will of course be taken care of by ARNES’ experts. Never before has cloud access been this easy.
Jure Kranjc has been employed at the ARNES’ system applications support department since 2009. He is responsible for the areas of server virtualization, cloud services and high performance computer centres. He is also participating in the Slovenian Initiative for a National Grid.
Slovenian Initiative for a National Grid and its Path Toward an Agile Infrastructure, Barbara Krašovec, ARNES, Matevž Markovič, student
Grid technology has been used in science and research for more than a decade and represents a solution to many complex computational problems or experiments. The first cluster in Slovenia was deployed in 2004. With the establishment of the Slovenian Initiative for a National Grid (SLING), of which ARNES is one of the founding members, we have started to connect organizations’ computer centres and users into a national grid network. Today it consists of eight clusters encompassing nearly 10,000 cores. There is no lack of challenges. Differing researchers’ and projects’ needs demand constant adjustment of the implementation environment and agile establishment of centres with various computational resources. SLING has thus been directing development in the direction of a unified agile architecture which will combine cloud, grid and HPC cluster resources. In this lecture we will present the future goals of the Slovenian initiative and several examples of how our cluster has been used in research and education (FRI).
Barbara Krašovec is a systems administrator at ARNES, Slovenian National Research and Education Network. She specialises in the administration and maintenance of virtualised resources, distributed computing clusters, grid networks and grid information systems. She is the systems administrator for SLING Network, Slovenian Initiative for National Grid, a part of EGI, and has been taking part in the EGI-Inspire infrastructure project since 2010.
Matevž Markovič is an interdisciplinary computer science and mathematics studies student at the Faculty of Information and Computer Science and the Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Ljubljana. He is an enthusiastic mathematician with an excellent grasp of computing and is keen to improve and enhance his knowledge by testing various theories and mathematical problems and participating in various mathematical/computing projects such as OEIS (On-Line Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences).
Welcome reception with cheese tasting and socialising (Discotheque, Hotel Kompas) from 18:15
*The programme of the ARNES 2014 Conference is tentative and minor additional changes are possible.
About ARNES Conference
The ARNES Conference is held as a part of SIRikt 2014 conference and brings together the fields of education, research and culture and is intended for a wide range of attendees, since it covers new technologies from the perspective of the user as well as the system. The Conference is not just an event to learn something new and useful. In addition to compelling lectures it will also provide an opportunity to meet and exchange experiences with other conference participants at the traditional cheese feast at the end of the event. Lastly, the ARNES Conference is an excellent opportunity to meet members of the ARNES team who will be available throughout the conference.