software Learning Management System R1

Transcription

1 software Learning Management System R1 Administrator's Guide December 2003

2 Disclaimer THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS DOCUMENTATION IS PROVIDED FOR INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY. WHILE EFFORTS WERE MADE TO VERIFY THE COMPLETENESS AND ACCURACY OF THE INFORMATION CONTAINED IN THIS DOCUMENTATION, IT IS PROVIDED AS IS WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED. IN ADDITION, THIS INFORMATION IS BASED ON IBM S CURRENT PRODUCT PLANS AND STRATEGY, WHICH ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE BY IBM WITHOUT NOTICE. IBM SHALL NOT BE RESPONSIBLE FOR ANY DAMAGES ARISING OUT OF THE USE OF, OR OTHERWISE RELATED TO, THIS DOCUMENTATION OR ANY OTHER DOCUMENTATION. NOTHING CONTAINED IN THIS DOCUMENTATION IS INTENDED TO, NOR SHALL HAVE THE EFFECT OF, CREATING ANY WARRANTIES OR REPRESENTATIONS FROM IBM (OR ITS SUPPLIERS OR LICENSORS), OR ALTERING THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS OF THE APPLICABLE LICENSE AGREEMENT GOVERNING THE USE OF IBM SOFTWARE. Licensed Materials - Property of IBM Copyright IBM Corporation 1985, 2003 All rights reserved. US Government Users Restricted Rights - Use, duplication or disclosure restricted by GS ADP Schedule Contract with IBM Corp. Lotus Software IBM Software Group One Rogers Street Cambridge, MA List of Trademarks IBM, the IBM logo, AIX, AS/400, DB2, LearningSpace, LearningSpace Forum, IBM Directory Server, RS/6000, iseries, xseries, MQSeries, Cloudscape, Netfinity, OfficeVision, OS/2, OS/390, OS/400, S/390, Tivoli, WebSphere, 1-2-3, cc:mail, Domino, Domino Designer, Freelance Graphics, inotes, Lotus, Lotus Discovery Server, Lotus Enterprise Integrator, Lotus Mobile Notes, Lotus Notes, Lotus Organizer, LotusScript, Notes, QuickPlace, Sametime, SmartSuite, and Word Pro are trademarks or registered trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Crystal Reports is a registered trademark of Crystal Decisions Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Pentium is a trademark of Intel Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.

3 Java, JavaServer Pages, JavaBeans, JavaScript, J2EE, JDBC, Sun Enterprise, and Sun Solaris are trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States, other countries, or both. JReport and JReport Designer are trademarks of Jinfonet Software, Inc. in the United States, other countries, or both. Macromedia, Pathware, and Dreamweaver are registered trademarks of Macromedia, Inc. in the United States, other countries, or both. Netscape and Netscape Navigator are registered trademarks of Netscape Communications Corporation in the United States and other countries. Oracle is a registered trademark of Oracle Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. PKZIP is a registered trademark of PKWARE, Inc. in the United States, other countries, or both. SmartForce is a trademark of SkillSoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. SQL Server and Internet Explorer are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Windows, Windows NT, Active Directory, and Outlook are registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the United States and other countries. Other product, company, and service names mentioned herein may be the trademarks, registered trademarks, or service marks of their marks of their respective owners.

4 Contents Chapter 1 Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration...1 Understanding the Learning Management System architecture... 1 The Learning Management System components... 2 Who s who in the Learning Management System?... 6 The roles in the Learning Management System... 6 The Learning Management System user interface and user tasks... 7 The user interface and tasks available to anonymous users... 7 The user interface and tasks available to students... 7 The user interface and tasks available to managers... 8 The user interface and tasks available to instructors... 8 The user interface and tasks available to administrators... 8 Other Administration tasks Chapter 2 Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products...11 Using Sametime for Chat Using Domino for Discussion Preparing the Domino server Enabling a Discussion server in the Learning Management System Creating a course s Discussion database Using Lotus Virtual Classroom for Live sessions Using Discovery Server for searching company knowledge Knowledge Search Learning Management System updates to Discovery Server profiles Enabling a Discovery Server in the Learning Management System Enabling single sign-on with multiple IBM products Single sign-on requirements Enabling single sign-on Chapter 3 Managing the Learning Management System Databases...23 Chapter 4 Managing the Learning Management System...25 Enabling Server settings Contents iii

5 Enabling notifications General Enrollment Certificate Curriculum Course management Scheduling notifications Setting up announcements Display preferences Setting default display preferences System logging Setting up logging Chapter 5 Managing Users...35 How the Learning Management System tracks users Using LDAP servers Overview of working with an LDAP directory Using the Learning Management System for rostering Adding users Using the command line for rostering Setting up the JDBC environment Rostering users from an LDIF file (rosterldif.bat or rosterldif.sh) Rostering users from a criteria file (rostercrit.bat or rostercrit.sh) Logging Rostering against large LDAP directories Segmenting users with the Rostering utilities Anonymous access Matching strings Defining roles Assigning explicit roles Managing auto assignments Setting permissions Creating roles iv Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

6 Summary of permissions Defining access control Assigning access control for locations Assigning access control for course master folders Assigning access control course offerings folders Managing profiles Creating a profile category Modifying a profile category Deleting a profile category Creating a profile Modifying a profile Deleting a profile Assigning profiles Using profiles Associating a profile with a course Updating user records Assigning roles Assigning auto-enrollment profiles Assigning user profiles De-rostering users Chapter 6 Managing Courses...67 Managing the Course Catalog Masters Course offerings Creating and managing resources Managing enrollments Enrolling individuals in a course Enrolling users in a selected course Enrolling users by profile Withdrawing individuals from a course Withdrawing users from a selected course Enabling users to enroll themselves in a course Contents v

7 Enabling users to withdraw themselves from a course Enrolling users from a wait list Removing users from a wait list Viewing the users enrolled in a selected course Viewing the courses in which a user is enrolled Viewing the users on the wait list for a course Monitoring attendance for enrolled users Viewing and modifying results Offline Learning Enabling the Home Offline permission Setting up the Offline Learning Client Enabling a course for offline use Downloading updates to the Offline Learning Client and offline courses Tracking student progress in an offline course Chapter 7 Managing Reports...85 Who runs reports? Predefined reports Report output File Format Report Locale Running reports Scheduling reports Managing Scheduled Reports Defining custom reports Creating a report Editing reports.xml Enabling the custom reports Selective generation of reports using the Learning Management System user segmentation feature Chapter 8 Using the Learning Management System Portlets...99 What are portlets? About the Learning Management System portlets My Course Catalog portlet vi Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

8 My Course Calendar portlet My Courses portlet Portlet.war file details Deploying the Learning Management System portlets on the WebSphere Portal Installing the Learning Management System portlets on the WebSphere Portal Server Configuring portlet parameters for use with the Learning Management System Security Debugging the portlets Portlets and national language support (NLS) Appendix A Troubleshooting General problems LDAP issues Error messages Appendix B Sample LDIF Entry Appendix C Learning Management System Search Rules Appendix D Learning Management System Glossary Index Contents vii

9 viii Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

10 Chapter 1 Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration The Learning Management System is a scalable, flexible platform for managing both classroom-based and e-learning activities, resources, curriculums, and courseware catalogs across the enterprise. The product is an end-to-end fully integrated learning solution. The Learning Management System organizes and delivers courses, tracks and reports on student activities, and reserves instructors and resources, enabling customers to manage their entire training program from a single platform. Using a Web browser, a student can review the online course catalog and enroll in both instructor-led classroom training and e-learning offerings. Alternatively, the Learning Management System can automatically enroll a student in particular courses based upon profiles that the course administrator creates. After enrolling in a course, the student receives a confirmation and will receive notifications of schedule changes if any occur. Instructors and training managers can reserve resources to avoid scheduling conflicts, develop curriculums for various audiences, and provide managers with reports on their employees' training activities. The Learning Management System streamlines the overall management of an organization's training activities, increasing efficiencies and saving time and expenses. Because the Learning Management System supports industry standards, organizations can offer a wide variety of courseware developed with third party products, such as Macromedia Dreamweaver, or they can develop their own courses in-house with the Learning Management System authoring tool. Subject matter experts can create courses on their own, with no programming skills required. The Learning Management System runs on the IBM WebSphere Application Server platform. This chapter includes the following sections: Understanding the Learning Management System architecture This section describes all of the components in the Learning Management System, as well as the flow of data in the Learning Management System. Who s who in the Learning Management System? This section describes the people involved in running the Learning Management System and describes their functions and roles. The Learning Management System user interface and user tasks This section describes the tasks that users with various roles can complete from the Learning Management System user interface. Other administration tasks This section describes additional tasks that administrators complete. Understanding the Learning Management System architecture This section describes the components in the Learning Management System and how they interact with each other. Chapter 1: Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration 1

11 The Learning Management System components The Learning Management System includes several required components, and can also include several optional components. These include: Learning Management System (LMS) Server The Learning Management System Server is the central functional component of the system. The Learning Management System Server contains the functions and capabilities for configuring and coordinating the other components of the system. You can deploy one Learning Management System Server, or you can create a cluster of Learning Management System Servers to improve performance and availability. Each server in the cluster contains the same Learning Management System files and data. Administrators, instructors, and students all have access to portions of the Learning Management System Server functionality. For administrators, the Learning Management System Server provides the ability to manage courses, course catalogs, students, and resources, to create reports, and to manage Learning Management System settings and Learning Management System components. For instructors, the Learning Management System Server provides the ability to select courses to run, schedule activities and resources, and track student progress. For students, the Learning Management System Server provides the ability to browse the course catalog, enroll in courses, display and complete course activities, and observe records of 2 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

12 their own progress. Students can also use the Learning Management System Server to download the Offline Learning Client so that they can work on courses on their own computers without having a network connection. The Learning Management System Server is required. Delivery Server The Delivery Server launches course content, provides course navigation features, tracks student progress, and sends tracking information to the Learning Management System Server. You can have multiple Delivery Servers in the Learning Management System, with different data on each Delivery Server. This lets you divide the load and take into consideration the location of the students. For example, it would be more cost-effective to have a student in Japan access a Delivery Server in Japan rather than a Delivery Server in Argentina. You can also use WebSphere to create one or more clusters of Delivery Servers. The Delivery Server is required, except for courses that take place entirely in a classroom and have no online content or sessions. Content server The Content Server maintains a copy of Web-based course content after a course is imported into the Learning Management System. In most cases, the Content Server is an HTTP server. The Learning Management System Server can deploy content to the Content Server using FTP or by copying content directly to the Content Server's file system. You can have multiple Content Servers in the Learning Management System and you can cluster them. Each Delivery Server can have more than one Content Server. In smaller organizations, you can use the same server for the Content Server that you use for the Delivery Server. The Content server is required. Relational database management system (RDBMS) The RDBMS software can reside on the same machine as the Learning Management System software for a small installation, but it usually resides on one or more separate machines for performance reasons. The Learning Management System Server and the Delivery Server use relational databases to store information about users, courses, the catalog, and other settings needed to run the Learning Management System. The Learning Management System Server and the Delivery Server store information in separate databases. In addition, the Audit database tracks events that occur in the Learning Management System, such as a course being removed from the course catalog or a student being registered for a course. These databases frequently reside on the same database server, but they don t have to. You use RDBMS utilities to create these databases. Then, when you install the Learning Management System, these databases are customized for your system. When users use the Learning Management System, the Learning Management System Server and the Delivery Server initiate database transactions to retrieve and update information. The RDBMS is required. Authoring tool The Learning Management System includes an authoring tool that you can use to create or modify course content and evaluations and import them into the Learning Management System. The authoring tool saves the content as a SCORM 1.2 package, which is the required standard to use the courses in the Learning Management System. In addition, you can use the authoring tool or the Command Line Import Utility to import courses from other sources into the Learning Management System. If the course uses a version of SCORM prior to version Chapter 1: Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration 3

13 1.2 or a version of AICC, you must use the authoring tool to import the course into the Learning Management System. The authoring tool converts the course to the SCORM 1.2 standard. If the course already uses the SCORM 1.2 standard, you can use the Command Line Import Utility to import the course into the Learning Management System. You have the option of installing the authoring tool when you install the Learning Management System. If you install the authoring tool, put it on a server that content creators can access, preferably an FTP server or an HTTP server. Content creators download a copy of the tool from the server and use it locally. The authoring tool is required for importing courses that are not in the SCORM 1.2 format. It is optional for creating courses and for importing courses that are in the SCORM 1.2 format. Command Line Import Utility You can use the Command Line Import Utility to import courses from other sources into the Learning Management System. These courses must use the SCORM 1.2 standard. For importing multiple courses into the Learning Management System, it is best to use the Command Line Import Utility. If you are importing a lot of courses, you can schedule the Command Line Import Utility to run overnight or on a weekend so that it does not use resources during the busiest times of the week. As with the authoring tool, you have the option of installing the Command Line Import Utility when you install the Learning Management System. If you install the Command Line Import Utility, put it on a server that content creators can access, preferably an FTP server or an HTTP server. Content creators download a copy of the tool from the server and use it locally. The Command Line Utility is optional. LDAP server The Learning Management System uses your LDAP directory as a repository of authentication information and user information. The Learning Management System communicates with the LDAP directory to verify that users are part of your organization and for other user information. Prior to adding students to the Learning Management System ( rostering students), the students must have an entry in the LDAP directory. Administrators must also have an entry in the LDAP directory. LDAP is an industry standard for enterprise directories. Compatibility with LDAP lets Learning Management System users employ the same user names and passwords that they employ for other applications in the enterprise. If you do not already have an LDAP server set up, you can create one using IBM Directory Server, which is included with the Learning Management System software. An LDAP server is required. FTP server You can use an FTP server as an intermediary server between the authoring tool or the Command Line Import Utility and the Learning Management System Server. Use the authoring tool or the Command Line Import Utility to place the courses onto the FTP server. The server imports the courses from there. SMTP server You need an SMTP server if you want to send notifications to users and give users access to the Help desk. The SMTP server is optional. IBM Lotus Virtual Classroom (LVC) server If your organization has both IBM Lotus Virtual Classroom R1.1 and IBM Lotus LVC Connector, you can schedule live online sessions as part of a course. These sessions let the instructor present material to everyone at once and then lead a discussion about the material. During these live sessions, you can have 4 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

14 students break out into small groups to work on different tasks, and then have the students get back together to discuss what they did during the breakout session. You can include live sessions as part of the course content when you create a course. If you create a course that contains the course structure but no course content, you can use the Learning Management System Server later to create live sessions for that course. For information about enabling and using an LVC server, see Using Lotus Virtual Classroom with the Learning Management System. The LVC server is optional. Discussion server If your organization has an IBM Lotus Domino server ( or later), you can enable that server as a Discussion server in the Learning Management System so that students and instructors can access coursespecific discussion databases to communicate with each other. For information about enabling and using a Domino server as a Discussion server, see Chapter 2, Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products. A Discussion server is optional. Discovery Server If your organization has IBM Lotus Discovery Server 2.0 or later and students are using Microsoft Internet Explorer as their browser, you can use a Discovery Server with the Learning Management System. The Discovery Server lets users search your organization s data repositories for information that is relevant to the subject matter of a particular course. For information about enabling and using a Discovery Server, see Chapter 2, Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products. A Discovery Server is optional. Chat server If your organization has an IBM Lotus Sametime 3.0 server, you can enable that server as a Chat server in the Learning Management System so that students and instructors in a course can send instant messages to each other. For information about enabling and using a Sametime server as a Chat server, see Chapter 2, Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products. A Chat server is optional. Offline Learning Client The Offline Learning Client lets students download courses and work on them while they are disconnected from the server. Using the Offline Learning Client is optional. Clustering Learning Management System components You can create a cluster of Learning Management System Servers, Delivery Servers, or other Learning Management System components. Clusters can provide better performance in an enterprise because multiple servers share the workload. In addition, clusters provide increased availability; if one server in a cluster stops, the other servers pick up the load. Chapter 1: Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration 5

15 You use WebSphere Application Server (WAS) to create and manage clusters. For information, see the WAS documentation. Who s who in the Learning Management System? There can be many types of users in the Learning Management System, based on the types of interactions they usually have with the system. Not every organization has all of these types of users. Some of the primary user types are: Students -- Users who participate in learning events but do not lead them. Students enrolled in a course have access to all of the course content, including live sessions, evaluations, and test scores. Students can also attend some classes anonymously. Anonymous users can view the online content, but cannot attend live online sessions or receive evaluations. Whether or not a course is configured for anonymous users is up to the course administrator. Instructors -- Users who participate in courses as leaders. Instructors run reports to view student progress, manage Discussion Boards for classes they teach, and manage the virtual classrooms while leading live sessions. Content developers Users who develop course material using the authoring tool or a third-party product (such as Macromedia Dreamweaver). Content developers can be people in your organization or people at outside vendors. These people might be responsible for importing course content into the Learning Management System, or they might just give the course content to someone else in your organization who imports the content into the Learning Management System. Course administrators -- Users who perform tasks related to creating, posting, and tracking online learning events, as well as enrolling and tracking students. Course administrators may be responsible for creating offerings, adding users to the Learning Management System ( rostering ), enrolling students in courses, and tracking student progress. A training department may assign one person to fill these functions while several instructors actually lead the courses. System administrators -- Users who are responsible for installing and maintaining the Learning Management System software and related third-party components. System administrators tend to focus on different functional areas than course administrators. While course administrators focus on course-related tasks, system administrators use the system-related features and settings in the interface. You may find some overlap between course administrator and system administrator tasks in your organization; for example, both people may be responsible for rostering users in the Learning Management System. Masters manager - Some organizations have a person who creates and configures course masters in the Masters Catalog. Offerings manager -- Some organizations have a person who creates and configures catalog entries and course offerings in the course catalog. Registrar - Some organizations have a person to enroll students in courses. However, courses can also be configured to allow students to enroll themselves. In addition, the Learning Management System can automatically enroll students in particular courses based upon profiles that the course administrator creates. The roles in the Learning Management System The Learning Management System lets you assign roles to users. These roles determine what the user can do in the Learning Management System. By default, there are five roles. However, you can add or delete roles and change what can be done by each of the roles. The default roles are: Anonymous Student 6 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

16 Manager Instructor Administrator The following section describes the default privileges for each of the roles in the Learning Management System. The Learning Management System user interface and user tasks The Learning Management System user interface changes depending on the role of the user. Users have access to various tabbed pages of settings and commands. The number of tabbed pages that each user sees and what is on those tabbed pages depends on the roles that users have been assigned. In addition, rostered users have access to a menu that lets them use Help and set their user preferences, such as the time zone, their preferred language, and their calendar options. The administrator can change what the user interface displays for each type of role and the tasks users can access. This section describes the default tabs and many of the default tasks available to users with each of the five default roles. The user interface and tasks available to anonymous users Users who access the Learning Management System anonymously without logging in see the following two tabbed pages in the user interface: Home tab From the Home tab, anonymous users can find out information about the features in the Learning Management System. Student Catalog tab From the Student Catalog tab, anonymous users can look through the student catalog to find courses they want to take, find information about those courses, and preview a course, if the course was enabled for previewing (attending a course anonymously). The user interface and tasks available to students Users who are assigned the Student role see the following two tabbed pages in the user interface: Home tab From the Home tab, students can access their calendars to see what activities are scheduled for their courses. They can also create profiles for themselves to indicate what types of courses interest them. In addition, they can view communications that they receive from the system, such as confirmations of enrollments in courses. Students can also download the Offline Learning Client. From this tab, students can also view a list of courses in which they are enrolled and courses they have completed. They can also view curriculums and certificates they are working towards, with a list of the courses required for each curriculum and certificate. In addition, students can view progress reports for courses in which they are enrolled, as well as receive information about the Learning Management System and assistance using the Learning Management System. Student Catalog tab From the Student Catalog tab, students can search for courses they want to take, find information about those courses, and enroll in those courses, if the courses allow self-enrollment. Chapter 1: Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration 7

17 The user interface and tasks available to managers Typically, Manager refers to someone who manages people who might be enrolled in courses. Users who are assigned the Manager role see the following three tabbed pages in the interface. Home tab From the Home tab, managers can do the same things that students can do. Student Catalog tab From the Student Catalog tab, managers can do the same things that students can do. Reports tab From the Reports tab, managers can create reports to do such things as track student progress, view a class roster, and view activity reports. Managers can schedule reports to run automatically at specific times or create reports manually at any time. Note By default, all reports are available to managers, instructors, and administrators. As administrator, you can limit this by assigning permissions for specific reports to specific roles. The user interface and tasks available to instructors Users who are assigned the Instructor role see the following four tabbed pages in the interface: Home tab From the Home tab, instructors can do the same things that managers and students can do. They can also view information about courses they are teaching and about live sessions they are scheduled to lead. In addition, they can change the dates of live sessions they are scheduled to lead and change the materials needed for live sessions. Student Catalog tab From the Student Catalog tab, instructors can do the same things that managers and students can do. Course Management tab From the Course Management tab, instructors can view and modify the following: student progress in a course, the list of students enrolled in a course, and the information in user profiles. Reports tab From the Reports tab, instructors can create reports to do such things as track student progress, view a class roster, view the teaching schedule, and view how far a student has progressed in a specific curriculum. Instructors can schedule reports to run automatically at specific times or create reports manually at any time. Note By default, all reports are available to managers, instructors, and administrators. As administrator, you can limit this by assigning permissions for specific reports to specific roles. The user interface and tasks available to administrators Users who are assigned the Administrator role see the following eight tabbed pages in the interface. Note If you have both a course administrator and a system administrator in your organization, the first seven tabs contain tasks that are usually performed by the course administrator, and the last tab (Settings) contains tasks that are usually performed by the system administrator. Home tab From the Home tab, administrators can do the same things that instructors, managers, and students can do. 8 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

18 Student Catalog tab From the Student Catalog tab, administrators can do the same things that instructors, managers, and students can do. Users tab From the Users tab, administrators can roster and deroster users (add users to and remove users from the Learning Management System); assign roles and profiles to users; create and modify roles; create and modify user profiles, which help to determine which courses might be appropriate for particular users; and create and modify auto-enrollment profiles, which are used to enroll users automatically in specific courses. Course Catalog tab From the Course Catalog tab, administrators can create, view, modify, unregister, copy, and delete masters in the Masters Catalog. In addition, they can add, modify, and delete offerings, such as courses, certificates, and curriculums, in the Offerings Catalog. Course Management tab From the Course Management tab, administrators can enroll users in courses, view results for specific users, view results for users in a particular course, and view user results for a particular instructor. In addition, they can view and modify the enrollments, waiting list, and approvals for a specific course. Administrators can also unenroll students, and they can manage user profiles and auto-enrollment profiles. Resources tab From the Resources tab, administrators can add and edit locations that provide training rooms; add and edit specific training rooms and details about those rooms, such as type of room, seating capacity, and available equipment; add vendors and edit information about existing vendors (vendors provide resources, such as instructors); and add instructors and details about those instructors, such as whether they are internal or external to your organization, what their skills are, and which geographical location they are in. Reports tab Administrators can run all the reports in the system. These include catalog reports, such as information about courses, certifications, and course masters; enrollment reports; user progress reports; resource reports (about classrooms, locations, instructors, and vendors); and several other types of reports. Administrators can also create a badge for each student in a particular course. For information about the various types of reports, see Chapter 7, Managing Reports. Settings tab From the Settings tab, administrators can modify settings for the Learning Management System Server, such as settings for the Help system, the Help Desk, the location of the Offline Learning Client, settings for enabling , LDAP settings, user default settings for when they access the Learning Management System, settings for automatic notifications, and settings that control system logging. From this tab, administrators also add and delete Delivery Servers, as well as modify information about existing Delivery Servers. From this tab, administrators can also add and delete Collaboration Servers, such as Chat servers, Discussion Servers, LVC Servers, and Discovery Servers. They can also modify information about existing Collaboration Servers. From this tab, administrators can also add, modify, and delete announcements that appear on a student s home page; and add, modify, and delete customization sets, which let you alter the user interface for specific users. Chapter 1: Introduction to the Learning Management System and Administration 9

19 Other Administration tasks Besides the administration tasks described in the section The interface and tasks available to administrators, administrators have other tasks to perform. In the Learning Management System, the system administrator is responsible for servers and software. The system administrator would most likely be responsible for the following tasks that were not mentioned previously: Installing and upgrading the Learning Management System servers For information about these topics, see the Installation Guide and the Migration Guide. Installing necessary software on server machines to be used with the Learning Management System, such as operating systems and database management systems. In your organization, there may be one or more people whose job it is to set up machines for everyone in order to ensure standardized configurations. Those people should read about the Learning Management System system requirements in the Release Notes to make sure your servers are installed with software supported by the Learning Management System. Enabling Sametime for chat, Domino for discussion, Lotus Virtual Classroom for live sessions, and Discovery Server for searching company knowledge. For information about these topics, see Chapter 2, Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products. Enabling Single Sign-on (also known as single logon) so that users will not be prompted for a user name and password every time they access a new component in the Learning Management System. For information about enabling Single Sign-on, see Chapter 5, Managing Users. Deploying the Learning Management System portlets in order to use the WebSphere portal to access and display information about specific areas of the Learning Management System. For information about deploying the Learning Management System portlets, see Chapter 8, Using the Learning Management System Portlets. Other people in your organization may be assigned to administer the database management system and enforce controlled access to corporate databases. Managing the relational databases required by the Learning Management System - the system database, the Delivery databases, and the Audit database - is accomplished through scripts using tools provided by the database or operating system vendor. The people responsible for administering the database management system should read Installing and configuring database servers and schema in the Installation Guide, as well as Chapter 3, Managing the Learning Management System Databases, in this guide. 10 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

20 Chapter 2 Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products This chapter discusses how to administer the portions of the Learning Management System that involve capabilities being hosted by IBM Lotus Sametime 3.0, IBM Lotus Domino and higher, IBM Lotus Virtual Classroom R1.1, and IBM Lotus Discovery Server 2.0 and higher. The capabilities that these products provide to Learning Management System users are real-time chat, discussion forums, Live virtual classroom sessions, and knowledge discovery. Because the Learning Management System is designed to work with these products, you can manage some of these products features from within the Learning Management System. Note For Microsoft Internet Explorer users, Learning Management System Chat and Discussion require the Microsoft Java Virtual Machine and do not support the use of Sun Microsystems Java plug-in. For information on administering the Learning Management System portlets designed to work with WebSphere 5.0, see Chapter 8, Using the Learning Management System Portlets. Using Sametime for Chat The Learning Management System supports chat, or the exchange of instant messages, among the instructor and students in a given course. Course-specific chat capability can be made available for users enrolled in or teaching a course regardless of whether or not the course includes a Live session activity. In order for chat to be available in a course, all of the following requirements must be met: The company has a Sametime 3.0 server. (The term Sametime server refers to a server that includes both Domino and Sametime.) It is best if the Sametime server is dedicated to supporting Sametime services. For more information, see the IBM Lotus Sametime 3.0 Administrator s Guide in the Documentation Library at You must enable one or more Chat servers in the Learning Management System by doing the following: 1. In the Learning Management System, click the Settings tab. 2. Click the Collaboration Servers link, and then click the Chat tab. 3. Click Add. 4. Enter a name for the Chat server that can be used to identify the server when the course offering is created. For example, enter Chat1. 5. Enter a description for the server. 6. Enter the URL for the Chat server. For example, enter 7. Click Save. 8. Repeat steps 3 to 7 for each Chat server. 9. Click Done. The course developer sets the chat property for the course in the authoring tool, or the chat requirement is selected when creating the course master. A Chat server is selected when creating the course offering. For more information on creating course masters and course offerings, see Chapter 6, Managing Courses. The user is enrolled in or teaching the course. Chat is not available in courses that allow anonymous participants. Chapter 2: Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products 11

21 Users start chat by launching the course and clicking the Chat button in the Course Tools menu, which opens a chat toolbar. The toolbar allows users to access a list of course participants currently online, to join a chat session with one or more other participants, to invite other participants to join a session, and to change their online status. The single sign-on capability of the WebSphere application server and Sametime allows course participants to authenticate with the Sametime server transparently whenever they use chat -- they don t need to log in again to access the chat toolbar. Using Domino for Discussion If your company has a Domino server ( or later) and you enable it as the Discussion server in the Learning Management System, you can create course-specific Discussion databases from the Learning Management System that instructors and students can access from an open course activity. Preparing the Domino server You need to copy the Discussion Database template and a servlet (contained in the Discussion Servlet JAR file) to each Domino server that will host discussions for the Learning Management System. 1. Ensure that the StdR5Disc template, discsw50.ntf, exists in the Domino Data directory. 2. Copy the Discussion Servlet JAR file (LMSDISCUSSIONS.JAR) to the Domino\data\domino\servlet directory. Note If this directory does not exist on the Domino server, you must create it. 3. From the Domino Administrator, edit the Server document as follows: Click the Security tab. Under Agent Restrictions, in the Run restricted LotusScript/Java agents field, enter IBM Learning Management System/Lotus Notes Companion Products. The Discussion Database template contains server-side agents that require this permission. These agents are signed with the trusted ID that you entered. For a list of restricted LotusScript and Java features and information about agents, see IBM Lotus Domino Designer Help. 4. Edit the server document to add LMSDISCUSSIONS.JAR to Domino s class path: Click the Internet Protocols Domino Web Engine tab. Under Java Servlets, in the Java servlet support field, make sure that Domino Servlet Manager is selected. In the Class path field, append the class path for the LMSDISCUSSIONS.JAR file. For example, enter domino\servlet;domino\servlet\ LMSDiscussions.jar. Note the inclusion of a semicolon (;). Save and close the Server document. 5. Assign an alias to the servlet, since Domino, for security reasons, does not allow servlet names containing periods to be used in a servlet URL: Locate the servlets.properties file (lower-case name) in the Domino data directory. If it does not exist, create it. Using a text editor, add the following lines to the file. The second line must be typed exactly as shown. # Properties for the Lotus Discussion database servlet servlet.lmsdisc.code= com.lotus.elearn.discussions.discussionservlet Save and close the file. 6. In the Domino console, enable the servlet by entering the following command: tell http restart 12 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide

22 Enabling a Discussion server in the Learning Management System For Discussion capability to be available from within the Learning Management System, you must provide the Learning Management System with information about each Domino server in your company that is providing the service. 1. In the Learning Management System, click the Settings tab. 2. Click the Collaboration Servers link, and then click the Discussion tab. 3. Click Add. 4. Enter a name for the Discussion server that can be used to identify the server when the course offering is created. For example, enter Disc1. 5. Enter a description for the server. 6. Enter the Domino Administrator s user name and password. 7. Select Use secure transport if you require users to access the discussion database via the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) using the HTTPS protocol. 8. Enter the URL for the Discussion server. For example, enter 9. Click Save. 10. Repeat steps 3 to 9 for each Discussion server. 11. Click Done. Creating a course s Discussion database To create a course s discussion database from the Learning Management System, do the following: 1. Define the Discussion server in the Learning Management System Settings as described in the preceding procedure. 2. (Optional) If you want to require a discussion database for courses created from the course master, select Requires Discussion when creating the master. 3. When creating the course offering, select Domino Discussion on the Course Details page. Note It is possible to use a service other than Domino for the Discussion by specifying the service s URL. 4. Specify the Discussion server by clicking the Select button and selecting a server from the list. 5. Enter a database title and a file name for the database. 6. Select the full-text index option if you want users to be able to search the database. For more information on creating course masters and course offerings, see Chapter 6, Managing Courses. Using Lotus Virtual Classroom for Live sessions A Live session is a scheduled online class for which all participants log in at the same time. If your company has Lotus Virtual Classroom R1.1, along with the IBM Lotus LVC Connector (the tool that makes it work with the Learning Management System), courses in the Learning Management System can include a Live session as a course activity. Users enrolled in a course that includes a Live session can join the session by going to their calendar, by launching the course, or by going to This Week s Activities. For more information, see Using Lotus Virtual Classroom with the Learning Management System. Chapter 2: Using the Learning Management System with Other IBM Products 13

23 Using Discovery Server for searching company knowledge If your organization has Discovery Server 2.0 or later, and users have Microsoft Internet Explorer as their browser, you can enable Knowledge Search links in the Learning Management System, as well as enable updates of Discovery Server s user profiles with the Learning Management System data. Discovery Server needs to be installed into an existing Domino (or later) infrastructure, but on a clean (non-domino) server. For more information on Discovery Server, see IBM Lotus Discovery Server Administration Help in the Documentation Library at Knowledge Search Specifying a Discovery Server in the Learning Management System Settings enables a Knowledge Search link on Home Page that takes a user to the company s K-map. If a course developer entered Find an Expert keywords for a given course in the authoring tool, the Knowledge Search link is also displayed in the Course Tools menu for that course. Here, it provides search results from across the company s data repositories on information relevant to the subject matter of the course. For information on entering Find an Expert keywords in the authoring tool, see the authoring tool Help. Learning Management System updates to Discovery Server profiles Enabling updates of Discovery Server profiles in the Learning Management System Settings results in Discovery Server profiles including Learning Management System courses, curriculums, and certifications and their dates of completion in each profile s Professional training field. Enabling a Discovery Server in the Learning Management System For knowledge discovery capability to be available from within the Learning Management System, you must provide the Learning Management System with information about the Discovery Server in your company. 1. In the Learning Management System, click the Settings tab. 2. Click the Collaboration Servers link, and then click the Discovery Server tab. 3. Enter the URL for the Discovery Server. For example, enter 4. Enter your user name and password. 5. If you want Discovery Server user profiles to be updated with the Learning Management System coursecompletion data, select Enable updates for user profiles. 6. Click Save. Enabling single sign-on with multiple IBM products For collaboration and knowledge management capabilities to work in the Learning Management System, the WebSphere application server and the Sametime, Domino, Lotus Virtual Classroom, or Discovery server that hosts the capability must share a common LDAP directory. Moreover, you must enable single sign-on (SSO) on WebSphere and on all the servers that host the collaboration capabilities. SSO allows Web users to authenticate only once within a DNS domain, so when users change to another server after being authenticated, they are not prompted to log in again. Single sign-on is the process which permits users to move between different Web applications or different parts of the same Web application hosted by the same or different physical machines, without being prompted for a user name and password (or certificate) every time. 14 Learning Management System Administrator's Guide