AN OVERVIEW ON USING THE BSCW WEB-BASED PLATFORM IN THE FRAME OF THE FISTE PROJECT M. BÎZOI *, 1, G. GORGHIU 1 and A. M. SUDUC 1 1 Science of Systems, Automatics and Informatics Department, Valahia University of Targoviste, 18-24 Unirii Boulevard, 130082 Targoviste, Romania Abstract: At present various resources are interconnected through different communication networks, having particular characteristics in terms of performance. Cooperative platforms are distributed resources interconnected through heterogeneous communication network that can be accessed and configured by users having Internet connectivity. As an example, the BSCW Shared Workspace system is an extension of a standard Web server through the server CGI Application Programming Interface. It can manage a number of shared workspaces and generally a BSCW server can manage workspaces for different groups. Consequently, the BSCW users may be members of several workspaces. Having as an objective to provide the cooperation among partners with a shared workspace on the Internet, the partnership of the Comenius 2.1 European Project FISTE ( A Future Way for In-Service Teacher Training across Europe ) agreed to use a BSCW shared platform, the server being installed by the project coordinating institution in January 2005. The paper emphasizes the way in which the platform was used by the project partnership and by the participants involved in two on-line courses developed in the frame of the mentioned project. Keywords: cooperative platforms; BSCW, Comenius 2.1. European Project 1. Introduction The World Wide Web already accounts for more Internet network traffic than any other application, including email and simple file transfer. It is also a collaborative technology in a narrow sense of the word it allows people to share information. It is socially unique in that unlike the telephone system it is a broadcast medium, and unlike television and radio the users have (a large element of) control over what is published and what they see. Most groupware systems are developed for particular platforms and are only usable within the particular organisations that use them. In contrast, the Web offers a globally accessible, platform independent infrastructure. Not surprisingly, many people are looking towards the Web as a potential platform for richer cooperative work, especially as hypertext * Corresponding author: e-mail: bizoi@valahia.ro 269
infrastructure has already been the basis of several groupware systems (Haake and Wilson, 1992). 2. Using cooperative platforms 2.1. BSCW Basic Support for Cooperative Work The BSCW Shared Workspace system is an extension of a standard Web server through the server CGI Application Programming Interface. A BSCW server (Web server with the BSCW extension) manages a number of shared workspaces; repositories for shared information, accessible to members of a group using a simple user name and password scheme. In general a BSCW server will manage workspaces for different groups, and users may be members of several workspaces (e.g. one workspace corresponding to each project a user is involved with). A shared workspace can contain different kinds of information such as documents, pictures, and URL links to other Web pages or FTP sites, threaded discussions, member contact information and more. The contents of each workspace are represented as information objects arranged in a folder hierarchy. Members can transfer (upload) information from their machines to the workspace and set access rights to control the visibility of this information or the operations which can be performed for others. In addition, members can download, modify and request more details on the information objects by clicking on buttons - HTML links that request workspace operations from the BSCW server, which then returns a modified HTML page to the browser showing the new state of the workspace. The shared workspace metaphor supported by the BSCW system allows members of a workspace to store information to make it available to other workspace members. Without any further mechanisms, this implies that everyone who is a member of the workspace has the same capabilities for manipulating this information, including editing and deleting documents. Where workspaces and member groups are relatively small, this approach may be suitable, but experience from user feedback from the previous version of the system revealed that for some tasks there is a need to both increase and decrease the degree of sharing for workspace information. [3] 2.2. Factors that influence the use of the cooperative platform This paper presents the use of the BSCW cooperative platform in the period of two years and four months (from January 2005 to May 2007). In order to obtain the best results, the system that supports the platform application must be operative and stable in time. Some factors that influence the use of the cooperative platform are described below: Hardware architecture. The server machine must have some capabilities to support the software required by the BSCW platform and the platform application itself. The number of users is an important aspect to be taken into consideration. In the frame of 270
the FISTE Project, the hardware machine is an IBM xseries 206 Server with Intel Pentium IV CPU, 1 GB RAM, three SCSI hard drives and one gigabit network interface. This hardware architecture is sufficient for the 300 users, allowed by the BSCW licence. Power supply. The server must be protected against the power fluctuations and power breaks. If the power system is unstable, the server can be damaged or will go off-line and the platform will become inaccessible for the users. The server is protected by an Uninterruptible Power Supply that reduces the power fluctuations and stops the server in safe conditions in case of the power loose. Server operating system and others additional software programs. The cooperative platform is running on the top of the web server. Excepting the operating system, the platform requires some application programs to be installed (web server, python interpreter, mail server, antivirus program and others). Users can use their workspace only if all the required programs are installed and configured correctly. Internet connection speed. Any web application requires a high speed Internet connection. The platform is available to users from five countries, that s why is important to have a good Internet connection. The server is directly connected to Valahia University backbone and the external access is assured through the Romanian Education Network on a 10 Mb/s line of optic fibber. The users Internet connection is also important for obtaining the proper performance. Client s applications. The web applications are accessed by the users with a client application web browser. Practically, the entire system of the user can influence the use of the platform from the difficulties to access some functions to the inaccessibility of the platform. User s skills. The BSCW platform offers different features based on the user profile. The platform web interface can be configured at three levels of proficiency: Beginner, Advanced and Expert. 3. Results and discussion The web server records all the transactions in the log files and these files are analyzed using a software program which generates graphic images and HTML files that presents the web site activities. These files are available on the web at the address http://usage.ssai.valahia.ro/webalizer/bscw/. The free software used to generate the statistics web pages is named Webalizer and is available for download on the project homepage 2. The paper presents the statistics information regarding the Basic Support for Cooperative Work Platform used in the FISTE Project, beginning with January 2005 until May 2007. The graphics showed in this paper are not generated by the Webalizer software, but the data used for those generations are provided by the files produced with Webalizer. 2 http://www.mrunix.net/webalizer/ 271
The number of total visits per month is illustrated in figure 1. The number of visits represents a series of requests from the same uniquely identified client with a set timeout. A visit is expected to contain multiple hits (in log analysis) and page views. 4500 4000 3500 3000 2500 2000 1500 1000 500 0 January 2005 February 2005 Fig. 1 Total monthly visits. March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 The number of visits runs high in time. The peaks registered starting June 2005 until October 2006 shows the activity during the national on-line courses: Integrating ICT in Traditional Training developed in the frame of FISTE project. This course had place at each project partner institutions in the national language and the participants were local teachers. The course is structured in 7 parts: 1) Introduction; 2) Instruction (Developing Basic Skills in Cooperative Platforms BSCW); 3) Pedagogical Use of ICT in Teaching and Learning; 4) Using Technology; 5) Implementation; 6) Final Product; 7) Final Evaluation. Due to the differences of the national educational systems and partners organizations, this course started at different moments in each country involved into the project. The peaks of the graphic line until October 2006 indicate the courses preparation and the highest activities during national courses. In Romania this course took place in November 2005 March 2006 in Targoviste, Cluj-Napoca and Bucharest and involved 120 teachers. The biggest accession was registered starting November 2006 until to March 2007. That is the period when the On-line course for European Educators ECSUT: Educational Challenges & Solutions in Using ICT has been in progress. The ECSUT course, provided 272
in English, was an improved edition of the first course. The course involved 57 educators from different European Countries: Latvia, Portugal, Bulgaria, Finland, Spain, France, Italy, Sweden, Romania, Poland, Hungary, Estonia, Turkey, Iceland and Malta. January 2005 February 2005 March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 200000 180000 160000 140000 120000 Hits 100000 80000 60000 40000 20000 0 Fig. 2 Total Hits per month. A Hit represents a request to a Web server for a file (image, HTML file, javascript or cascading style sheet etc). When a webpage is requested to a server the number of "Hits" or "Page hits" is equal to the number of files requested, therefore one loaded page does not always equal with one hit because often pages are made up of other images and other files which stack up the number of hits counted. To know the number of the hits is useful to evaluate the requirements of a server. It should be considered the number and the size of the files which will be transferred for one request. The servers should be tested to make sure they meet throughput targets (they should be capable to process a certain amount of 'hits' per second). Figure 2 shows the total Hits per month starting January 2005 until May 2007. For the same period, Figure 3 shows the total files monthly opened on the web server. The highest number of Hits and also the highest number of files opened on the platform was registered in December 2005. At that time the Romanian on-line course version was in progress. These numbers are also correlated with the activities in December 2005 when the students were involved in the Technological Unit of the course. The activities of this unit 273
(many files to be downloaded, video-conferencing sessions, discussions etc.) impose an intensive use of the platform which was clearly visible into the graphics. Another high numbers were registered in March 2006 when the participants uploaded their final products on the platform. Due to the numerous participants, the traffic in Mbytes, represented in Figure 4, increased very much in this month. 60000 50000 40000 30000 20000 10000 0 January 2005 March 2005 May 2005 July 2005 September 2005 November 2005 January 2006 March 2006 May 2006 July 2006 September 2006 November 2006 January 2007 March 2007 May 2007 Fig. 3 Total files monthly. Another busy period visible in Figure 2 and Figure 3 was framed in the ECSUT period: November 2006 March 2007. The peak of the European course activities was registered in February 2007, during also the Technological Unit. In the frame of ECSUT Unit, the participants could choose two of 10 studying directions. For each direction, several files were provided. In order to make a selection, the participants accessed almost all the files. This intense activity is shown in the graphics (the number of Hits and the number of opened files). Figure 3 is relevant to the fact that in the national courses almost all the participants uploaded their final products in the same period (March 2006), unlike the ECSUT participants which ended at different moments their tasks. The ECSUT students also had a constant participation to the Units activities, the numbers registered for hits per month, 274
opened files and monthly traffic in Mbytes being comparable for all the months when ECSUT course was in progress. 6000 5000 4000 3000 2000 1000 0 January 2005 March 2005 May 2005 July 2005 September 2005 November 2005 January 2006 March 2006 May 2006 July 2006 September 2006 November 2006 January 2007 March 2007 May 2007 Fig. 4 Total traffic in M Bytes / Month. 4. Conclusions The four figures presented in this paper, representing the number of visits, number of hits, traffic amount and opened files on the web server, show an intensive activity during two periods: June 2005 until October 2006 and November 2006 until March 2007. The peaks of the graphics indicate the periods of time when the course participants accomplished their tasks in the frame of those two FISTE courses: the national course Integrating ICT in Traditional Training and the European on-line course Educational Challenges & Solutions in Using ICT. The lowest numbers showing the activity on the platform were registered during the summer when no course was in progress. The limited number of user accounts (300 accounts) and the small number of visits (table 1) in correlation with the number of the number of hits and files opened on the server in this period indicates a large user activity. 275
Table 1 shows the sums of all monthly numbers for each category of the information presented into the Figures 1-4. Table 1. Statistic information - Totals Description Value Number of visits on the BSCW Platform 40276 Hits number on the web server 1415984 Number of files open on the web server 642214 Total information traffic in Giga Bytes 31.67 Acknowledgements This work was funded through Project 118766-CP-1-2004-1-RO- COMENIUS-C21 from European Commission, Education and Training, School Education: Socrates: Comenius. We thank all Project institutions and all the on-line course participants for their cooperation and work. References [1] Bardram, J., Designing for the Dynamics of Cooperative Work Activities, in: Proceedings of the ACM conference on Computer supported cooperative work, pp. 89 98, 1998. [2] Bentley, R., Horstmann, T., Trevor, J., The World Wide Web as Enabling Technology for CSCW: The Case of BSCW, in: Computer Supported Cooperative Work: The Journal of Collaborative Computing 6, pp. 111 134, 1997. [3] Bentley, R., Appelt, W., Busbach, U., Hinrichs, E., Kerr, D., Sikkel, K., Trevor, J., Woetzel, G., Basic Support for Cooperative Work on the World Wide Web, in: International Journal of Human Computer Studies: Special issue on Novel Applications of the WWW, 1997. [4] Bernstein, A., How can cooperative work tools support dynamic group processes? Bridging the specificity frontier, in: Proceedings of the ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, 2000. [5] Dix, A., Challenges for Cooperative Work on the Web: An Analytical Approach, Computer Supported Cooperative Work: The Journal of Collaborative Computing 6, pp. 135 156, 1997. [6] Fernández, V. G., Garcia, Alicia, Gorghiu, G., Gorghiu, Laura BSCW As a Support System for Distance Teacher Training, in: Recent Research Developments in Learning Technologies, Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Multimedia & ICT s in Education, vol. 2, pp. 696 701, 2005. [7] Gorghiu, G., Fernández, V. G., Gorghiu, Laura, BSCW Un suport adecvat învăţării cooperative, in: Revista Română de Informatică şi Automatică, vol. 15, nr. 1, pp. 53 60, 2005. [8] Grasso, Antonietta, Meunier, J. L., Pagani, Daniele, Pareschi, R., Distributed Coordination and Workflow on the World Wide Web, Computer Supported Cooperative Work: The Journal of Collaborative Computing 6, pp. 175 200, 1997. [9] Jefferies, P., Constable, I., Using BSCW in Learning & Teaching, in: Educational Technology & Society 3, 2000. [10] Yang, Y., Zhang, D., Effective Coordination For Cooperation Support In Web-Based Process- Centred Teamwork Environments. 276