Title: A model for empowering web-based communities through the digital educational repository paradigm

Authors: Elaine Maher, Pramod Pathak

Addresses: School of Informatics, National College of Ireland, IFSC, Mayor Street, Dublin 1, Ireland. ' School of Informatics, National College of Ireland, IFSC, Mayor Street, Dublin 1, Ireland

Abstract: In this paper, we study web-based communities and the role that they play. We also explore the role these communities can play in the development and well-being of the society in future. In reference to this, we survey Digital Educational Repositories (DER) and analyse their importance in supporting web-based communities in achieving their aims. We look at some of the more popular DERs in use today and examine how they are being used. We ask the question, is it possible to pull out a course/information on the fly from available web-based digital repositories for the benefit of web-based communities? We also propose the development of a software engine that would be able to develop appropriate content/information for web-based communities using the DER mechanism.

Keywords: digital educational repository; DER; web based communities; learning objects; e-learning; electronic learning; online learning.

DOI: 10.1504/IJWBC.2006.011759

International Journal of Web Based Communities, 2006 Vol.2 No.3, pp.273 - 284

Published online: 20 Dec 2006 *

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