SCORM authoring tool advice

I've only recently heard of SCORM and i've been asked to put together a simple e-learning module which can be deployed as a SCORM module. The module is a questionnaire with an additional bank of information (possibly laid out wiki-style). I've just looked at some of the open source tools eXe and xerte and both look quite good.

What I'm not sure about is the limitations of using these tools. I want to be able to fully style all aspects of the template and add javascript tooltips etc, and possibly use ajax to load in each section of the quiz. However, I guess if i'm using ajax, then i'm using server side code, which then limits the module to a specific platform.

Are these things possible using one of these authoring systems? I'm trying to get my head round the possible restrictions. How do these tools 开发者_Go百科handle data storage such as quiz scores per user?

Grateful for any advice!

You have a lot of control over the style and design of a SCORM course. Internally, we run the range of courses that are entirely HTML/JavaScript, Flash/JavaScript and even courses in Java. The authoring tools differ greatly too in the output they produce. Most free ones will produce HTML output. Several of the pay ones like Articulate and Smartbuilder produce Flash content. Regardless of the design or authoring tools that are used, a SCORM course has to communicate to the LMS using a JavaScript API. So at some point the course will have to have some JavaScript so stick to technologies that work well with JavaScript.

I can not recommend enough using a precanned authoring tool. Writing a SCORM course from scratch will involve a lot of work. Your customer may not define their needs well and you may target SCORM 2004 only to find they actually need SCORM 1.2. With an authoring tool that is as simple as changing the publishing settings in a drop down. For a self authored course, that could be a lot of rescripting and debugging.

Most authoring tools have some type of quiz/assessment authoring that allow you to control scoring, tracking and setup question pools.

I would stay away from AJAX as that can break the "Shareable" part of Shareable Content Object if the course is deployed in a firewalled intranent. But I would not stay away from AJAX if your client needs a secure assessment. To make a course shareable, all the content is included in the package including all the answers. Although usually obscured using some method they are still transfered down to the client browser where someone with enough know how can view the source files or use Flash decompilers.

As far as the SCORM 2004 properties around quizes, most authoring tools will use the cmi.interaction data elements to store each interaction a learner performs. That usually includes a unique ID for the interaction, timestamp, description, correct response and what the learner responded. There are more properties that can be set but those are the most common ones I see used. There is also a set of scoring properties in cmi.scaled_passing_score which is the required score to demonstrate mastery of a SCO and cmi.score where you can set the learners raw, min and max scores. Again, the nice thing about an authoring tool is all that is wired up for you when you publish.

There are several testing tools you can use. ADL has their conformance testers that will allow you to see the data passed between the course and the LMS and scorm.com has their Test Track software that you can test the course and see the results. Both are useful for final testing and debugging of a course.