Comments on: Apple iPad Disappoints eLearning Industry

By: Alexandre Enkerli

Alexandre Enkerli — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 21:31:25 +0000

Coming even later to the party, thinking about the move towards HTML5 in eLearning. Given Apple’s push towards HTML5 widgets in iBooks2 (and the fact that Adobe abandoned mobile Flash, as reported in another post), there might be growing interest in learning objects which can be converted to HTML5. Never tried Adobe Captivate, but it sounds like its move toward HTML5 is even more assertive than for other Adobe properties.
So, I know this is an old thread and it may sound slightly off-topic at this point but… What about the future of HTML5 learning objects given the iPad’s growing presence in educational contexts and Apple’s iBooks textbooks?

By: Martín Pacheco » Blackberry Playbook: mejor que el iPad?

Martín Pacheco » Blackberry Playbook: mejor que el iPad? — Sun, 24 Oct 2010 02:14:17 +0000

[...] iPad (que a pesar del ranking en sus ventas, aún existe gente que piensa que no es otra cosa que una copia en grande del iPhone). El Playbook viene con una cámara, un procesador rápido (QNX) que permite realizar verdaderas [...]

By: Is the Blackberry Playbook just a watermelon? or a serious iPad beater?

Is the Blackberry Playbook just a watermelon? or a serious iPad beater? — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 11:29:11 +0000

[...] Amit Gautam on upsidelearning.com.O.K. true, true, [...]

By: BJ Checket

BJ Checket — Thu, 15 Apr 2010 00:57:51 +0000

I’m coming late to this party but at the same time, much is yet to be written about the topic of Apple and Flash, particularly as it impacts the learning community. And this article struck a real chord with me…
http://iansamuel.com/essays/progress-of-the-platform/
…for two reasons: 1) it’s deeply insightful about the reasons for the changes and 2) While I know that Apple is thinking about dollars and cents, they are also a company with a very long history of thinking of the users and of the user experience and that’s what I want to aspire to as a developer of e-learning, m-learning or any other kind of learning with a letter in front of it.
And while I’m thinking of it, for terrific insight into Apple and the decisions it makes, read nearly anything written by John Gruber at his exceptional site Daringfireball.net.
Finally, by now everyone will have heard of the new iPhone OS 4.0 SDK developer agreement which includes the very contentious section 3.1 which prohibits the development of apps using “an intermediary translation or compatibility layer tool.” In other words, “No Flash, no way, no how.”
I am very much looking to join a community of learning developers who are willing to share their thoughts about what and how we will develop in a post-flash world, or at least a world in which we can only trust Flash to run successfully in the terrarium-like environments of corporate America.

By: Abdulrahman Alzahrani

Abdulrahman Alzahrani — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 05:50:04 +0000

Reasonable. However, iPad might provide a great help to many people especially learners. The way that many learners use their mobile devices or notebooks does a great job in their learning process from emails, forums, or blogs, iPad can do maybe a better job as well. People are attracted to any type of technology and iPad is one of the most attractive ones that many people are looking forward to get. Now, with the great technology that Gmail has for documents, learners can store their won text files there and access them from anywhere without the need of the MS to be installed in the iPad. Moreover, as the technology is getting sophisticated in the cloud, Drpbox has a great free service for public so that learners can store their own files in the cloud and access them later on, without the need of an extra capacity of the internal memory of the iPad. To sum up, I’m totally agree that the Flash support is something important to be available in such devices but, in my opinion, iPad is a nice bigger mobile device.

By: Akshay

Akshay — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 13:42:29 +0000

Hey Buddy

I think if you can use the apple development kit to develop learning modules, it could be a very successful idea. Apple always has a thing for having propriety content and hence flash may never make it to apple. There are some nice educational applications you can have for apple but the IPAD can never be used as a generic learning device like the computer. It will always have to go through Apple and the training will have to be made for IPODs and IPADs.

Thats their business strategy and it seems to be working well if you look at the number of applications on the app store. Many prominent game companies have started making games for IPOD/PHONE/PAD and it may not be far when e-learning companies also have a small apple centric division. Companies like Sun have gifted IPODs to consultants and sales to push mobile learning on their PODs. Next step is to create apple specific content for them.

By: Tim Fernando

Tim Fernando — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 18:24:32 +0000

Apologies for being brief and perhaps not reading all of the comments above, but my two cents:
1. Flash is not a good thing for the web – proprietary code for a system that is entirely dependant on one company is not good. And is an example of why there is this discussion in the first place – using open techs stops this ridiculous dependancy.
2. As with all Apple products, mk2 is always far more impressive. Despite that, I reckon the current iteration with sell markedly well in the UK. The price point, although higher than a Netbook is not high enough to be considered a very high value item. The key uses apply to the average user much more than it does to an IT professional.
3. The Camera – Sorry, AR is getting a lot of press but it’s still not massively compelling outside of niche uses e.g. finding out the name of a building and related info.
AR on a 10″ platform is frankly silly as the technology stands as it’s simply not practical.
Saying that, I’d love to use it as a video conferencing platform – and suspect that will come with mk2 (and the next iPhone expected in June).

By: Michael Withrow

Michael Withrow — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 15:05:16 +0000

I think that “touch” is a key component of the future of computer interfaces in general and with that said, iPhones and iPads show great promise for e-learning, and particularly mobile learning. E-learning is a very small niche in the greater ecosystem of technology and will not be enough to save Flash if it doesn’t evolve to meet the current movement in web trends. I came across a few articles of interest on the future of Flash:
http://scobleizer.com/2010/01/30/can-flash-be-saved/
http://scobleizer.com/2010/01/30/google-will-save-flash-a-developer-who-uses-it-says/

By: Amit Gautam

Amit Gautam — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 08:58:15 +0000

@Dave : thanks for sharing useful info on Flash/HTML5 and also possible reasons of Apple not going for Flash in iPad. I am not sure if pushing HTML5 would be a ‘key’ objective as it has not really been mentioned in its release or info on website. HTML5 itself is still in nascent stages.

@Simon: thanks for sharing the useful links about Flash. HTML5 definitely holds potential. However as we shared in one of our earlier blog posts on HTML5 and eLearning Development its still a little far from being ‘there’ yet. So Flash is going to be there for quite some time and I am sure it will also keep evolving – they already have FlashLite for mobile devices and it would be optimized further. It would be interesting to see how HTML5 develops (and more importantly how fast). SilverLight also attempted but has not been successful yet in coming near to Flash. All eyes on future…

@Michael: thanks for sharing the link. It was very useful. Yes, people will find workarounds and it would be great!

@Zec: I agree with the potential of apps and the need as well. iPhone is a great phone made greater by ‘there is an app for everything’ approach. iPad is a great platform and will attract numerous apps, I am sure.

@monsterofNone: My post was from eLearning perspective (with more focus on corporate eLearning and not really education only). As I also mentioned in my post that iPad is a great device and has a high relevance for content publishers, etc. It has a great potential in the field of education where players like Kindle are already making a huge difference in children’s lives. However I still strongly feel, from corporate eLearning perspective, that there are things iPad misses which are needed. Also as @Bernard put it, we have still seen a good number of people in eLearning field echoing some of my thoughts and I put reasons for my disappointment as well. If these items are taken care of in iPad2/iPad3 or whenever I have no doubt about iPad being a great tool for eLearning as well. Also, I am really keen to know if you have a blog/website where we can get more info on the apps you mentioned.

@Bernard: thanks for your thoughts. As you mentioned that some bloggers focus on disappointments while others move on to look at the positives – we (at Upside) are doing the same. iPad is here to stay, I feel, and we would love to make use of its potential in whatever ways we can, to add value to what we bring to our customers.

Everyone, thanks for coming out and sharing your thoughts. I have learnt quite a few things from all responses on this post and I appreciate the same. I look forward to more comments about what other views are there for iPad in eLearning.

Cheers!

By: Bernard

Bernard — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 01:59:12 +0000

monstorofNone wrote, “I, and others I know will be developing some incredible eLearning apps for the iPad” Great! Now this is the spirit of elearning that I love. It isn’t about what the leaders think, but about the systematic designs by people like yourself, and whether or not the designs hold water when it comes to actually solving a learning problem or improving student engagement and learning. I look forward to reviewing and potentially making use of those incredible apps that you mentioned. Do you have a blog or site where you will keep us posted about your app development projects?

By: monsterofNone

monsterofNone — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 01:41:28 +0000

Bernard – Good luck with that. I, and others I know will be developing some incredible eLearning apps for the iPad… without the need for Flash or other web based technologies. Flash support (aka Adobe support) is not a deal breaker when a vibrant app store economy will allow developers of eLearning to skip the browser entirely and create applications with real teeth.
But I’m certain your poll of reviewers, analysts and pundits is more reliable. I would stick with them.

By: Bernard

Bernard — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 01:16:29 +0000

monstorofNone – Certainly there are different reviews, but the sentiment in this blog post is widespread in the educational blogosphere over the past several days. I just spent the last few hours reviewing educational bloggers who are writing about the iPad, and out of 50-60, I’ve only found a few that don’t mention many of the disappointments (especially the “no Flash support”) noted by Amit. Some bloggers focus upon the disappointments, while others mention them and move on to the positive attributes on the iPad. Whatever the case, Amit’s posts are definitely good food for thought for anyone who wants to keep teaching and learning in mind, and not simply fall into edtech fashion and letting e-learning be driven by brands and trends more than clear logic, research, and systematic planning. With all due respect to whomever you are working with, the field of e-learning is not about submitting to what the “leaders” think (although you will find that plenty of “leaders” will agree with the criticisms in the blog post above. BTW – In many ways, the “follow the leaders” approach is counter to the entire spirit that has inspired the field of distance learning. E-learning is about doing what is supported by systematic study, clear logic, careful planning, and what will open learning.