Through Blackboard’s documentation and website I was able to test out their new Mobile app (Mobile Learn) which was provided to all licensees for testing (Blackboard also provided free iPads for testing purposes).  The app was released in June, was supported on Android and iOS (both iPad and iTouch/iPhone).  The apps renders Bb on the iPhone and Android using a similar approach to the apps we’ve seen for Mobile Moodle so far, but with the iPad they made a huge shift.

Honestly, the iPad app is one of the most innovative approaches and retooled mobile apps I’ve seen for an existing LMS.  It’s hardly resembles the student experience online, instead providing a robust level of Blackboard’s collaborative tools through the app.  There are downsides too (no test taking, which in my opinion is one of the most important and must have functions of a mobile app); but even the video demo got me excited about trying out the app:

Now, there’s a flurry of activity surrounding the development of Moodle Mobile (http://www.moodlenews.com/tag/mobile-moodle/) and it’s all positive (the more apps in development, the better off the community will be; but Blackboard has the advantage of concentrated effort).

The apps under development for Moodle all have a generally similar look and feel (which is not a bad thing), but there is a developer that’s thought quite outside the box for their organization specific iPhone/iPad app which pulls data from the Moodle quiz module: http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/unio-pagesos-cuestionarios/id346456267?mt=8#.  According to the translated app site [translate.google.com],

Farmers Union uses Moodle as a tool for managing your online training. Thanks to an amendment to the authentication plugin, the iPhone/iPod can directly access the campus, and through export of the questionnaires as these are displayed on the iPhone/iPod.

The user can respond to the questionnaires, see the photos and videos associated and know their score.  Scores are calculated and stored directly in Moodle.

It’s a pretty far cry from the current Mobile Moodle apps, but it’s the kind of development and out-of-the-box thinking needed to differentiate the Moodle app from just a mobile rendering with a similar look and feel to Moodle on a compute screen.

In my opinion, the Blackboard apps matter to Moodle because Blackboard has the lead.  In other aspects of development, Moodle has outpaced Blackboard in terms of flexibility, community building and ease of use (not to mention providing an outlet for 1000s of other capabilities through 3rd party plug-ins).  Mobile though could prove to differentiate LMSs very soon as it becomes more and more of a necessary feature for schools and teachers world wide.  Though cost prohibitive to some, the availability of a polished Mobile application (compatible with the various mobile OS’s) may be a deciding factor as licenses come up for renewal in the coming years.

The obstacle is harder yet to overcome due to the decentralization of development efforts.  Maybe Moodle.org will step to the plate.

What do you think?

Check out the presentation embedded or by the link below:

The presentation covers the history of the project and their focus going forward.  It’s roots are in mobile health coordination and education efforts in rural country settings.  But it’s blossomed into a highly anticipated iPhone and Android application.

No date on when the app will be publicly available has surfaced yet, but perhaps this presentation will mark and important milestone signifying it’s impending release.  Try it out by pointing your mobile browser at http://iphone.moodle.com.au.

For more information:

• Post from Ignatia Webs: http://ignatiawebs.blogspot.com/2010/05/mlearncon-2010-in-san-diego-with-mobile.html
• More Moodle News about Moodle4iPhone: http://www.moodlenews.com/tag/moodle4iphone/

From the presentation’s page at the mLearn Con website,

This session will describe the pilot phase in which physicians located in 20 urban and peripheral Peruvian HIV clinics use ten Nokia N95s and ten iPhones equipped with portable solar chargers. The mobile phone system distributes critical reading, module revision, and suggested reading along with the clinical modules’ discussion. Though the mobile educational platform, MLE Moodle, originally supported the learning events and tracked students’ progress, during the mid-term evaluation, the physicians expressed their difficulties in using it. Taking into account their opinions, and after assessing the existing Mobile moodles, IMTAvH decided to develop their own mobile Moodle system. You will see the software they created that solves all the difficulties that the physicians had. They hope to launch this open-source mobile version during the conference.

If you happen to be in SoCal this June, mLearn Con and the Moodle4iPhone presentation would be a great addition to your summer plans.

Related:

• For more information about mLearn Con 2010 click this link: http://goo.gl/4OmS.
• More Moodle4iPhone coverage on Moodle News: http://www.moodlenews.com/tag/moodle4iphone/

Native:

Native apps are downloaded onto your phone from an app store (a great example is MoodleTouch).

Web:

Web apps are additions to your Moodle code base (sometimes to the theme) which allow a better Moodle experience when you’re accessing the site using a mobile handset.  The Moodle4iPhone, which is under development, is a modification made to the Moodle server, putting it in the web app category; as is the MLE: http://mle.sourceforge.net/.

Which type of app is better could be argued, both provide benefits to end-users respectively.

MPage has both a native and web component.  A Mobile folder must be added to a Moodle install for it to function fully, meanwhile users must download mPage from the Apple App Store to then access their Moodle site using mPage.  So why this approach?  It’s clear from the mPage repository page that this hybrid approach is optimized for speed.

mPage can
-communicate with its own web service to request only the data it needs. As a result, the data transferred between the iPhone or iPod Touch device and the Moodle server will be significantly reduced as compared to other app available or web browsers.
-retrieve the descriptions of the various modules and activities, as well as the contents of many of them. This way, when the user explores the course, he’s not impeded by “Loading” screens at every turn (common with other methods).
-transfer more data in less bandwidth, which leads to not only faster loading times, but fewer of them.

By cherry picking only the information it needs to serve to mobile users pages are delivered faster to phones, a very definite positive.

The files necessary for modification to your Moodle install are now available at Moodle.org in the plug-ins and modules repository http://moodle.org/mod/data/view.php?d=13&rid=3806; while the app is download-able on any iPhone or iPod Touch: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mpage/id369809342?mt=8.

What do you think, is native better than web or vice versa?  Who has the best app available to date?

Here’s one more

Pretty slick.  V1.1 of mTouch has not yet been released (but it was submitted to the app store at the end of last week).

Check out all the theme options at http://www.pragmasql.com/home/moodletouch/themesamples.aspx.

Related:

• MoodleTouch on MoodleMonthly: http://www.moodlemonthly.com/?s=moodletouch

The videos are about a minute and showcase the mobile layout and navigation for mTouch users.  It’s a pretty cool representation of what can be done using mTouch (note: here’s a link to the feature list for the mTouch which highlights exactly what the app is capable of, http://www.pragmasql.com/home/moodletouch/moodletouch-features.aspx).

Here’s a direct link to the video on Youtube.com:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JjE_2o_ov4

We’ll be notifying the winners of the free downloads of mTouch this week.  Anyone else out there using it already?

I wrote an article on the relevance and importance of Moodle Mobile over at Opensource.com (http://opensource.com/education/10/4/can-you-moodle-me-now).  In it, I outline two projects that have come into the lime light over the past few months and the general benefits to the community that their work might usher in.  I want to reiterate the importance of a Moodle mobile initiative and how it will help Moodle grow and prosper in the future.  In a few years, access to websites via mobile will be a default capability.  Android, Win7 Mobile, iPhone OS and other players may all end up being the majority of traffic to our sites of learning, commerce and information.

A short term benefit of these projects is publicity and exposure for Moodle.  While we wait for a Moodle2.0 release, Moodle Mobile has provided the community with a stop-gap raison d’etre. Though access by mobile may not be perfected for years, the future viability of its ubiquitous adoption is shored by the fact that there are multiple projects working collaboratively, simultaneously and sharing their progress publicly.

That being said, the longterm effects of Moodle mobile will have a substantial community, financial and developmental effect on the Moodle economy.

Mobile Community

The community will benefit from exposure to millions of additional users, who otherwise may not have even been considering Moodle, will find another “pro” in their list of pros and cons for possible learning management systems.  Perhaps rural countries and communities with better cell coverage than internet will leap frog to a mobile implementation in general.  Africa, with it’s savvy and growing mobile community comes to mind specifically¹.

Mobile Finance

In terms of straight dollars and cents (or pounds and pence) we could see a strictly mobile Moodle partner establish itself, contributing money and code to Moodle HQ.  This isn’t to mention the possible book titles (who’s going to write Designing Moodle for Mobile Use: A Guide), custom themes, freelance and contracted Moodle mobile theme installations, native apps created or other custom work.  The question isn’t “will Moodle mobile create jobs?” it’s “how many?”².

Mobile Code

In my article over at Opensource.com I argue that development will be profoundly affected by the introduction of mobile.  In a quick survey running at MoodleMonthly currently, over 50% of respondents say “yes” to the question “Now that Mobile access is available for Moodle sites, will that change how you construct your courses?”.  We might quickly find a movement to make mobile course construction easier and faster (I hope so).  In general we might find teachers trimming the use of features that don’t work for mobile, simplifying their course structures to ensure that all students have equal access and opportunities.

What about new modules specifically designed for mobile use?  SMS, better live chat, photo upload from mobile cameras, voice recording as an activity….  What other mobile modules might you want for your students?

Conclusion

In a few years looking back I hope we’ll recognize this as a significant event in the long history of Moodle.  There are a great many possibilities and if only part of the community’s vision for Moodle mobile is realized it will be great news for education.

¹http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_39/b4051054.htm

²http://opensource.com/education/10/2/moodle-driving-jobs-education

The app is $2.99 for download and can be used by the end user to connect to any pre-Moodle 2.0 installation.  The app looks very much like our original screen shots.

As an additional option, organizations and schools with Moodle sites can contract their own branded mTouch app by contacting PragmaTouch (http://www.pragmasql.com/home/moodletouch/custombranding.aspx).  Custom branding cost as low as $1 per student.

One option for custom branding is that organizations can use their custom branded mTouch app to create their own revenue stream through the app store,

Providing free custom mTouch is not the only option, institutions can also sell their custom branded mTouch on the AppStore. In this case institutions will have to manage their own AppStore account. PragmaTouch will only provide the ipa of the custom branded mTouch.

In any event, it’s a great day for Moodle Mobile.  Don’t forget you can “try it before you buy it” by downloading the Windows demo from http://moodletouch.com.  Tell us what you think: too expensive? too cheap? will your students buy it? will your organization buy it?

I’m wondering if it’s possible to track which of my students access my Moodle site from a computer and which of them access it from their cell phone via the mobile interface?  Any ideas?

Short answer is no. At least not in Moodle. Because you are accessing a standard Moodle site, it doesn’t know the difference. You could however check the apache logs or use a tool like google analytics to find out.

Adding Google Analytics is good form on all sites, so talk to your Admin or Server Admin to see if you can get Analytics set up on the site (easy to do and in 24 hours you’ll be collecting a great deal of information about your site traffic).  Here’s a really informative Moodle.org discussion about adding the tracking code to an existing site: http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=86223.

Ali Özgür submitted this response in regards to the MoodleTouch.com native iPhone app (available soon):

MoodleTouch sends all of the requests with User-Agent header set to “Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; en-us) MoodleTouch”. So on the server side Moodle admins can inspect logs and calculate MoodleTouch statistics. On the other hand if they want to know which students use MoodleTouch this requires a little bit of work on our side but more work on the institutions site. In this case they will have to provide a service for us (another option is we can develop a custom SOAP service for them) so that we can write who uses MoodleTouch. Yet another possibility is to enhance Moodle so that Moodle collects login statistics so that MoodleTouch can post UserAgent data directly to Moodle.

Thanks to both Ali and Julian for submitting our first ever “Mr. Moodle Answers”.

Check back for more, and to ask your own question just click here.

On the Symbian (More pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/carlos.kiyan/Moodle4iPhoneNokiaN97Symbian#):

Here’s a quick video of the app running on the HTC G1: