Remote Access Labs @ USQ
Mark in TEDI
Here is a recent email from Tony Ahfock at USQ. He outlines some of
the interest they have in iLab-LabView. It may also interest others.
I am planning to meet with him at UQ on Monday Nov 5 at 2 pm. If you
also would like to meet with him, let me know.
Cheers
Mark
From: Tony Ahfock [mailto:ahf...@usq.edu.au]
Sent: Wednesday, 24 October 2007 11:10 AM
To: Mark Schulz
Cc: Len Payne
Subject: RE: Remote Access Laboratories
Hi Mark
Thanks for your response and interest.
I'll attempt to answer your question about what we are looking for.
We are looking at doing a range of "experiments" remotely. A larger
proportion of those will involve laboratory hardware with appropriate
data acquisition and control interface. Labview will most likely be
used for some of those. But for others a PLC/SCADA based control
system will be more appropriate. We are looking at using CITECT
( Industrial SCADA software of Australian origin). A smaller but still
significant proportion of our remote "experiments" will actually be
remote accessing of application software (no laboratory hardware
involved). These will typically be professional versions of software
that we cannot expect our external (distance) students to have access
to. [ More than two thirds of our students study in distance mode].
We have run one course with some remote access content this semester.
We used the Sun Global Desktop (SGD). Our current SGD license limits
us to only 20 concurrent users.
We are now planning a more comprehensive remote access laboratories
infrastructure suitable for 200 concurrent users. We will also have to
include a booking system.
The question that we have to answer is whether we stick with SGD or
adopt iLAB. Brian Kissell, our Chief Technology Officer attended your
iCampus workshop in July. He was impressed with iLAB and is asking us
to give it serious consideration. I wished I had attended your
workshop, but unfortunately it was too late when I came to know about
it.
So far I have concluded that the original batched version of iLAB is
not suitable to us. The newer interactive iLAB looks promising. The
Service Broker facility of iLAB could meet our booking requirements.
So my hope is that, with your assistance and the assistance of others
in your group, I can confirm suitability (or otherwise).
Yes, it would be very helpful for our group to have you here. Thank
you for the offer. Please let me know when a USQ visit will be
suitable for you. Some time in November is suitable to us.
Is it possible for me to come to UQ and have a chat with you and Len
before your Toowomba visit?
Thanks for your time and assistance.
Regards
Tony
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________________________________________
From: Mark Schulz [mailto:m.sc...@uq.edu.au]
Sent: Wednesday, 24 October 2007 10:00 AM
To: Tony Ahfock
Cc: Len Payne; Phillip Long
Subject: RE: Help with UQ Contact Please
Hi Tony,
We have a group of staff and students at UQ looking at remote online
labs. There is a fledgling website on http://icampus.uq.edu.au that
will give some background on all iCampus activities, but iLabs in
particular.
We have a full time engineer working on bringing up new labs, and
another working in part on developing new experiments to run under
iLab. UQ has just purchased a campus license for LabView (which is
well integrated with iLab), so we expect to see the growth of iLab
take off over the next couple of years.
If you give me an idea of what you are looking for, I can come up to
USQ and give a talk on iLab activity - both at UQ and around the
world. Would this be of some interest to you?
You'll see that I have copied Len Payne into this email. He is the
full-time engineer developing iLab code and experiments. I have also
copied Phil Long of MIT as he looks after the world-wide activity with
iLabs.
I look forward to hearing from you in the near future.
Regards
Mark Schulz