Using CCB 102

General Information

There is instructional material on-line from a captured presentation on how to use Classroom 2000 and room 102. You can view it here. Select the "Tutorial on ECLASS" presentation.

• If you have any problems during class, use the phone at the back of the room and call 4-1077 or 4-7512.
• To use the SGI machine, you need a special account. Talk to Gregory or Irfan for more information.
• The WinNT machine in the front of class is not for general use. It is dedicated to Classroom 2000 activities.
• Please DO NOT install any software on the liveboard or the Win95 machine without prior permission from Gregory or Jason (abowd@cc.gatech.edu, brothert@cc.gatech.edu). Please un-install any software you do install when finished using it.
• Please DO NOT turn off the liveboard. You may do a soft-reset (CTRL-ALT-DELETE) if necessary.
• Please DO turn off the liveboard LAMP when finished along with the projectors.

Welcome to CC 102. This room is equipped with many technical enhancements designed to make your teaching experience more satisfying. To begin, we will present some pictures of the room and define the terminology used in this manual. Next, we will describe how to use the equipment in this room. Finally, we will introduce Classroom 2000 and what you need to know to use it in your classes.

Using the Projectors

If you want to play a tape on the VCR, or project the display from the MAC, SGI, Win95 machines, or your own laptop, you will need to use the projectors. There is one remote for both projectors, usually kept in the Audio Mixer Rack or somewhere in the front of the room.
To turn on a projector, aim the remote at the projector lens and press the Yellow button once. To turn off the projector, aim the remote at the projector lens and press the Yellow button twice.

If you have problems getting the remote to control the projectors, it is possible that the batteries are dead. Replacement batteries can be found on top of the Audio Mixer Rack in the front of the room. To play a VCR tape or display a laptop, you'll need to change the input source on the projector. To do this, press either "MODE" button on the remote repeatedly until the projector indicates that it is set to video 1 or computer 1 depending on your needs.

Playing a Tape in the VCR

To play a VCR tape, turn on projector B as described above. The VCR player is at the top of the stack of VCRs. You can put a tape inside and play. Make sure that the TUNER is set to VIDEO. The video image will come from Projector B You will have to make sure the projector is on, and the input source is set to video 1. If you don't have any sound, be sure the TUNER is set to VIDEO and the tuner volume is not turned down all the way.

Using the Macintosh or SGI

To use either machine, turn on projector A as described above. The MAC is projected by default, so if you want to project the SGI, you will need to swap the VGA cable that goes from the wall outlet to the proper distribution box behind the machine. Please be sure to replace the cable so that the MAC is the default machine when finished.

Using the Win95 machine or a Laptop

The NT machine is not for general use and cannot be projected. To use the Win95 machine, turn on projector B as described above.

To use your own laptop, you can plug it into a wall socket for either projected located in the front of the room. Please replace any cables you change when finished.

Using Classroom 2000

Classroom 2000 offers instructors the opportunity to capture their lectures for replay by students. We currently capture slides presented as well as any annotations on them, audio, video, and Web pages visited during class.

We've tried to automate most everything, but there are still some things you need to be aware of. Users of Classroom 2000 will fall into one of two main types of users.

• those who write notes on a blank whiteboard
• those who write notes on top of prepared slides

In addition, Classroom 2000 allows instructors to

• capture Web pages
• display "extended whiteboards" of previous slides

Regardless of how the system is used, the presenation is the same. Students will go to a single URL (automatically generated) that will be a table of contents for your lectures as you record them. The URL to point to is linked off of:

The LiveBoard

When using Classroom 2000, you will be running a program called ZenPad. All of your notes will be written on the LiveBoard instead of a traditional whiteboard.

To turn on the LiveBoard, press and hold for two seconds the Lamp button on the front left panel. To turn off the LiveBoard, repeat the procedure.

To start up ZenPad, double-click the ZenPad icon on the LiveBoard desktop.

Using Classroom 2000 with Blank Slides

1. Turn on the liveboard by pressing and holding for two seconds the "lamp" button on the front left panel.

2. Make sure that the NT and 95 machines are running a program that automatically records the audio and video for your classes. These are the two machines next to the big audio cabinet.

   You should see a DOS window running with the title "Java" (don't worry about any messages the window might contain) If you don't see this window on the screen, check to see if it is on the Win95 task bar. If it is not there, then you can assume it is not running) and you should launch it. The correct program to launch is labelled 'ZenCoder' on the desktop. Double-click on the icon labelled 'ZenCoder' on the desktop to start up the audio encoder on that machine.

   How do you know audio encoding is working? After the lecturer presses the 'record lecture' in ZenPad on the Liveboard (see below), the DOS window should say that it is recording Audio or Video for your class. If you don't see that message, it's not recording! When finished with class, the audio and video files will automatically be uploaded and a message to that affect will be echoed to the DOS window.

   *** THE NT MACHINE IS LOCKED - YOU DON'T NEED TO WORRY ABOUT IT

   The program should *ALWAYS* be running, but alas, some people like to muck with the computer.

3. Double-click the ZenPad icon on the Liveboard. ZenPad should correctly predict your class. From this point, just type in a title for the lecture and your username and password, which is (for most people) your lastname for both.

   After clicking on the "Start Lecture" button, you'll see a blank whiteboard. Pick up a pen and start writing by pressing the pen tip to the surface of the liveboard. On the left you'll see buttons for scrolling up and down and changing the pen color and thickness.

   To erase, press and hold the wide back button on the pen while drawing over the strokes to be erased.

4. When done, exit ZenPad by clicking on the "x" in the upper right corner of any windows. Be sure to close the main electronic whiteboard window (which will have the name of the lecture title) and also the window labelled ZenPad which was the window used to start the recording of the class.

5. Your (referring to the lecturer here) username and password for viewing the online notes (which are created automatically for you) is also your lastname for both.

Using Classroom 2000 with Prepared Slides

UPDATE: It's easier to just use a utility called Transfermation to upload your powerpoint slides. More info can be found at here (installation manual) and here (user guide).

1. Prepare your notes in any presentation package.

2. Save your slides as .gif with the following naming convention: Slide1.GIF, Slide2.GIF, Slide3.GIF, etc...

   Currently, our system assumes the GIF images are a particular resolution range. Make your GIF images as close to 1000 x 700 and they will work fine. Larger resolution will likely result in clipping and lower resolutions will result in your slides covering only a portion of the upper left corner of the whiteboard. If you use PowerPoint slides, save them using the 'File | Save As' option and save them as .GIF. Making the page size in landscape orientation 10inches by 7.25 inches will result in GIFs of the correct size most of the time. Easy enough to do. But if need help, don't be afraid to ask Gregory Abowd. for assistance.

3. Place all the .GIF images in a location served by an FTP server From any browser, load up ZenPad main page, bypassing any predicted classes by pressing the "expert menu" if needed. (http://eclass.cc.gatech.edu/zenpad)

   If you have problems getting ZenPad to run on your machine, make sure that your browser supports Java 1.1 applets. For versions of Netscape 4.05 and earlier, you can obtain the AWT upgrade from Netscape to enable your browser to run ZenPad. Laptops running NT currently are having problems with Netscape and ZenPad.

4. Once at the expert menu, create your lecture by selecting the course using the class quarter and year pull down menus. You only need to select the class. Next, select the date the lecture will be given, and give a title.

   Check the "FTP Slides" check box before creating the lecture. This brings up a simplified FTP dialog box similar to most FTP clients. Traverse by clicking to the directory where you placed your .GIF images. When you see your .GIF images in the bottom portion of the right window pane click on the 'FTP All GIFs' button. This FTP client is very primitive- please be patient and don't go double clicking willy nilly. You can't jump do a directory, only traverse the directory tree structure.

   ZenPad is smarter about the naming convention, so you shouldn't have to rename your gif files. You can use 'slide' or 'page' as the image prefix.

   As we mentioned above, Zen* is entirely Java 1.1.5. You may need to update your browser to run it on your personal machine.

5. You can press the "view lecture" button to view your lecture and check out how your slides look. When you go to class, process as in Section A. When your class is predicted automatically, you should already see a title for the lecture that you provided when you created the lecture and FTP'ed the slides into the system.

Capturing Web Pages

To capture Web browsing activity, you MUST be running ZenPad. If in room 102, you can surf using the LIveboard, the 95 machine, or the MAC. If in 101, you can use either the liveboard or the NT machine.

You'll need to turn on a projector if you use the MAC or Win 95 machines as described above.

Simply surfing to a URL will log its occurrence in the class. By default, a Web page visited for 30 seconds or longer in class will be displayed in the timeline of the captured notes for students to see. That time value can be changed, upon request.

Note to potential power users: We are using a modified proxy server to do the URL logging. If you want to do a lot of surfing for one class, we recommend viewing the URLS before class (perhaps the night before) through some browser that points to the proxy server (fce.cc.gatech.edu, port 8080). Ask us if you have questions.

Using ZenViewer to Extend the WhiteBoard Size

A nice feature of the system is using the 95 machine to display previous slides, effectively doubling the size of the electronic whiteboard. To do this, double click on the "ZenViewer" icon on the Win95 or Mac desktop. (Make sure the projector for the machine is on, as described above) Select the type of extended whiteboard you want. Popular choices are:

• previous slide (default)
• overview (2x2 default)

It is possible to use ZenViewer on the Mac as well. To do that, open up the Internet Explorer icon on the desktop and proceed as above. If you use more than one ZenViewer, we recommend that you launch the one on the Win95 machine first and then the Mac.

Miscellaneous

• Room 101 doesn't support audio or video recording. Stay tuned. Our plans are to upgrade the room in the first half of 1999 and then move on to room 201 in the College of Computing.

• Please don't adjust the volume controls on the mixer! The mixer drives the audio levels for two PCs and a VCR. Changing it screws up at least three other devices. If needed, adjust volume controls on the PCs. (Of course, you can press the 'mute' button on the mixer if you desire, but be sure to un-mute it when done!)

• Audio quality is much better when the instructor uses the wireless lapel mic located in the Audio Mixer Cabinet. To use this, turn the wireless unit to ON (it should be turned OFF in the cabinet). A red light burning brightly indicates the batteries are OK. If the light is dim or does not come on, then replace the 9-volt battery by picking a new one off the top of the Audio Mixer Cabinet. Place the mic as high up on your shirt/sweater as possible to ensure good pickup.
• The X-server is no longer available on the LiveBoard. If you really need to run X, then we suggest using the SGI, called cyberone.cc.gatech.edu. Contact help@cc.gatech.edu to request an account on that machine for classroom use.

• C2000 icon on the LiveBoard provides telnetand ftputilities.

• Please let us know if you are intending to use C2000 in some way this quarter so that we know how big our user population is.

• Use of C2000 is voluntary, both on the part of instructors and students. If at any point, you feel you are not being served adequately by the system or by us, then you can feel free to stop using the system and no feelings will be hurt.

• This is a research prototype, and not a commercial product. We have problems at times, sometimes due to problems in the software we have written and sometimes due to things we cannot control. We ask your patience.

• To help serve you better, we need your help. We would like to train your TAs to help set up and shut down the system. I will also attempt to assign a separate student to your class so that you have someone there to help when problems come up. Problems do arise and many times there are very simple fixes.

• Students need to see how the notes work in order to feel comfortable with them. We urge you to show them the notes in class as soon as you are comfortable with them. We can help with this, if you would like.

• We rely on your feedback and on student feedback, so don't hesitate to tell us how to improve things. There are always new things we are trying to do with the system and your input helps us define those new or better capabilities. At the end of the quarter, we ask that you have your students fill out a short (25 question) survey on their use of the system that will help our research.

Known Problems

1. If the pen does not track properly, it might need recalibrated. Using the mouse, open up the c2000 folder on the desktop and select the Pen Calibration icon from within that folder. The program shows that it is using a calibration file "calibra tXGA.dat" even though it really isn't. We trick the system into thinking we selected a new file by clicking on "Use file in" The system automatically selects the proper file in the ensuing dialog box, all you have to do is click ok. Now, click on the verify tracking button to reset the tracking, and then ok when finished.
2. While in Netscape, a URL is selected (highlighted), yet it is impossible to change the URL, and it is constantly selected (there is an effect of a blinking screen). The problem stems from Netscape trying to guess the URL to which we want to go, and the Microsoft pen utility. To overcome this problem, use either mouse or keyboard, select File->Open Location. Enter the URL you want to go to.