Stellar is MIT’s
learning management system that supports teaching and learning across the
Institute. In use since September 2001, Stellar provides an easy way for
faculty and teaching assistants to organize class materials for students,
handle homework assignments, and engage students in discussion using the
Web.
The O.K.I. Role
The Open Knowledge Initiative and the Stellar development
team began work simultaneously in 2001. Stellar, along with Stanford's
Coursework, served as a prototype to help O.K.I. better understand the
requirements for educational technology.
Under the auspices of the Academic Media Production Services
group, the Stellar team is preparing Stellar 1.5 to use a number of Service
Interface Definitions: authentication, authorization, DB connectivity,
filing, and logging. Stellar source code will be available under an open
source license as an example of a working learning management system that
uses O.K.I. Service Interface Definitions.
