MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA, July 31, 2014 — Pearson today announced the upcoming release of EQUELLA 6.3, the latest version of its award winning digital repository. EQUELLA 6.3 will be showcased at NAVIGATE 2014, the fifth International EQUELLA User Conference, in Melbourne from September 4 – 5, with the official release due soon after the event.
EQUELLA 6.3 will extend the user experience with cloud service integration support, embedded metadata extraction, gallery view, integration screen enhancements, additional REST services and Canvas® LMS integration.
EQUELLA enables educators and students within a wide range of schools, universities, colleges, TAFEs, departments of education, corporations and RTOs around the world to effectively discover, manage and deliver engaging course content to improve learning outcomes. Extending EQUELLA, the upcoming release introduces new capabilities for cloud services that enable the storage of
Open Educational Resources (OER) content on the cloud, with the ability for locally installed EQUELLA instances to search and consume OER content within integrated LMSes.
Users will be able to search for OER cloud content from the integration screen, locate the most relevant content for their learners, and publish this into their course, the same way they would contribute standard EQUELLA content.
EQUELLA 6.3’s gallery view presents users with the opportunity to build a media gallery that displays search results with image attachments in a graphical, grid display. The new functionality for embedded metadata supports standards that provide information often embedded in photographs, such as the time taken, location, aperture used and other details.
This feature allows users to import and display this metadata as well as custom tagging in image files from cameras and phones.
Simon Wilkinson, EQUELLA Director of Product Management, Pearson said: “EQUELLA 6.3 will enable content to be delivered ubiquitously and at scale, meeting the diverse requirements of our growing global EQUELLA community. “A key aim of our latest release is to provide a complete solution for clients requiring a stable, scalable cloud-based content solution alongside a rich configurable content system, locally installed.”
Other key feature enhancements include:
- New integration with emerging Canvas® LMS responds to the need for clients to access a unified, validated and supported integration. Built to seamlessly utilize the EQUELLA integration experience, this solution makes use of LTI as the key technical bridge in the integration
- Increasing the usability of the EQUELLA integration screens with a new, more intuitive resource selection user interface and the addition of Save and Share Search functionality. Delivering seamless LMS integrations supports the efficient development of course content for learner consumption with tools users require during the full integration experience
- The expansion of the available REST services that EQUELLA supports. These services include service parity (SOAP – REST) and will provide a migration path for institutions utilizing SOAP specifications, copyright/activations, user experience and cloud
- Requested changes to the CAL module, including the option to set the Part VB percentage, override functionality at the time of activation, improvements to the Course search on the Activation page, activation information stored in the item’s xml, rollover enhancements as well as other improvements
- In support of the ongoing commitment to the requirements of the EQUELLA user community, EQUELLA 6.3 also includes these additional feature requests: Ability to reorder attachments on the Resource summary page and a new function whereby specific attachments can be marked as ‘restricted’ and only suitably privileged users can view those attachments.
For more information about EQUELLA®, visit www.equella.com.
About Pearson
1. Pearson is the world’s leading learning company. Our education business combines 150 years of experience in publishing with the latest learning technology and online support. We provide education and assessment services in more than 70 countries. Our courses and resources are available in print, online and through multi-lingual packages, helping people learn whatever, wherever and however they choose.
2. EQUELLA has more than 150 global entities as users, including a collection of state or province deployments within the US: Florida, North Carolina, Utah, Kentucky; Canada: British Columbia; Australia: New South Wales, Tasmania, and Queensland; and also across Northern Ireland and Turkey.
