TIPS Volume 3, No. 5
January, 2003

     Grade Level Key 
     Suitable for elementary school= Elem, Suitable for middle school= Middle
     Suitable for high school= High, General interest= Teachers

 
The EditorThe Editor's Page
 Technology Applied
Into the Classroom
Connections
Through a Student's Eyes
Assistive Technology
 On Line 
Internet Resources
Literacy on the Web
 Help Resources
Tips from the Pros
Technology Training
Staff Profiles
 Miscellaneous
STLP News
The network is down...
TIPS Archives
Editor: Jeffrey L. Jones,
District Tech Resource Teacher
jjones@fayette.k12.ky.us
This website is intended for the instructional use of students and staff of Fayette County Public Schools.

TIPS Connections

http://www.tappedin.org/

TAPPED IN is an unusual on-line environment. It's a MOO - a tangled bit of acronym obscurity which refers to the fact that it provides multiple users with the ability for each to establish an identity, a "virtual" space, and the ability to interact in a variety of ways with other members. Hence TAPPED IN provides more than simple on-line forums or email discussions, though it is that too. The services are completely free - they require registration with the environment, but as a true non-profit they have a strict privacy policy making that a non-issue. The members cover the entire gamut of education, and are truly international in scope. The original focus was social studies, but no such strict subject allegiance exists now.

Included in the services are the possibility of live "chats" with well-known or heavily-involved names on a variety of subjects. TAPPED IN regularly posts these events in other discussion forums, and maintains their own email distribution list for notices. Many are archived, and available for review. Of course, the environment is available for teachers and other interested persons to establish and monitor their own chats or other interactivity - for classroom use, or simply as a way of connecting with like-minded individuals.

TAPPED IN is financed by SRI (originally Stanford Research Institute, now a separate non-profit), The National Science Foundation, and Sun Microsystems (who provided the computer which runs the system). Be sure to visit and poke around!

.

What's a MOO?
  • a MUD, Object Oriented

That's nice. What's a MUD?

  • Multiple User Dialogue. Weeeell, sorta. A co-designer of the first MUD was Richard Bartle, who offers this caveat: "...The 'D' [actually] stands for 'Dungeon', but not because the original MUD...had a dungeon in it; rather...there was a hacked-up version of Zork doing the rounds at the time, which bore the name 'Dungeon'. We thought that this program would act as the archetype..." (See this FAQ for more.)

Where did all this come from?

  • As is true of many of the advances in general computing, MUDs were first used for games. On-line gaming provides for user identification, interactivity, and graphic representation, three very useful general characteristics of online environments.

One last question: What's "Object Oriented?"

  • Objects are such only in the virtual sense. The term comes from computer programming, where "objects" are passed between program and user, and between users. Objects can be data, they can be the results of a query (the "answer" to a "question" asked by a computer), or even a query itself. The results are an environment which is much more efficient in managing interaction.

 

 Submitted by Joy Buckingham
Joy Buckingham