Moodle 1.9: E-Learning Course Development

This book is a comprehensive guide to Moodle 1.9, covering everything from installing Moodle and creating courses through to in-depth explanations of how Moodle works under the surface. One thing I enjoyed about this book is that it’s not just a collection of step-by-step guides, but it gives detailed information so you understand why you are doing it.
For example, when describing configuration options, it doesn’t just give an overview of what the option is for. Additionally it provides more information on the advantages and disadvantages of using it.

The book is divided into the following chapters:

1. Introduction
This provides information about Moodle and how an overview of how it works

2. Installing and Configuring Moodle
Indepth guide to the Moodle installation process. It includes the standard step by step explanations as well as covering possible complications and areas to watch out for.

3. Configuring Your Site
The administration of Moodle is covered in this chapter as well as information about authentication methods, language options. How to set up the enrolment for a course is covereed here, such as using LDAP, PayPal or Flat Authorize.net etc.

4. Creating Categories and Courses
Basic category and course creation is covered in this chapter.

5. Adding Static Course Material
Uploading files and adding multimedia to courses are some of the topics covered in this chapter. It also covers the markup and the HTML editor.

6. Adding Interactive Course Material
Assignments, Lessons and Quizzes are the main focus of this chapter. The SCORM standard is also covered.

7. Adding Social Course Material
Web 2.0 meets Moodle. This chapter shows how to add Chat, Forums and WIkis to your Moodle course.

8. Welcoming Your Students
The ins and outs of customising the front page of Moodle are thoroughly examined here. Themeing and Front Pages Blocks are covered.

9. Features for Teachers
Reports, Logs annd Grading is covered in this chapter.

10. Extending and Administering Moodle
The more advanced parts of Moodle Administration are covered here, including external Modules, Backup and Roles.

This book covers everything most people need to know about Moodle in a style which is detailed. It can be read as a guide or dipped into when you have problems or questions. If you are thinking about or currently using Moodle this is definitely the book for you.

As you may have read, I was asked to review a new book from Packt on Blender 3D. Blender is an open source 3D modeling application and can be put to an amazing variety of uses, from lifelike images through to Pixar style 3D animation.

This book aims to cover the use of Blender in creating “Incredible Machines” which are described by the author, Allan Brito, as “a kind of machine that doesn’t exist in our world, has amazing capabilities, and has a great sci-fi look”. If you aren’t a sci-fi fan don’t be put off by the description, this book has a lot to offer away from the world of Spaceships and Robots.

…

A very, very minimal knowledge of Blender is assumed and the author provides some information in the introductory chapter for complete beginners. If you have modeled anything in Blender before you should have no trouble at all with this book! Also there is plenty for more experienced Blender users and the book can be used as a quick reference.

The introduction is informative and gives a basic outline of the aims of this book which is aimed at those who want to produce pictures, 3D models or videos of mechanical objects. The book will also help Blender artists looking to integrate YafaRay and LuxRender into their workflow.

The book is split into three sections, each detailing a separate project from start to finish. The projects increase in complexity as the book progresses and every new tool or concept is thoroughly explained as needed.

The first project is to model a handgun and a basic overview of the different modeling techniques is given. The author gives a very good introduction to polygon modeling and the step by step examples are easy to follow. I must make one criticism at this stage, the book itself is excellent quality however the pictures are a bit on the dark side. Even so, it did not cause a problem for me when reading through the book and I think it is a minor issue.

After going through the modeling process there is a good introduction to the Yafaray rendering engine and how to set up a studio environment in Blender. Basic lighting and materials are also covered at this stage.

Upon rendering an image of the handgun we then move on to the Steampunk Spaceship. After explaining what Steampunk means for those who, like me, didn’t know, this project takes the basic skills from the first project and uses them in a bigger project, explaining and introducing new methods and concepts as needed. UV mapping is explained in detail and there is a chapter on creating flares and plasma rays with Blender Particles. After this more advanced rendering with Yafaray is covered.

The final project introduces LuxRender and a spot of animation with the Transforming Robot! Subdivision modeling is introduced as well as modifiers such as the bevel and array modifiers. There are some examples on how to use LuxRender materials and lights as well as an explanation of unbiased rendering.

Animation is quickly covered and the book finishes with how to do post production, including examples of common problems that need to be sorted out in the postproduction phase.

Overall this is an excellent and useful book, describing how to model, texture, animate and render with Blender in a comprehensive and understandable way. If you want to get to grips with project workflow, mechanical modeling or are just looking to pick up some tips on how to improve your modeling methods I would definitely recommend this book.

You can buy the paper version of the book from Packt at a special offer rate of £23.79 or the ebook for £13.29. You can also download a pdf of the chapter “Steampunk Spacecraft” here.

However this game is pretty good just with the single player campaign. The basic premise is that you’re a group of soldiers gone AWOL trying to chase down a load of trucks containing gold.

Along the way you get to handle trucks, armoured cars, patrol boats, tanks and even the occasional helicopter while you literally blow away the enemy.

Pretty much all of the environment is destructable, you can blow away all four walls off 90% of the buildings. However it doesn’t go all the way as you can’t completely level a building. That isn’t a major problem as you can still throw a grenade into a building and watch as in full HD the ground is ripped away from under the feet of an enemy on the 1st floor.

The maps are huge as well, and although the routes for the first few levels are fairly linear, the possible routes increase as the game goes on.

The campaign plot is simple but fun and the dialog both in game and in cut scenes is good and comical.

The major point that I didn’t like about this game is the AI, you do feel like the other three characters are not helping and just following you around. For instance, in parts of the story you fight without the other characters and it isn’t any harder than with them next to you.

Also, if you move fast they do instant catchup, it can break the flow of the game to see your fellow company members teleporting into view and they sometimes do get stuck.

However overall this is a really enjoyable game.

7/10

The graphics are fantastic, damage is semi-realistic and the number of different racing styles that you can play is huge.

The crashes are pretty good too, not just when you crash but when another AI car makes a mistake and causes a five car pile up which you juuuusst manage to avoid adding to.

In career mode you win money to buy cars and points to unlock new levels to race. You can eventually hire a team mate to race alongside you and get a team win for the race as well as individually.

AI is a strong point for this game, you start to smile as the car that was just in front of you for the last two laps suddenly loses it and does a barrel roll out of a hairpin bend. It’s almost like the driver was getting nervous and made the mistake due to you slip streaming him for the last four minutes.

This really is an awesome game.

9/10

However the way that the game achieves this is to get a group of mini-games and string them together.

For example, you may be running down a corridor, turn a corner and run smack into a security guard… prompt the ‘fight’ mini game which is basically press block, wait for them to attempt to hit you and then mash triangle and square until Bourne does the coup de grace on the opponent.

You’ll then run off, go through a door and enter and ‘press the button on the screen God of War style’ mini game.

This is annoying because you never feel that you’re in charge of where the game is going, it feels like a 3D platformer.

The visual effects are pretty good however they’re not always seamless and the game doesn’t last long enough to really be able to enjoy it. In fact it lasts just long enough for the gameplay to get gratingly annoying and repetitive before it abruptly ends.

The other thing is that the models used in the game look nothing like the characters from the film, this might be a minor problem for some people, but it would have been nice to look more like the actual films.

Overall: 5/10

Naturally, for a movie which stars Harrison Ford, is co-written by George Lucas and is directed Steven Spielberg, you would expect a really good film to continue the Indiana Jones legacy. What you get though is ET meets Star Wars with a dash of archaeology thrown in.

This film actually comes close to Armageddon’s record for most impossible scenes in one film. What with the ridiculous man-eating ants, Indy escaping from the epicentre of a nuclear blast in a lead fridge, the sword fight on two moving cars, and five people not only surviving three huge waterfalls, but staying in the same boat for two of them!

Wait there’s more, the crystal skull is magnetic and yet it attracts gold. Also the magnetic force only attracts objects when there is some tense cinematic reason for doing so…

Not only that, but for some super, all knowing, inter-dimensional, powerful alien/s, they sure were astronomically stupid to let some mere mortal go and nick their precious skull.

And please, for the love of all thats good and real, don’t even attempt to give me a reason why Dr Jones, Jr. doesn’t get sucked into the vortex that would have been created when the flying saucer takes off, or why the physical force of the Amazon river rushing into the hole that is subsequently created doesn’t cause Indy and Co to go on one big cliff-slide into the water below.

When there are so many physical impossibilities in a movie the plot really does need to be amazing to rescue the film. Unfortunately this is not the case for this one, the plot is lame, and everybody with a brain bigger than a peanut would guess the many predictable twists. Also, for a series of films where the villain is always destroyed at the end of the film by the artifact that they were trying to get, you could have at least let Indy get the bad guy (girl) in the end for a change.

To sum up, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull does nothing to deserve the title of a ‘good’ film and it was a complete waste of time to go and watch it. Average acting, a predictable script and impossible, over the top special effects completely spoil this movie.

3/10

I’ve never enjoyed a car racing game this much since Need For Speed: Most Wanted.

The whole environment looks fantastic and the motion sensitive driving works a treat. The cars themselves look great and although you can’t customize them as much as you can in the NFS series, there are enough cars and paint options to keep me at least satisfied.

The physics of the car damage and crashes are fantastic and in the slow-mo crash playback you can hit the R1 and L1 buttons to do a mini game where you try to bounce off as many other cars and buses as possible.

There are a lot of different types of races in the game: straight forward races, survival races, beat the stunt score and ‘takedown’ other car races.

Once you’ve got a car that you’re satisfied with you can hit the right D-Pad button and go online in a freeburn mode where you can play ranked races, do group stunts and more. In freeburn if you takedown another player you get a mugshot of them sent to you if they have the PS3 eye attached.

All in all this is a fantastic game!

9/10

I preordered Assassin’s Creed a month before it came out and my expectations of the game were not disappointed.

The detail in the maps are incredible and the ability to climb pretty much everything will have you roaming the cities for hours on end.

However, if you try to get through the storyline fast (it’s very tempting as the plot is fascinating) you will find some of the info gathering missions repetitive. This won’t effect you too much as unless you try to do all of them they won’t take too long.

Overall it’s a well thought through game with amazing attention to detail and the graphics and locations are breathtaking. The rumors of freezes on the PS3 are not as bad as is made out (I had it freeze about 3 times total) and Ubisoft have released a patch for it which seems to have fixed the problem.

9/10

Finished Bladestorm last week.

It starts off well (a particularly amazing opening movie) and the rpg element is ok but it drags on and is reeeaaallly repetitive. The ending scene is disappointing as well.

6.5/10