Difference between revisions of "Spoken Tutorials Requirement Specification"

Latest revision as of 12:24, 14 December 2012

You are here: Main Page >> Spoken Tutorial Processes >> Spoken Tutorials Requirement Specification

Introduction

Purpose

The purpose of spoken tutorial portal is to publish short video tutorials on free and open source software. These videos will be made by the community and the portal will provide workflow process for submitting and approval of videos. Portal will also act as a platform for discussing potential spoken tutorials and bidding process for developing tutorials.
This document is meant to delineate the features of spoken tutorials portal, so as to serve as a guide to the developers on one hand and software validation document on the other hand.

Scope

The spoken tutorial portal will provide following functionality

• Viewing spoken tutorial.
• User registration and authentication.
• Uploading new spoken tutorial scripts and videos.
• Approval process for the scripts and videos.
• Bidding process for new spoken tutorials.
• Rating and feedback for the spoken tutorials.
• Creation of study plans.
• Tracking user's progress through a study plan.

 - a study plan is a suggested order in which videos should be watched in order to learn the particular software. How do you 
   propose to track a user's progress through the study plan and why would you want to track a users progress through a study plan?

• Forums for discussing potential spoken tutorials.
• Bidding process for developing new spoken tutorials or dubbing existing videos in other languages.

Following functionality will be out of scope for spoken tutorial portal

• Creation of videos.
• Dubbing of videos.
• Editing of videos.

Definitions and Abbreviations

Definitions

• Spoken Tutorial: Spoken Tutorial refers to explaining a computer based activity with a screencast and a narration.
• Script: A script is a written document containing the narration of the Spoken Tutorial.
• Study Plan: Study Plan is a step-by-step collection of video tutorials which allows the user to learn a particular software or subject.
• Pedagogy: Refers to method and practice of learning

Abbreviations

• ST: Spoken Tutorial. Also used to refer to spoken-tutorial.org website.

Overview

The rest of this SRS is organized as follows:

• Section 2 gives an overall description of the website. It gives expected types of users, and some general technological constraints.
• Section 3 gives specific requirements which the website is expected to deliver. Functional requirements are given by various use cases.
• Section 4 gives some possible future improvement to the website.

Overall Description

Perspective

Spoken Tutorial aims to provide a platform for learning and teaching FOSS technologies to masses. Video tutorials and Study Plans are used as learning tools for the users of the website.

Bids will be put up on the website for creation of content by the users. Website will also proivde discussion forum, blog, comments and ratings for the interaction among users.

Functions

• View uploaded tutorials to learn FOSS tools, software and languages.
• View study plans to learn a FOSS technology in-depth.
• Upload examples, script, spoken tutorials and dubbing.
• Create own study plans.
• Bids for creating examples, scripts, spoken tutorials and dubbing.
• Interaction with users in form of comments, ratings, feedback, discussion forum and blog.
• Registered Users can customise home page to suit their likes.
• Search for videos, study plans and other content.
• External Resources for each FOSS category on the website.
• Sharing on external websites through social bookmarking & sharing.

User Characteristics

• Registered Users: This class of users have registered on the website and can be served personalised content. They belong the following categories
  • Professors: Will be interested in showcasing spoken tutorials and study plans. Can also contribute to spoken tutorials and study plans. Will also be interested in blog posts.
  • Students: Will be interested in learning from spoken tutorials and study plans. Likely to indulge in discussion forums.
• Contributors: Interested in bids and creation of examples, scripts, spoken tutorials and dubbing. Active participants in discussion forums.
  • General: These users are registered but their activities can not be classified in any of the above categories.
• Ministers: Various ministers who will be interested in viewing the salient features of the website.
• Unregistered Users: They will get a generic home page view which gives a general overview of all the content on the website.
• Low Bandwidth Viewers: Those visitors to the website who do not have broadband or have lower data transfer limits. This category of viewers are similar to general registered/unregistered users but the look and feel of the website will be less flashy and more information oriented for these users.
  • Mobile Viewers: Those users who will visit the website from mobile phones and other portable devices. This category of user may or may not be classified as low bandwidth as many portable portable users can connect to fast broadband connections over wi-fi. The content will be more information oriented and placed strategically as screen real estate will be lower.

General Constraints

Server capacity will determine the number of videos that can be served simultaneously. Codec support for HTML 5 video tag in the browsers and suitable encoding technology on the server will pose as challenges and make implementation of certain features difficult as they cannot be achieved as easily with flash.

Assumptions and Dependencies

• Some of the proposed features for videos will rely on HTML5 and will not work with flash.
• Website will use CDN for speedier retrieval of videos from different locations.

Specific Requirements

Functional Requirements

Study Tool: Videos and Study Plans will serve as learning tools for the users. This function will be used by general public as well as students for learning purpose. Will more likely be a hands on learning tool for the users.

Teaching Tool: Teachers can also make use of videos and study plans to teach their students. The students may or may not be doing hands on learning while viewing the tutorials.

Contribution: People familiar with a topic can contribute to the website by preparing examples, scripts, spoken tutorials and dubbing. The contribution can come directly or through bidding process. All the submitted contributions have to be accepted by the reviewers.

Interaction Tool: Website can also be used for interaction by means of comments, ratings, discussions forums, blog posts and feedback. This interaction is of importance to understand and improve the working of the website as well as the user experience.

Performance Requirements

Future Enhancements

• HTML5 video codecs will be implemented in the future to enhance the quality, performance and features of the videos.