ConferenceXP and Distance Learning at UW CSE

Fred Videon & Rod Prieto

Agenda for Today

• ConferenceXP• Classroom Presenter• Archiving/Playback• Configuration of this Room• Future Work• Demos• Questions/Discussion

ConferenceXP• Platform for Real-time collaboration• High-quality multipoint conferencing • Full-screen, real-time video at 30 fps• Built-in presentation capability,

whiteboard & screen sharing

A Brief History of ConferenceXP

• Project began at MSR in 2001 as DISC• Successful UW deployment for

distance learning, Spring 2003• 4-way distance learning deployments

Autumn 2004, 2005 & 2006• July 2007: UW Center for

Collaborative Technologies founded to continue CXP development & support

ConferenceXP Services

• Venue Service– Provide virtual meeting spaces– Simple web service

• Archive Service– Conference archive & playback

• Reflector Service– Unicast tunnel– Multicast support is not great in many

areas

ConferenceXP is a Shared Source Platform

• Provides a great platform for research in collaborative environments– APIs designed for extensibility– .Net Framework shortens development cycle– Includes rich AV device support

• Provides a proven platform for distance learning and distributed meetings– Existing tools support integrated TabletPC

based presentation, archive post-processing and integrated archive playback

Classroom Presenter• Tablet PC Based Distributed Presentation

System• Instructor navigation and annotation on local

and remote displays• Students can contribute to class using digital

ink on instructors slide• Integrates well with ConferenceXP and

ConferenceXP archiving• Also fine as a stand-alone presentation system• Open source license (for non-RTP version)

Classroom Presenter Student Submission Example

Instructor

Projected Display

Students

Multicast

CXP Archive Service

CXPAudio/Video

(multiple sites)

Classroom Presenter Instructor Tablet

Classroom PresenterProjected Displays

(Multiple Sites)

Archiving Schematic

• All devices use CXP Multicast Networking

• CXP Archive Service provides a simple way to collect all classroom activity

Archiving, Processing, Playback

• All data on the wire captured in SQL Server database

• Post-processing tools extract WMV and XML representation of the Presentation, Ink, and Table of Contents.

• Archive materials are packaged for download and streaming in custom WebViewer application

• MPEG-4 version produced for Mac/Linux clients

Archive Playback

Future Work: Port WebViewer to Silverlight!

Configuration of this Room• 2 Computers

– CXP runs on Windows XP or Vista– Medium-high end CPU and graphics

rendering

• Audio– ClearOne XAP hardware echo cancellation– Ceiling mics + wireless Lav mics

• 3 cameras with pan-tilt-zoom controls• 3 projectors

What’s Next for ConferenceXP

• CXP 5.0: Aiming for Summer 2008 Release– Improved Diagnostics– Security Enhancements– Support for Heterogeneous Network

Capabilities• Beyond 5.0

– High Definition Video

Get the ConferenceXP Source

• ConferenceXP and related projects are available in source & binary distributions– http://www.codeplex.com/ConferenceXP

Collaborate with us on new features, etc.

Resources & Contacts• CCT Website/Wiki

• MSR ConferenceXP Site

• Email List

• Contacts:

cct.cs.washington.edu

www.conferencexp.net

cct-announce-request@cs.washington.edu

cct@cs.washington.edufred@cs.washington.edu

Demos

• ConferenceXP Demo– Additonal CXP Features:

• Screen streaming• Shared Browser• WM playback

• Archive Production Demo