ReMarkable Texts: A Digital Notepad for the NSDL

Brown University, Providence RI

Investigators

Abstract

This Targeted Research project is investigating capabilities for an innovative pen-based digital notebook to enable users, particularly students, to work and interact with NSDL's digital materials in a personalized manner. The main features of the system include viewing, taking notes on, annotating (e.g. freehand ink, post-it notes, and bidirectional fine-grained hyperlinks), organizing, and collaborating on multimedia documents, all with the ability to replay the temporal sequence of one's notes in the contexts in which they were made. Whiteboarding activities are also supported along with audio facilities to capture voice commentary digitally and anchor it to a specific document location. The primary targeted device is a lightweight, high-resolution tablet computer used in an environment with ubiquitous wireless LAN in frequented areas (e.g., on a college campus) and a WAN for other areas. However to ensure widespread usage, the system also works on standard desktop and laptop computers. Finally, the system includes facilities for personalized organization of documents and notes, for example folder and outline views, search, and default support for personal spatial hypertext provided by the basic annotation and linking facilities. This research effort extends Microsoft Research's DISC project (DIStributed Classroom) in the areas of collaboration, fine-grained hyperlinking, multidocument journaling and synchronization, and document and note organization. In addition to partnering with Microsoft, the PI and team are working with other NSDL projects, such as Carnegie Mellon University's Threading Information Pathways Through NSDL Video, to help integrate the system with the NSDL's existing and future services and infrastructure. With the capabilities of this project in hand users of the NSDL are much better able to make the available materials of NSDL "their own", forming a personalized, hyperlinked portfolio from their digital library experience that supports a natural and enjoyable process of learning.