Course description                   

Providing training and courses online is nearly as old as the web itself, but as with any innovation, some instructors have been early adopters while others have watched the development with both interest and skepticism. As publishing and managing content on the web has become easier, and as providing online training and courses has become increasingly more popular, many have begun exploring ways to offer their learning opportunities online. A common perspective is that moving instruction online is primarily about designing and sequencing instructional content. This is wrong.  Rich content is already out there.  Changes on the web in the last decade – toward a more open, social and interconnected space – have necessitated the rethinking of what it means to make the transition to online teaching and learning. The unprecedented changes occurring on the web are disrupting the normal practice of teaching and learning.  E-Learning is not about content…it is about connecting people.  New theories are emerging regarding teaching and learning online. We will explore these theories and the new practice of eLearning in this course.

 

Course learning outcomes

By the end of this course, the student will be able to:

• Use the theoretical knowledge provided by the main e-learning philosophies to suggest a design for a typical e-learning scenario;
• Demonstrate knowledge/awareness and ability to critically evaluate some of the eLearning issues of the day;
• Evaluate the various development tools, e-learning technologies, and assess their effectiveness vis-a-vis specific e-learning requirements and implement them in real-life scenarios.
• Identify the theoretical constructs and philosophical orientations that support knowledge construction in networked environments.
• Describe how the internet is changing how and where learning is occurring.
• Articulate ways in which a philosophy of eLearning practice could be translated into content and practice developed for adult learners in various settings and contexts.
• Describe the specific affordances as well as levels and types of interactivity offered by various forms of web-based activities by contrasting eLearning with traditional face-to-face delivery of instruction.
• Identify design elements, instructor and student roles, community building strategies, and the role of feedback and assessment in creating an online community of learning that supports learner-centered instruction.

 

 

Course content

·         Understanding e-learning

·         Advocacy of e-learning

·         E-learning strategy: development

·         E-learning strategy: suppliers and resources

·         E-learning strategy: learning design issues

·         E-learning strategy: measurement and results

·         Learning more about e-learning

 

 

Course reading Materials

·         Delivering E-Learning: A complete strategy for design and assessment. (2009) By Kenneth Fee. Kogan Page Ltd. ISBN - 10 0749453974 ISBN - 13 978 0749453978.

·         E-Learning by Design (2nd ed). (2012). By William Horton. Pfeiffer. ISBN - 978-0-470-90002-4.

·         The E-Learning Handbook (2008). Saul Carliner, Patti Shank (Eds). ISBN978-0-7879-7831-0.

·         Anderson, T. (Ed.) (2008). Theory and practice of online learning (2nd ed). Edmonton, Alberta, Canada: Athabasca University Press. Available http://www.aupress.ca/index.php/books/120146 (Free PDF Tab)

·         Harasim, Linda (2012). Learning Theory and Online Technologies, New York: Routledge. (Optional)

Kop, R. & Hill, A. (2008, October). Connectivism: Learning theory of the future of vestige of the past? International Review of Research in Open and Distance Learning, 9(3).

Course description                   

This is intended to be a straightforward and accessible course on information theory. Information theory is the mathematical theory that deals with the fundamental aspects of communication systems. As such, its primary goal is not to deliver practical solutions to communications problems, but rather to answer the question whether encoding and decoding schemes exist or not for a given combination of a source model and a channel model. The two main outcomes of single-user information theory are that any source requires a minimum description rate to represent its output faithfully (source coding theorem) and that any channel is characterized by a maximum transmission rate above which the probability of error cannot be made arbitrarily small (channel coding theorem). The purpose of this course is to develop the fundamental ideas of information theory and to indicate where and how the theory can be applied.

Course learning outcomes

At the end of the course students should be able to

·         Calculate the information content of a random variable from its probability distribution;

·         Relate the joint, conditional, and marginal entropies of variables in terms of their coupled probabilities;

·         Define channel capacities and properties using Shannon’s Theorems;

·         Construct efficient codes for data on imperfect communication channels;

·         Generalize the discrete concepts to continuous signals on continuous channels;

·         Understand Fourier Transforms and the main ideas of efficient algorithms for them;

·         Describe the information resolution, compression, and efficient coding properties of wavelets.

Course content

·         Introduction and Preview

·         Entropy and Mutual Information

·         Asymptotic Equipartition Property

·         Entropy Rates of a Stochastic Process

·         Data Compression

·         Channel Capacity

·         Differential Entropy

·         The Gaussian Channel

 

Course reading Materials

·         Thomas M. Cover and Joy A. Thomas, Elements of Information Theory, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1991, ISBN 0-471-06259-6.

·         Lin S, G Costillo D.J. 2004 Error Control Coding 2nd Ed., Prentice Hall, ISBN 978-0130426727.

·         Wells R.B., 1999. Applied Coding and Information Theory for Engineers, Prentice Hall, ISBN 0-13-961327-7.

·         Reed I S, Chen X 1999. Error-Control Coding for data Networks, Springer,ISBN: 978-0-7923-8528-8.

Course description                   

ICT innovation in organisations has a history of more than half a century and is continuing unrelentingly. It has given rise to a variety of specialist jobs – from computer programmers to chief information officers (CIOs) with a varying mix of technology and managerial competencies. The knowledge and skills needed for information systems (IS) jobs are continuously changing. The mainframe era required computer operators, large numbers of computer programmers, systems analysts and designers, and relatively few IS managers with business management skills. There were some large computer service providers running standard applications, such as payroll, but most large companies had their own electronic data processing (EDP) departments, and that is where most IS professionals were employed.          

 

Course learning outcomes

·         Discuss the process of information systems innovation as a sociotechnical endeavour that comprises both technology and organizational change

·         Identify the main trends in the socio-economic context of organisations that affect IS innovation

·         Critically discuss the relationship between ICT and organizational change

·         Discuss the strategic value of information systems for organisations and methods used for information systems planning

·         Critically discuss the options organisation have to acquire the technologies they need for their information systems

·         Critically discuss some of the most frequently used methods for developing and implementing information systems

·         Describe the tasks involved in managing IS development and implementation projects

·         Discuss the challenges facing information systems management

·         Explain the notion enterprise governance of IT

·         Identify the security risks confronting information systems and the mechanisms used to address them

·         Critically discuss threats to privacy associated with the use of ICTs in organisations.                     

Course content

·         Technology, organizational, and social aspects of information systems innovation

·         Information systems development

·         Information systems management

·         Information systems and organizational change

Course reading Materials

·         Avison, D. and G. Torkzadeh Information Systems Project Management. (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2009) [ISBN 9781412957021].

McNurlin, B.C., R.H. Sprague, Jnr. and T. Bui Information Systems Management in Practice. (Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall (Pearson International), 2009) [ISBN 978013157951].

Course description

This course builds on the introductory module in databases. It intends to introduce more advanced topics in databases such as data mining and data warehousing, distributed databases and client server architecture after introducing the DBMS implementation.

Course learning outcomes

On successful completion of this module, the student will be able to:

·         Apply normalization techniques

·         Understand how transactions are processed in a database.

·         Explain the concepts of Distributed Databases and Data Warehousing.

·         Explain some database security issues.

·         Explain the different techniques in Concurrency Control. - Tune and Optimize some Database Applications.

·         Carefully explain the concepts of Object-Oriented database

·         Understand theoretical foundations and principles of database design

·         Learn new ways to query and model data.

·         Get familiar with the expanding role of database technology in big data era.

·         Understand and practice the research skills (algorithm design, problem solving, paper review and presentation)

Course content

·         Introduction, Concepts and Definitions

·          Normalization Techniques

·         Data Mining and Data warehouse

·         Transaction Processing

·         Concurrency Control

·          Distributed Databases

·         Database Security

·         Temporal database

Course reading Materials

·         Fundamentals of Database Systems, Ramez Elmasri, Shamkant Navathe, pp.1200, Addison Wesley, 6 edition, 2010, ISBN-13: 978-0136086208

·         Advanced Database Systems, Carlo Zaniolo , Stefano Ceri, Christos Faloutsos , Richard T. Snodgrass, V.S. Subrahmanian, and Roberto Zicari , pp. 576, Morgan Kaufmann, 1997, ISBN-13: 978-1558604438

·         Foundations of Databases: The Logical Level, Serge Abiteboul , Richard Hull, and Victor Vianu, pp. 685, Addison Wesley, 1994, ISBN-13:978-0201537710

·         Readings in Database Systems, Joseph M. Hellerstein (Editor), and Michael Stonebraker (Editor), pp. 877, The MIT Press, 4 edition, 2005, ISBN-13: 978-0262693141

·         Transaction Processing: Concepts and Techniques, Jim Gray, and Andreas Reuter, pp. 1070, Morgan Kaufmann, 1992, ISBN-13: 978-1558601901

·         Data Mining: Concepts and Techniques, Jiawei Han, and Micheline Kamber, pp. 800, Morgan Kaufmann, 2nd edition, 2005, ISBN-13:978-1558609013

·         The Architecture for the Next Generation of Data Warehousing, William H. Inmon, Derek Strauss, and Genia Neushloss, pp. 400, Morgan Kaufmann, 2008, ISBN-13: 978-0123743190

·         Date, Database Systems, 8th edition, 2004

·         Patrick Valduriez M. TamerOzsu, Principles of Distributed Database Systems, 2nd Edition, Prentice Hall, 1999.

Course Description: 
The emphasis of the material for this class will be on the information systems approach to client-server and distributed systems analysis, design, and management. The theory behind each component will be presented while exploring the impact it has on the business of managing information. Topics include the components of client-server and distributed systems architecture, operating systems, networking, interprocess communication, user interface, middleware, distributed objects, security, and the software development process. The role of standards in client-server and distributed systems development is discussed, including a detailed study of protocols. Also included are the various relationships between client-server computing and business process reengineering, workflow automation, and groupware. Migration from legacy systems is considered along with project development and management.

 

Course Content Overview:

• Fundamentals of Client/Server Systems
• Client/Server Components
• Networks and Data Communication
• Client Operating Systems
• Server and Network Operating Systems
• Middleware
• Client/Server and the Internet
• Distributed Data Management
• Client/Server Transaction Processing
• Client/Server Groupware
• Distributed Objects
• Distributed System Application Architecture and Process Design
• Migration
• Distributed System Management
• Security
• Future Trends

 

Course reading materials

·         Bostic, K., Karels, M.J., McKusick, M.K., Quarterman, J.S. (1996). The design and implementation of the 4.4 BSD operating system. Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley. 

·         Comer, D. E., and Stevens, D. L. [1991], Internetworking with TCP/IP, Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.

·         Custer, H. [1993], Inside Windows NT, Microsoft Press, Redmond, Washington

·         Ferrari, D. (1978). Computer systems performance evaluation. New Jersey: Prentice-Hall.

·         Folk, M.J., & Zoellick, B. (1992). File Structures (2nd ed.). New York: Addison-Wesley.

·         Jain, R. (1991). The art of computer systems performance analysis: Techniques for experimental design, measurement, simulation, and modeling. New York: John Wiley and Sons.

·         Kant,K. (1992). Introduction to computer system performance evaluation. New York: McGraw-Hill.

·         Niedermiller-Chaffins, D. [1992], Inside Novell NetWare, New Rider Publishing, Carmel, Indiana

·         Pfleeger,S.L. (1998). Software Engineering theory and practice. New Jersy: Prentice-Hall.

·         Pressman, R.S. (1997). Software Engineering a practitioner's approach. New York: McGraw-Hill.

·         Stallings, W. [1997], Data and Computer Communications, 5th, Macmillan Publishing Company, New York, N.Y.

·         Warford, J. S. (1991), Computer Science, D.C. Heath and Co., Lexington, Massachusetts

·         Wulf, W. A, Shaw, M., Hilfinger, P. N., and Flon, L. (1981), Fundamentals Structures of Computer Science, Addison-Wesley Publishing Co., Reading, Massachusetts