Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments
Online laboratories and computational notebooks have established themselves as essential tools in the fields of engineering and science education, significantly enhancing the teaching and learning experience. Despite the benefits of remote laboratories, and although architectures, models, and tools...
| Main Authors: | , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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IEEE
2023-01-01
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| Series: | IEEE Access |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10328562/ |
| _version_ | 1797376337862721536 |
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| author | Oswaldo Vanegas-Guillen Pablo Parra-Rosero Javier Mu Munoz-Anton Johanna Zumba-Gamboa Carlos Dillon |
| author_facet | Oswaldo Vanegas-Guillen Pablo Parra-Rosero Javier Mu Munoz-Anton Johanna Zumba-Gamboa Carlos Dillon |
| author_sort | Oswaldo Vanegas-Guillen |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Online laboratories and computational notebooks have established themselves as essential tools in the fields of engineering and science education, significantly enhancing the teaching and learning experience. Despite the benefits of remote laboratories, and although architectures, models, and tools have been proposed to facilitate the work involved in their implementation, challenges remain in the development lifecycle. This paper proposes a novel architecture that simplifies the development and management of remote experiments using a publisher-subscriber communication paradigm to securely and efficiently integrate WebAssembly computational notebooks. This approach eliminates the need for additional infrastructure for communication at the lab stations. It also avoids the need for servers to deploy notebooks, because all operations, calculations, and data processing run locally in the user’s web browser. To achieve this, a remote laboratory management system (RLMS) interoperable with virtual learning environments was designed and implemented, including notebook-based authoring, learning scenarios, and grading tools. As a case study, remote experiments were developed to characterize and evaluate the performance of heat exchangers using a thermal fluid systems test bench built for this project. Several quality criteria categorized into technical, educational, and adaptability groups were quantitatively evaluated using the responses of 70 participants from two different universities. The analysis highlighted both the advantages and challenges of the proposal, with a significant emphasis on interaction, scalability, reusability, interoperability, and accessibility. The results confirmed the effectiveness of the notebooks in each phase of the remote experiments, demonstrating an increase in students’ active and autonomous participation and exploration. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-08T19:37:06Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-2f6b00ef9a10434189e0eb0b3cadc456 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2169-3536 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-08T19:37:06Z |
| publishDate | 2023-01-01 |
| publisher | IEEE |
| record_format | Article |
| series | IEEE Access |
| spelling | doaj.art-2f6b00ef9a10434189e0eb0b3cadc4562023-12-26T00:02:15ZengIEEEIEEE Access2169-35362023-01-011113249613251510.1109/ACCESS.2023.333628710328562Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational ExperimentsOswaldo Vanegas-Guillen0https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4284-3412Pablo Parra-Rosero1https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1596-3961Javier Mu Munoz-Anton2Johanna Zumba-Gamboa3https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5733-5678Carlos Dillon4https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4805-4898Department of Energy Engineering, School of Industrial Engineering, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Madrid, SpainIndustrial Processes Research Group (GIPI), Universidad Politécnica Salesiana, Guayaquil, EcuadorDepartment of Energy Engineering, School of Industrial Engineering, Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Madrid, SpainDepartment of Computational Systems, Faculty of Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Universidad de Guayaquil, Guayaquil, EcuadorDepartment of Computer Science, Universidad Politécnica Salesiana, Guayaquil, EcuadorOnline laboratories and computational notebooks have established themselves as essential tools in the fields of engineering and science education, significantly enhancing the teaching and learning experience. Despite the benefits of remote laboratories, and although architectures, models, and tools have been proposed to facilitate the work involved in their implementation, challenges remain in the development lifecycle. This paper proposes a novel architecture that simplifies the development and management of remote experiments using a publisher-subscriber communication paradigm to securely and efficiently integrate WebAssembly computational notebooks. This approach eliminates the need for additional infrastructure for communication at the lab stations. It also avoids the need for servers to deploy notebooks, because all operations, calculations, and data processing run locally in the user’s web browser. To achieve this, a remote laboratory management system (RLMS) interoperable with virtual learning environments was designed and implemented, including notebook-based authoring, learning scenarios, and grading tools. As a case study, remote experiments were developed to characterize and evaluate the performance of heat exchangers using a thermal fluid systems test bench built for this project. Several quality criteria categorized into technical, educational, and adaptability groups were quantitatively evaluated using the responses of 70 participants from two different universities. The analysis highlighted both the advantages and challenges of the proposal, with a significant emphasis on interaction, scalability, reusability, interoperability, and accessibility. The results confirmed the effectiveness of the notebooks in each phase of the remote experiments, demonstrating an increase in students’ active and autonomous participation and exploration.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10328562/Architecturecomputational notebookengineering educationonline experimentationonline laboratoryremote laboratory |
| spellingShingle | Oswaldo Vanegas-Guillen Pablo Parra-Rosero Javier Mu Munoz-Anton Johanna Zumba-Gamboa Carlos Dillon Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments IEEE Access Architecture computational notebook engineering education online experimentation online laboratory remote laboratory |
| title | Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments |
| title_full | Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments |
| title_fullStr | Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments |
| title_full_unstemmed | Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments |
| title_short | Remote Labs Meet Computational Notebooks: An Architecture for Simplifying the Workflow of Remote Educational Experiments |
| title_sort | remote labs meet computational notebooks an architecture for simplifying the workflow of remote educational experiments |
| topic | Architecture computational notebook engineering education online experimentation online laboratory remote laboratory |
| url | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10328562/ |
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