Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs
One of the challenges of online engineering education is to provide students with hands-on laboratory experiences that require being in an on-campus laboratory. Virtual laboratory technical solutions have been developed over the last decade to allow learners to simulate engineering systems online or...
| 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/10322739/ |
| _version_ | 1827650421485731840 |
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| author | Mazen Alkhatib Yanzhen Qu Richard Cai Ricardo A. G. Unglaub Richard Ritter |
| author_facet | Mazen Alkhatib Yanzhen Qu Richard Cai Ricardo A. G. Unglaub Richard Ritter |
| author_sort | Mazen Alkhatib |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | One of the challenges of online engineering education is to provide students with hands-on laboratory experiences that require being in an on-campus laboratory. Virtual laboratory technical solutions have been developed over the last decade to allow learners to simulate engineering systems online or to connect to predesigned system modules within physical laboratories. However, these predesigned solutions must be acquired as software and hardware components that require a certain budget and training time before they can be used. In addition, these solutions do not concentrate on the construction portion of the systems under experimentation, but rather on testing the predesigned module using a virtual application that connects to it. In this paper, we developed a solution that enables online learners to build virtual systems, step-by-step, at their ends and connect them to real-time on-campus labs to perform remote experimentations with logic gates systems. We used a combination of technologies, such as Virtual Networking Computing (VNC) technology, Video Conferencing (VC) technology, and Object Oriented Programming (OOP). Our solution was practically proven using Python programming running on a Raspberry PI system to construct sample examples of virtual logic gates applications. This allows online students to concentrate on constructing, step-by-step, logic gate systems remotely, and to control actual physical logic gate systems within an on-campus lab with the help of a webcam. Our solution was tested by a group of learners and was proven to be a cost-effective alternative to traditional laboratory experiences. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-09T20:15:59Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-e094b15fee444ea4990834fae624a281 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2169-3536 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-09T20:15:59Z |
| publishDate | 2023-01-01 |
| publisher | IEEE |
| record_format | Article |
| series | IEEE Access |
| spelling | doaj.art-e094b15fee444ea4990834fae624a2812023-11-24T00:01:28ZengIEEEIEEE Access2169-35362023-01-011113050813051610.1109/ACCESS.2023.333426210322739Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree ProgramsMazen Alkhatib0https://orcid.org/0009-0006-8983-3763Yanzhen Qu1https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1808-5087Richard Cai2Ricardo A. G. Unglaub3Richard Ritter4Department of Computer Engineering, Colorado Technical University, Colorado Springs, CO, USADepartment of Computer Engineering, Colorado Technical University, Colorado Springs, CO, USADepartment of Computer Engineering, Colorado Technical University, Colorado Springs, CO, USADepartment of Computer Engineering, Colorado Technical University, Colorado Springs, CO, USADepartment of Computer Engineering, Colorado Technical University, Colorado Springs, CO, USAOne of the challenges of online engineering education is to provide students with hands-on laboratory experiences that require being in an on-campus laboratory. Virtual laboratory technical solutions have been developed over the last decade to allow learners to simulate engineering systems online or to connect to predesigned system modules within physical laboratories. However, these predesigned solutions must be acquired as software and hardware components that require a certain budget and training time before they can be used. In addition, these solutions do not concentrate on the construction portion of the systems under experimentation, but rather on testing the predesigned module using a virtual application that connects to it. In this paper, we developed a solution that enables online learners to build virtual systems, step-by-step, at their ends and connect them to real-time on-campus labs to perform remote experimentations with logic gates systems. We used a combination of technologies, such as Virtual Networking Computing (VNC) technology, Video Conferencing (VC) technology, and Object Oriented Programming (OOP). Our solution was practically proven using Python programming running on a Raspberry PI system to construct sample examples of virtual logic gates applications. This allows online students to concentrate on constructing, step-by-step, logic gate systems remotely, and to control actual physical logic gate systems within an on-campus lab with the help of a webcam. Our solution was tested by a group of learners and was proven to be a cost-effective alternative to traditional laboratory experiences.https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10322739/Online educationengineering programexperiential learningvirtual laboratoryvirtual systems constructionsimulation |
| spellingShingle | Mazen Alkhatib Yanzhen Qu Richard Cai Ricardo A. G. Unglaub Richard Ritter Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs IEEE Access Online education engineering program experiential learning virtual laboratory virtual systems construction simulation |
| title | Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs |
| title_full | Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs |
| title_fullStr | Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs |
| title_full_unstemmed | Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs |
| title_short | Real Time Virtual Laboratory Solution Prototype and Evaluation for Online Engineering Degree Programs |
| title_sort | real time virtual laboratory solution prototype and evaluation for online engineering degree programs |
| topic | Online education engineering program experiential learning virtual laboratory virtual systems construction simulation |
| url | https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10322739/ |
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