Analysis of Distance Education Environments Luciana A. Martinez Zaina, Graça Bressan, Regina Melo Silveira and Wilson V. Ruggiero Digital System Department of Polytechnic School, University of São Paulo lzaina@larc.usp.br , gbressan@larc.usp.br , regina@larc.usp.br , wilson@larc.usp.br Abstract Distance education has the main function of providing knowledge to people from far regions of the country. LARC, Computer Networks and Architecture Laboratory, is a research institution belonging to the Computer Engineering and Digital System Department of Polytechnic School at University of Sao Paulo, Brazil. We have developed, in the last three years, on-line courses using media such as audio, video and animation and we have developed a Web education system called Col (On- Line Courses). We are planning Col evolution and for this reason we made a study of commercial and academic distance education environments. This paper presents an analysis between the studied systems that provides us with essential information on how to manage a distance education system. 1. Introduction Nowadays, it is a reality people of different countries study together. The distance education approaches learners with different lives allowing a rich exchange of the knowledge. The question is: is it necessary to adopt a system to manage a distance course? I believe so, because teachers must deal with the development of the course content; they must concern to attract the student's attention. However, the teacher needs to know the data to manage the course like knowledge assessment of the students, statistics about the accesses etc and at the same time, he needs to find ways to communicate with the learners who are taking of course. Based on this, we developed a distance education system called Col, which is in the first version. The fundamental features like organization content, interactive tools and self tests are found in Col. But before we started Col's evolution we had to answer a question: how can we be sure that the system had the necessary aspects for a distance education system? Then we decided to study some commercial and academic distance education systems where it is possible to store and to organize a virtual course. The analyzed systems were:  Webct (version 3.1): developed by British Columbia University- Canada  Intralearn (version 2.5): developed by Intralearn Corporation – USA  AulaNet (version 1.2): developed by PUC – Brazil (Catholic Pontific University – Rio de Janeiro – Brazil)  UniverSite: developed by MHW – USA  Col (version 1.0): developed by LARC – USP – Brazil. The research made it possible for us to know different ways to organize a distance education course. 2. The studied systems We decided to study academic and commercial systems because there are academic distance education systems that are highly used in Brazil such as Webct and Aulanet. Some analyzed system characteristics are presented below and are better explained in the Analysis of the Distance Education System Features section. 2.1. Academic systems Col is a new distance education system that has been in development since 1999. Nowadays, its first version is finished but we have been studying Col's evolution. The system tasks don't depend much on the work administrator where teachers and learners are the main characters of the course. The most important course functions are controlled by the teacher, like consulting course statistics, developing knowledge assessment and so on. Aulanet was developed before Col. We considered it to be the first distance education system developed in Brazil. It has a simple interface and the fundamental tools to develop a distance education system are implemented in it. In general, the user doesn't have problems learning how to use it. Distance education researchers have certainly heard about Webct and, in the most cases, they have already used it once at least. The user has no difficulty using Webct because, in the studied version, it provides a good interaction between learners and teachers, presenting a lot of tools to make it easier for the user. 2.2 Commercial Systems