When Providing Material for Use Online: All proprietary formats should be converted to HTML For printable versions of documents, Acrobat PDF may be used.

Many faculty and students have asked us why they/we can't post original PowerPoint presentations or Word documents to the Web pages of the Online Syllabus. To answer this question, we have created the following document explaining our policy to convert these proprietary formats into HTML documents and to provide PDF files when necessary. We hope this statement will help unify our efforts aiming at our common goal of facilitating student learning.

All proprietary formats should be converted to HTML.

Documents created in formats such as Word or PowerPoint are not designed for online use in their "native" formats (that is, the .DOC or .PPT the respective program produces); they must be downloaded in their entirety before they can be used at all, and then must be opened in whatever program created them. Students working from low-bandwidth connections such as dial-up modems are at a severe disadvantage attempting to use these documents, as they must invest a considerable amount of time merely in downloading the file. Further, should they be using a computer which doesn't have the originating program installed, the file will be useless to them in the end. HTML documents can be viewed on any computer with a browser, regardless of the platform (Windows, Mac OS, Unix/Linux, and OS/2 all have high-quality, free browsers available). Also, most HTML files load in seconds, rather than minutes, getting students to profitable work far quicker. In the effort to provide students with learning materials available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, from practically any computer in the world, HTML should be our first tool. Many newer programs include a "Save as HTML" feature, which makes it much easier to convert native formats to HTML, so we should make use of these functions in an effort to move all materials intended for Web delivery to HTML format.

For printable versions of documents, Acrobat PDF may be used.

Often, faculty may wish to provide students with a printable version of online documents. This is particularly true of PowerPoint presentations, which print in low-fidelity and one slide per page when printed from a Web browser. Other converted formats may produce unoptimized printed results when printed via a browser. When high-quality printed output is desirable, we recommend using the Adobe Acrobat PDF (portable document file) format. This format affords several advantages in quality and usability. First, Acrobat files are typically only 25% the size of the originals they're based on. Download times, thus, are reduced markedly. Second, the Acrobat Reader is free and widely available. Many computers will have this program installed; for those which don't, it may be downloaded and installed from many sites on the Web. This free program is available in versions for a wide variety of platforms. Students will have few, if any, stumbling blocks in accessing PDF files. Third, PDF files print high-fidelity copies of the original file without having to have the originating program and its supporting elements (such as fonts) installed. What you create will be what the student prints, regardless of the computer he or she is working from. A final advantage is greater control over the created output. In order to save paper, for example, a PDF file containing up to six PowerPoint slides per page may be created, a plus for both the environment and the wallet. We are aware that the commercial program used to create PDF files, Adobe Acrobat, is not widely available throughout the Dental School. Thus, should a faculty member wish to forgo the purchase of this software ($99.95 from Student Stores), the Office of Academic Affairs Online Syllabus Support Staff will perform the conversion for any faculty member who provides us with the original file. Additionally, we have developed a guide for using GSView, a freeware application, to produce PDF files.

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We believe that use of these guidelines will provide both the usability and availability a Web delivery system affords the students, and the easiest route to making materials available for the faculty. As with the growth of any medium, there may be occasional stumbling-blocks to creating online content, but given the advantages of providing round-the-clock learning materials and the potential of dynamic educational content in enhancing the learning experience Web resources present, we believe it's a valuable effort. Our office will do our utmost to minimize difficulties and support all faculty efforts to utilize electronic media, in an effort to provide students with the best learning environment possible.