CATS

The CATS ( C onstructing A ssessments using T ools and S ervices) project built a web-services based system to search for and retrieve assessment items held within one or more distributed item banks.

The input to CATS is a profile - a parameter file which includes the query to be executed (e.g. "retrieve 50 Maths Level 2 items") and the item bank(s) to search. The system then connects to and searches these bank(s), and harvests matching items. CATS ensures that each item retrieved is complete i.e. all its related assets (e.g. associated image files) are returned. Finally, CATS internally creates a content package containing the set of retrieved items. This content package can be exported from CATS either as a zipped file, or can be directly written to a file system.

This project built upon and extended the functionality of two existing ELF Toolkits, DPlus(D+) and SPAID.

CATS was a collaborative project between the Department of Learning Services, University of Strathclyde, Glasgow and Edinburgh University Library.

Related items
This project is involved in the following systems: This project is involved in the following software: This project has associations with the following organisations: This project is funded by the following organisations: This project contains the following people:
 * is involved in::CATS System'''
 * is involved in::CATS Aggregator Web Service v1.0 - this is the main orchestration engine
 * is involved in::CATS Harvester Web Service v1.0 - this coordinates connection to the item bank(s)
 * is involved in::CATS Connector Web Service v1.0 - this connects to and retrieves items from one item bank
 * is involved in::CATS Packager Web Service v1.0 - this bundles retrieved items into a content package
 * is involved in::CATS Writer Web Service v1.0 - this writes out content package
 * has associations with::SPAID - CATS created a SPAID item bank, as well as adapting the SPAID Content Packager and Writer services
 * has associations with::DPlus- CATS adapted the DPlus connector service to work with item banks
 * is funded by::JISC - CATS was funded under the e-learning frameworks and tools programme
 * contains::Iain Tulloch - Iain Tulloch was a Co-Investigator on CATS; in particular, he undertook the domain scoping study

Links & Documents

 * [[Image:web.gif|Web Document]] CATS Homepage: Website:=http://assessmentbanks.info