The O'Reilly School of Technology (OST) and Wolfram Research have signed a special licensing agreement to develop a Web 2.0 version of Mathematica.
Called 'Hilbert' after the influential German mathematician, David Hilbert, the newly licensed software will be browser accessible and, using AJAX technologies, will emulate the desktop version of the software.
‘The magic of AJAX will allow OST to combine or "mash-up" Mathematica with other web-based technologies to deliver and support high quality science and mathematics courses online such as those currently taught through NetMath at the University of Illinois and other universities,’ said Scott Gray, director of the O'Reilly School of Technology.
According to Gray, development of the Hilbert software is currently underway and courses will be available to students in the latter half of 2008.
The O'Reilly School of Technology bases its courses on the premise that for people to learn any skill they must immerse themselves in the skill and practice. The school employs an online learning technique called 'useractive learning' in which the student or 'user' is actively engaged in building and creating projects while the instructional material is presented. There are no presentation-heavy videos and simulations to sit through. Instead, the courses feature tutorial-style content and Learning Sandboxes that contain easy-to-use, real, open programming environments in which the students try examples and work on projects.
Students at the O'Reilly School of Technology can earn a Certificate for Professional Development from the University of Illinois Office of Continuing Education upon completion of a selected series of courses. Certificates are currently offered in Client-Side Web Programming, Linux/Unix System Administration, Web Programming, Open Source Programming, and .NET Programming.