/mooclet-engine-jehan-sandbox

MOOClet web service engine

Primary LanguagePythonMIT LicenseMIT

mooclet-engine

A web service for creating and using MOOClets.

Background

What is a MOOClet?

A MOOClet is a digital component – like an explanation in an online course or problem – designed using the MOOClet technology. This technology enables instructors and researchers to engage in a wide range of A/B experimentation, crowdsourcing, real-time data analysis, and personalization.

The term MOOClet is used because this technology was first developed for MOOCs – the framework can be used to redesign any digital resource – this webpage, emails, components of smartphone apps.

See http://www.josephjaywilliams.com/mooclet for a comprehensive definition.

MOOClet engine

This application, built with Python Django, provides a web service that a user or application can interact with via a RESTful API, enabing the creation and use of MOOClets.

Setup

Local setup

Install required packages for local development:

  # Install from requirements file
  pip install -r requirements_local.txt

Fill in the required Django settings in mooclet_engine_app/settings/secure.py based on the template files.

Start up the application:

  # Start the web server
  python manage.py runserver

Deployment on AWS Elastic Beanstalk

Create an AWS account and install the Elastic Beanstalk Command Line Interface (EB CLI) if needed.

Fill in the necessary settings in mooclet_engine_app/settings/secure.py and .ebextensions/secure.config based on the provided template files.

Deploy the application:

# Initialize the Elastic Beanstalk project
eb init
# Create a new envrionment and deploy
eb create

See AWS's guide to Deploying a Django Application to Elastic Beanstalk for more details.

Usage

See this spreadsheet for a list of supported API endpoints and examples.

Note that the API uses token authentication, as decribed in the Django REST Framework's TokenAuthentication documentations