Course Title: Electronic Publishing

Part A: Course Overview

Course Title: Electronic Publishing

Credit Points: 12

Course Code	Campus	Career	School	Learning Mode	Teaching Period(s)
ISYS1179	City Campus	Undergraduate	620H Business Info Technology	Face-to-Face	Sem 2 2006

Course Coordinator: Paul Mercieca

Course Coordinator Phone: +61 3 9925-5825

Course Coordinator Email:paul.mercieca@rmit.edu.au

Pre-requisite Courses and Assumed Knowledge and Capabilities

None

Course Description

This course aims to provide you with an opportunity to develop an understanding and appreciation of electronic publishing. The main foci will be on business models for electronic publishing, new technology, aspects of design and issues with readability. Practical exercises and presentations will also introduce you to aspects of the technology used in e-publishing

Objectives/Learning Outcomes/Capability Development

At the conclusion of this course, you will develop the following capabilities:
- Ability to research the impact that changing technology has on online content development, traditional and electronic publishing, multimedia content and information access
- Ability to track and evaluate changing trends in electronic content development

At the completion of this course you should be able to:
1. Identify important trends in electronic publishing.
2. Describe typical workflow used in the creation of electronic publications.
3. Describe and use information services enabled by the Internet and appraise their implications for the publishing industry.
4. Appreciate the issues involved in packaging information for electronic publication, and, in particular, designing content for on-screen reading.
5. Develop an understanding of the cost centres involved in e-publishing.
6. Identify the relative merits of various strategies that seek to provide optimum utilisation of distributed information.
7. Design and implement basic electronic publications.
8. Use the Internet both as a source of information and as a means of publishing information.

Overview of Learning Activities

In order to develop the stated course capabilities, you are expected to actively participate in the following learning activities:
- Regular attendance and active participation in scheduled lectures and workshops.
- Reading of course notes and other assigned reading materials and active participation in group discussions.
- Satisfactory completion of all assessment tasks, including a digital publishing project
While a minimum attendance standard is not compulsory in this course, satisfactory completion of the program is required. Most students will find that regular class attendance is needed to achieve the necessary standard to pass this course.

Overview of Learning Resources

All course materials are available online at www.rmit.edu.au/online. Information regarding access will be given in the first class.

Overview of Assessment

The assessment for this course is on the basis of the satisfactory completion of a set of assignments that include practical projects, an academic research essay and a digital publishing project. Some of these assessment tasks are completed in groups. All tasks must be successfully passed in order to meet the requirements of this course. Penalties will be applied for late submission of assessment components.
Should the course coordinator deem that variation to the assessment tasks is needed, then this will be discussed with the class and will only proceed with documented consent of 75 percent of the class.