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I am working on a learning project for mobile devices that requires (or would at least be desirable) the ability to export to a SCORM-compatible format. I see that SCORM has a "Package Interchange Format" (PIF) based around a .zip file. I am new to SCORM and am trying to understand exactly what this file must contain. Specifically, is the PIF file just a format for generating interchangeable data between systems, or is it more complicated than that?

For some context, imagine the use case of a set of questions/sections that a user has to run through on a native mobile app, and at the end, we want to offer the ability for the user to "export" their data in a SCORM-compliant fashion. Is this simply a matter of exporting information about a) the questions and b) the answers into some .xml format, or is there more to it? I notice a lot of the documentation around SCORM seems to focus on Javascript and HTML. Is SCORM HTML specific, or are native apps reconcilable with SCORM, at least from the export perspective?

Apologies if any of this is basic stuff. Just trying to wrap my head around the standard and how it does or does not apply to what I'm doing.

Bryce Thomas
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The PIF is really a very small detail of SCORM's packaging. It only says that you can distribute your content in zip format, but not what that should contain. What a SCORM (1.2) file should contain is described in much, much detail in the SCORM CAM book. To summarize very quickly, you need:

  • All the files necessary for the content to run (images, html files, javascript files, css etc)
  • A file called imsmanifest.xml that describes a few things about your content, the files it contains and possibly how they interract with the LMS they run on. It can vary from very simple to very complicated.
  • Optionally, metadata in XML format

So, SCORM does not care if and where you include your questions and answers. It doesn't know about them. This is your content's responsibility and that should be able to include them and present them to the user, when ran. What SCORM can do is make your content communicate with the LMS you're running it on, so that the results of these questions are persisted.

For now, I'd suggest that you have a look at some existing SCORM files, to get an idea of how the imsmanifest.xml file should look like, and then study the SCORM CAM book and things will get rolling.

periklis
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The trouble with SCORM is that is has to be launched from within LMS. If you're building an external app that has to communicate to a LMS, take a look at either LTI (http://www.imsglobal.org/toolsinteroperability2.cfm) or TinCanAPI (http://tincanapi.com/).

Sergey Snegirev
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SCORM 2004 sample https://github.com/cybercussion/SCOBot/ You zip the contents of the directory. Some LMSs expect the imsmanifest.xml to be located in the root of the zip.

Some people are using Native Apps in a LMS format and loading the SCO's into an HTML view, but as stated above SCORM is expecting a JavaScript to JavaScript communication.

Mark
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