World Wide Web Virtual Computer: reaching the active, global student

This paper addresses research using the World Wide Web (WWW) as a platform for the delivery of an interactive hypermedia tutorial and simulation package. Developed for active, global learners, the WWW Virtual Computer allows students to learn about and build a virtual computer. As a tutorial, the WWW Virtual Computer provides hypertext and digital movies on each of the components of a computer system. As a simulation, students can configure seventeen different components of the computer. After configuration, the student can run three benchmarks against the system to measure its performance. Each of the benchmarks provides an animation of which components of the computer are being heavily utilized as well as a description of which component of the computer system is the bottleneck. The student can then redesign the system to address performance bottlenecks and improve performance within student-selected constraints.