Distributing education services to personal and institutional systems using Widgets

One of the issues for the Personal Learning Environment is the integration of personal tools with institution-centric information and services such as timetable information, and the coordination of cohort-specific group activities. One potential solution is the use of widgets – small, single-function applications that can be used in different applications, including personal technologies. One of the challenges facing the use of widgets is the diversity of platforms, and the issues around security, privacy and control. This paper describes an approach developed as part of the EU-funded TenCompetence project to develop a system based on open standards for enabling widgets to be used in a range of personal and institutional systems.