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CIF : Overview : What Is CIF?

Curriculum Interchange Format, or CIF, is a set of very simple HTML standards developed by Growth House, Inc., for presentation of brief learning modules via a Web browser. CIF tutorials can be played-back directly from a web site, used as embedded content within a frame of another web site, displayed on the right-hand frame of the IICN console, distributed as components of larger education systems, and even shipped to end users via diskettes if standalone use is preferred to web connectivity. The Interchange aspect refers to the fact that CIF modules can be developed by different educational institutions and later combined like "tinker toys" to form larger educational applications.

While CIF modules can be used directly for online education, the design of CIF pages also is optimized for integration with our Lexical Scanner Project (Lex) artificial intelligence system. When used in this way the CIF pages are components of the Lex knowledge base, with the Lex language processing software running as a higher-order indexing layer between them and an end user. In effect, Lex keeps copies of all CIF-compliant tutorial pages in his back pocket and can present individual pages from a CIF-compliant tutorial to a user in response to a natural-language question. This permits the user to pick up with the entire tutorial from the point which pertains specifically to the question which the user asked.

Content for this flash card was provided by Growth House, Inc. For full credits click here.