This article will first discuss a list of desirable features we would expect from an ideal web based course environment.
Introduction Putting higher education courses on the web has many obvious advantages.
It has the potential to increase the course quality due to complex media types like video clips or interactive elements like simulations or automatically corrected quizzes. It probably can decrease costs because the content delivery expenses do not depend on the number of enrolled students. And it finally can even help to make contacts between students and instructors more personal if new communication features and tracking capabilities are applied appropriately. Some of the current downsides are that new pedagogical concepts are needed, the sometimes observable lack of acceptance of teachers and students and that the implementation of web based courses is time-consuming and technically demanding. This article focuses on the latter issue - how technology enables the creation and distribution of web based courses.