A two-way information exchange could help solve this problem with the current structure of the Web. This type of exchange also leads to many benefits in education as it will allow discussion to take place outside the classroom in addition to that which is conducted inside. The solution to our problem is the instantiation of an annotation tool that can be used to make private, public, or shared annotations, or notes, on already existing Web pages. Annotation systems are meant to give electronic documents some of the same note-taking possibilities as paper documents. There are varying beliefs of what note-taking capabilities should be offered in an annotation system.
Readers often take notes in the margin of a page or on a separate page.
Another common form of annotation is underlining, highlighting, circling text or writing between lines. A different type of annotation is one meant to be shared with other readers, such as discussion-like comments or questions. The functionality and implementation of these varies greatly. In this paper, we will give an overview of several existing annotation systems, which will eventually be used as a basis for the development of our own easy to use annotation system for classroom use. When a reader views an annotated document, the annotated text is highlighted and the author's picture or icon is displayed after it.