They are introduced to the Web cam and chat board in the first session. They are encouraged to use the facilities when problems arise. The lecturer must be logged on too during the session for the full service to be in operation. We are currently in the process of evaluating the student feedback questionnaires on the service. The people logged on within the student forum are listed on the right of the chat applet.
People can come or go.
This tells us that the lecturer is the forum supervisor and he holds the power to remove interlopers from the forum. A typical conversation using the chat applet Should the lecturer have to remotely login to the student machine, he will ask the student to e-mail their IP address. Then the Verase program is executed allowing the lecturer to take control of their machine. The student can see the lecturer working on the computer. We may allow other students to invoke this feature in future versions.