I recently posted this to the Moodle 2.0 forum at
http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=119349
TIm, IMS LTI has two parts – Basic LTI and Full LTI. Basic LTI is launch-only and Full LTI does provisioning, launch, and run-time web services. Marc and Jordi are working on Basic LTI for Moodle 2.0.
Basic LTI essentially allows you to author a Basic LTI resource in a Moodle course like any other resource. In a sense, it is a “smart iFrame”. When you select the resource, instead of just putting the URL in the iFrame, Moodle will generate a form with the user and course information and then sign that request using OAuth (www.oauth.net) and a key/secret stored by the instructor inside Moodle and then auto-post the form, sending the user and course data to the external tool.
OAuth is used by Google and Twitter to establish server-to-server identity and end-user identity. IMS LTI only is using the server-to-server part of OAuth. OAuth insures against replay attack, password guessing attack. Since OAuth is designed to pass through a user’s browser, the data can be “viewed” without compromising security.
Basic LTI allows us to build lots of simple external tools for teaching and plug them into Moodle, Sakai, Blackboard, D2L, etc with the same integration (i.e. Basic LTI).
For all the LMS systems it means less need to install Moodle Modules, Sakai Tools or Building Blocks of “unknown quality” just to play with some tool in one class. It allows both the LMS developers and the LMS administrators to keep their systems clean and unmodified – while at the same time allowing teachers and learners far greater flexibility in the tools they can use in their courses.
It is my hope that this ushers in a new era where really cool learning-focused tools can be developed and used regardless of the LMS system in use at a campus.
I am hopeful that once we get Basic LTI support in all of the major LMS systems, then we can work on trading Learning Tools like trading cards. Instead of needing some PHP code installed in your system – you can add a new tool with a URL, Key, and Secret and a couple of clicks.
This is made even more exciting when we can create course cartridges with Basic LTI Launches embedded in them. This makes cartridges simpler, and smaller and yet allows very rich cartridges to be produced and distributed.
The status of LTI is that Basic LTI is about to be sent to the IMS Technical Advisory Board for review, approval, and release. The draft of the spec is only available to IMS members until it is approved and released as a final spec. There is a public discussion forum about IMS specs at:
http://www.imsglobal.org/community/forum/index.cfm?forumid=11
Let me know if you have any questions.