NeoSoar’s “eTextbooks for Education” platform a win-win-win for students, schools and publishers
1. White Paper
NeoSoar’s “eTextbooks for Education” platform a win-win-win
for students, schools and publishers
Taiwanese software developer NeoSoar, Inc. develops an innovative eTextbook delivery platform utilizing
Adobe Content Server and Adobe Reader Mobile SDK technologies through Datalogics.
Background
Pupils in the educational system in Taiwan consistently attain some of the highest test scores in the
world. With over 5 million students (primary, secondary and post-secondary), extremely high literacy
rates and very competitive / world-class / world-reknown secondary institutions, education continues
to be a top priority there.
The increased competitiveness among educational institutions; the proliferation (and growing
ubiquity) of powerful handheld computing devices; and the emergence of eBooks as a superior
alternative to traditional printed books has created an ideal market opportunity for Taiwanese
software developer NeoSoar to leverage their technical expertise to develop an “education
ecosystem” and a technology platform, built upon Adobe Content Server and Adobe Reader Mobile
SDK technologies from Datalogics, which provides benefits to students, schools, and publishers
alike.
Introducing the NeoSoar Platform
The NeoSoar platform is illustrated in Figure 1. It is a full-service, end-to-end, multitenant hosted
system for providing eTextbooks to students. Via this platform:
• Schools can review and select eTextbooks for course curricula from a number of different
(participating) publishers;
• Publishers can connect to multiple schools, and can market and sell or lend their eTextbooks to
schools and students;
• Students can access their semesters’ textbooks electronically on the device(s) of their choice;
and aren’t required to purchase textbooks permanently
Figure 1. Publishers, Universities and Students can all participate and engage on the NeoSoar platform.
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2. How it Works
The NeoSoar platform is comprised of a multi-tenant, highly available and scalable cloud-based
back-end server farm for use by schools and publishers, and a front-end client app for students.
Publishers upload their eTextbooks into the NeoSoar cloud; schools browse the set of uploaded
eTextbooks, place orders based on their course curricula and upload student information and
course schedules; and students download the front-end NeoSoar app from the Apple App Store or
Google Play, and connect to the NeoSoar cloud. As they do this, the corresponding eTextbooks are
automatically downloaded into the front-end app.
The Front End
The front-end app is an EPUB and PDF viewer built by NeoSoar using the Adobe Reader Mobile
SDK from Datalogics. The NeoSoar app is available for iOS, Android and Windows OS. Students
can download the app on multiple devices; content, bookmarks, and user-generated notes/
annotations are automatically synchronized across devices; and are automatically backed up.
In addition, students have easy access to online resources (dictionaries, encyclopedias, search
engines) and hyperlink targets while reading to facilitate an enhanced learning experience. Since the
reader utilizes industry-standard Adobe technology, students can also use the front-end app to read
content from any other sources that use ACS including public libraries, school libraries, and online
booksellers.
The Back End
The back-end consists of a stack of different technologies:
• a scalable commerce engine through which schools and publishers place, manage and fulfill
orders;
• a powerful relational database through which schools maintain student database, course
curricula, and student schedules;
• an Adobe Content Server farm to provide DRM on eTextbooks;
• a cloud storage service where content is stored, archived and backed up;
• a content delivery network, to optimize performance and facilitate delivery of static/cached
content; and
• unique administrative dashboards for schools and publishers to manage books, orders and
fulfillment; and to provide at-a-glance relevant metrics on orders, reading habits and reading
progress, and other useful metrics.
Figure 2. The NeoSoar back end architecture.
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3. The system is highly redundant, for performance and failover purposes; and it has been architected
to scale up and scale out as new schools and publishers join.
A scalable open system
The NeoSoar platform leverages industry standards (e.g., ONIX, XML) to facilitate batch processing
of orders, account setup and management, etc. The system is also integration-ready: publishers,
for example, could drive their front-end retail website powered by content served directly from the
NeoSoar cloud. Similarly, schools could integrate the eTextbook management and fulfillment services
with their own existing administrative websites.
The NeoSoar platform: for Schools
Schools utilize the NeoSoar platform to: review publishers’ titles and order eTextbooks for curricula;
manage student accounts, create users, generate/reset passwords; select and assign specific
eTextbooks for specific classes, and push content automatically to students’ reading devices; and
monitor student reading progress.
Figure 3. A standard reading progress dashboard for schools. The three green bars indicate overall student usage
rates (as indicated by client app activation rate); eTextbook fulfillment; and note/annotation utilization. Clicking on
individual books below displays specific reading progress of that book. This data is also available as ONIX-XML feeds,
should schools wish to design their own dashboards.
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4. The NeoSoar platform: for Students
Students access the NeoSoar platform completely through the front-end reading app. The app
is fully-featured, with powerful notes and highlights capabilities, and easy access to hyperlinked
data sources such as online dictionaries, encyclopedias and search engines. eTextbooks are
automatically loaded into their apps at the start of each semester, and are available for the duration
of the class. Students have the option to purchase the eTextbooks permanently, but this is not
required. Students can also use the front-end reading app to read content loaned from public
libraries, school libraries and purchased from other online booksellers utilizing Adobe Content Server.
Figure 4. The bookshelf view of the student iPad app and the reading view of the Windows app. Students can use
powerful notes and highlights functions to annotate important passages. These notes are automatically synced across
all students’ devices, and are backed up in the cloud. If the student loses their tablet, for example, all of their notes
would be automatically copied back to their replacement device.
The NeoSoar platform: for Publishers
Publishers utilize the NeoSoar platform to upload and manage their eTextbook titles. Through
this platform they can build the marketing and wholesale channels to every school that uses the
NeoSoar platform. In addition they can sell titles directly to students. All transactions are handled
within the system using a consistent mechanism: publishers do not have to implement new payment
procedures when new schools join the system.
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