Podcasting

Podcasting is an easy way to deliver a series of audio files in such a way that people can subscribe and have all current and future 'episodes' downloaded automatically to their computer or media player.

Podcasting in Moodle

There are several ways to podcast in Moodle:

• Create a discussion forum and activate an RSS feed for the forum. Then simply post messages with media files as attachments. These will be delivered as podcasts in the RSS feed.

Note: This works in some situations and not in others. For example, users that do not have full permissions to access the forum may find that their podcast software does not have rights to the media files.

• Use the optional Ipodcast module which creates a specific podcasting activity type in Moodle. The advantage of this method is that it includes extra metadata designed to work well with Apple's iTunes software (such as keywords and category labels).
• Use "Podcaster" module: found here in Modules and Plugins.

Podcasting about Moodle

You may also like to know that a podcast about Moodle is in preparation, tentatively called "mCast".

Software for receiving podcasts

• Apple's iTunes is currently one of the more popular pieces of software for subscribing to podcasts
• Juice (previously known as iPodder) which is open-source and available on Windows and Macintosh.
• Songbird, a truly cross-platform, Open Source media player.
• Rhythmbox for the Gnome Desktop
• Amarok for KDE

See also

• Using Moodle Podcasting module forum
• Wikipedia article on podcasting
• Apple webpage on podcasting
• Audio in Moodle
• iTunes university block contributed code that links to iTunes U