SCIENCE

SANTA CLARA, CA -- Mentorware(TM), Inc. a leading innovator in eLearning and knowledge management solutions, announced today it has broken new ground in forwarding the overall discipline of eLearning in the marketplace. For the first time, a world-renowned conference, Sun Microsystems' JavaOne(SM), has been placed online, making it possible for a conference that lasts only a few days, to go on for 365 days, turning it into a perpetual conference. Mentorware's eLearning infrastructure powers Sun Microsystems' newly launched Java(SM) Learning Center program, converting the recent JavaOne conference technical sessions into an online classroom. Today, more than 150 JavaOne sessions along with an additional 30 new sessions by speakers who were not in attendance at the JavaOne event, are available for students on the Java Learning Center web site, http://java.sun.com/learning . By July 17, over 300 sessions will be available. "One of the big promises of the Internet has been the ability to put educational forums online and have them actually work out well," said Shyam Subramanyan, Mentorware president and CEO. "The placement of an entire conference's courseware online may start a trend that could revolutionize the conference industry. Java developers can now benefit from the learning delivered at one of the largest conferences in the world, without ever leaving their place of work." In just two months, the Mentorware powered and managed site was created providing the entire "soup to nuts" functionality starting with student registration, complete eCommerce functionality, and personalized learning delivery. "Converting the 300 plus sessions into eLearning classes in just six weeks is a challenging undertaking," said Jeet Vaidya, director, eLearning Services, Mentorware. "Over 120 Mentorware developers are working round-the-clock to complete the eLearning classes and meet our commitment of July 17, the result being over 300 hours of eLearning." This year's JavaOne conference hosted five days of sessions to 25,000 developers. With Mentorware's eLearning application infrastructure, now the one million plus developers worldwide who missed JavaOne, can today take part in the learning experience that the conference offered anytime and from anyplace that has access to the Internet. With both audio and visual, the user has the sense of sitting in a classroom listening to an instructor. Mentorware believes in the value of providing interactive learning content. "There has to be more than just text and graphics. We've found a way to leverage the power of the Internet by utilizing audio and visual features to enhance learning," said Subramanyan. "Because the classes require only a browser and a Flash 5 plug-in, which can be downloaded for free, they are quick to load and run on multiple platforms." "Sun believes in the concept of and is committed to enabling anyone from anywhere in the world to learn, share, and innovate at any time," said Kavindra Patel, manager, JavaOne Enhanced Learning, Sun Microsystems. "Through our collaboration with companies like Mentorware, we are able to bring the rich content and broad expertise provided at our annual JavaOne conferences to developers, IT managers and others throughout the year -- continuing the evolution of Java and other technologies that are redefining the network." Mentorware provides a complete end-to-end solution to power the Java Learning Center. Mentorware's third-generation Java-based infrastructure, now being used successfully by some of the largest companies in the world to develop, manage, and deliver eLearning, powers the Java Learning Center program. Mentorware's experienced content development team has created a process to quickly create over 300 hours of eLearning with content slides, audio, transcripts, and illustrations. Mentorware and Sun also plan to localize the top 30 classes in three languages -- Japanese, Mandarin, and Spanish. Because of this breakthrough in eLearning, conferences like JavaOne can now become a 365 day experience. For additional information visit www.mentorware.com