The point isn't just cost. The administration of many of these systems
takes significant time - usernames and passwords, groups and
memberships, access rights. Many of these web solutions are hosted
externally and cannot therefore integrate easily with existing school or
user databases.
If you're interested in a cheap solution and things like mysql
integration, you could start by looking at moodle. If you use
sharepoint then you're into MS servers and IIS/ISA servers, and you
still have a lot of work to do to get a 'school' structure up and
running. You'd have similarly to work on moodle to produce a structure
which is acceptable, but if you have pupil and staff data in existing
databases you will be able to customise moodle more.
It depends on how large the site might become. Moodle would be good on
a relatively small scale, and you are trading off costs: developers
costs money by the hour as well, and even if that's you or existing
staff you should cost it.
I'm installing a product called 'firefly' which originated from St
Paul's School, and is now being managed by a separate small company.
Why? We use MS servers. Firefly authenticates to NT/200* servers, and
integrates with active directory, where we can store pupil/staff/group
data. Minimal administration costs therefore. It's written in c#
.net and though the code belongs to the company, it's possible to
customise page content to integrate with any external database (and you
can run PHP/mysql on an IIS server if you feel so inclined).
Page editing happens online - less hassle, less skills needed. Much
easier to impose consistency over content generated by others, and no
need to learn how to use editing packaged unless you're into technical
stuff.
Because it sits on our server, we have the opportunity to roll out
various media formats for internal use - with an external server, you
wouldn't really want to put up too much movie content for example.
We are going to take data from SIMS to active directory to define groups
and access rights. We can script this but I'm thinking how we can do
this live. After all, SIMS is just an SQL database.
Once up and running robustly, we will make the server available
externally, and it will probably run the school's 'official' website as
well; that depends on bandwidth requirements and costs.
This is not a sales pitch, but an attempt to explain the logic behind a
decision which I think will suit our specific requirements and setup. I
think you have to define what you want from your website first, and only
then how to deliver it. AT which point you will eliminate a lot of
products, and I suspect the solution will find itself.
Derek
-----Original Message-----
From: linuxgirlie [mailto:linuxgirlie@gmail.com]
Sent: 17 January 2005 12:12
To: suse-linux-uk-schools@suse.com
Subject: Re: [suse-linux-uk-schools] Re: The BETT Show & A Computer on
Tottenham Court Road
Have we got all those things? Though in seperate packages??!??
If so surely its just a case of putting on a frontend for all the
systems so its intergrated. I'm pretty sure its easy enough to get PHP
to talk to all of the different MySql Databases provided.
Has anyone got any ideas to what we can use instead??
This sort of thing really annoys me!! ARGH!!
:)
Jo
On Mon, 17 Jan 2005 11:56:38 +0000, Colin McQueen
linuxgirlie
wrote: I was interested in RM who seemed to be showing off a VMWare clone and M$ who seemed to be showing some kind of Online Classroom system
like Moodle.
This may be the Learning Gateway. It is essentially Sharepoint Portal
Server 2003 (SPS) configured for LEA/Schools with web parts for Class Server, Exchange Server and LIVE Comms server (Messenger) and some integrating web parts that bring assignment deadlines, school events and personal calendars into a planner view. There are attempts to integrate SIMS as well. All held together by MSSQL server and protected by ISA-SERVER. Very expensive solution but quite good at sharing and indexing information. Moodle has far more learning tools and isn't trying to be all things. RM has Kaleidos as a VLE and CMS and may be releasing a complete MLE/LMS in Autumn which licences SPS from MS. Connect 3 schools only at first. Other similar things on show, NetMedia's MyGrid4Learning and Capita's Learning Platform. All very expensive.
-- Colin McQueen
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