Agree that all of the applications are requiring more implementation time and effort than is ideal. However, generally is does not require a Java programmer to implement Blackboard or WebCT. Having worked with a couple hundred institutions in implementing and managing course management systems I can assure you that. The primary need for integration is with the student information system and that is becoming more plug and play.

Clearly applications like Blackboard and WebCT which have been deployed at thousands of instiutions which have been counting on 24x7 access for 4-5 years now are more shrink-wrapped and tested than Sakai which has been deployed at perhaps a dozen or so Institutions. Moodle, on the other hand, you could argue has been more widely deployed certainly than Sakai and may be rivaling the commercial products. Also, Moodle strikes me as an open source app that is much more oriented toward installation and use by knowledgable end-users - guys like me who don't program anymore but can install a database and something like pHpBB.

In higher ed open source, the two very different directions that a Moodle and a Sakai come from are very interesting. Moodle is more like what we all think of as open source - go to the web site, download it, install it, get updates, etc. Sakai and others that I refer to as "grant funded" initiatives are more closed in that an institution or vendor has to pay $10000 to the Sakai foundation to participate, get access, etc. This model has been called "community source". Some think this is the right model for a community like higher ed with special needs. I have no opinion. Let's wait and see what comes out of it.

I write more on the background for higher ed open source in the online report at:

http://www.a-hec.org/research/in-depth_articles/op en_source0505/open_source0505_toc.html

Clarification is needed on the much bandied about quote, "It's not quite ready for prime time," First, is says "not quite" as opposed to "not". Second, those words are not in my report anywhere. Third, the reporter at Inside Higher Ed probably shouldn't have even had quotes around that because he is actually attributing it simultaneously to both me and Kenneth Green, founding director of the Campus Computing Project, which studies the role of technology in higher education (who according to the article "calls the mindset regarding open source "affirmative ambivalence." Chief information officers are confident the software will be a part of the future but are still taking a wait-and-see approach"). I don't recall saying anything about "prime time" in my conversations with the reporter. He decided to lump me into the attribution for that phrase that may have come from Casey Green - I have no way to know.

In the Inside Higher Ed article it says, "Rob Abel, founder of the Alliance for Higher Education Competitiveness and chief executive of IMS Global Learning Consortium, shared Green's view. "There's a lot of considering, but commitment isn't very high," he said." I do remember saying that (or something close to it). Again, this is referring to the higher ed specific applications which the data from the surveys clearly indicated that there are very high percentages of schools considering/evaluating them but relatively few are adopting as their primary application at this point. I stand by that point because the data clearly indicates it.

As mentioned in some of my other comments on this site it is very early days and lack of adoption now does not mean there is any conclusion. The main reason for doing the study was to identify what are the obstacles so that they could be addressed. My personal perspective is that higher ed can benefit greatly from the investments in both the commercial and open source products and I'd like to see that happen - more innovation, adoption, and learning.

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