Sakai - Open Source Course MS - Cool Tool

Sakai is an open source courseware and collaboration product.  Collaboration is as key to the product as the courseware concept.  The idea is that not only can teachers provide resources, but that faculty can interact with other faculty or staff.  Development of the tool is heavily influenced by the schools that use the software package and comprise the community.  As an open source project, anybody can add to the code unlike a product built by a commercial vendor.  The fact that the code base can be used by any sized institution is of tremendous value.

The project is led by the Sakai Foundation, a member-based nonprofit.  Members include higher ed and commercial partners.  The Foundation acts as a coordinator of the community, keeping a pulse on what developers are up to.  It provides a connecting point for others across the community and hosts several conferences a year.

I recently downloaded the Sakai demo and loaded it up on my laptop.  The process is pretty straight forward.  This is the route I took on my Mac.

1. Go to http://sakaiproject.org/portal/site/sakai-downloads/page/6faced6e-dd0a-4cd0-a528-d30eae3a4670
2. Download the Mac/*nix demo sakai-demo-2.5.4.tar.gz
3. Unpack the demo by double clicking on it
4. Plopped it into my MAMP setup in the htdocs folder
5. I then opened the demo_readme.txt file which sent me to the command line
6. You’ll need to change your directory to the Sakai demo folder.  In my case I entered into my terminal window

cd /Applications/MAMP/htdocs/sakai-demo-2.5.4

7. Then you need to start the package up.  To do this type into the command line: ./start-sakai.sh
8. Once Sakai has started up, you’ll be able to access the site at:  http://localhost:8080/portal

Once you access the site, logging in as an admin allows you to start setting up your collaboration environment.  The system is set up with an a home dashboard  that gives you an overview of recent announcements, discussions, and chats.  The system has an area for posting/submitting assignments and a way for teachers to grade them.  You can set up a simple blogging environment.  A drop box section allows for file sharing. There is also a messaging system that allows you to send mail between collaborators.  There is an evaluation tool that allows review of student portfolio items.  Forums can be made available for discussions. The Gradebook allows grades to be stored from tests and quizzes and for offline grades to be entered. There is a linking area that allows for linking to offsite resources. The Mailtool allows for group emails and for the teacher to attach documents to those message.  The news feature works as an RSS aggregator.  A podcasting tool allows site managers to create, store and distribute audio, video, and graphic files.  Sakai includes a polling feature.  The presentation section allows you to display slides to users.  You can move forward and backward in real time, as the presenter.  Users can also use “View” mode to navigate on their own.  Resources allows posting of documents amongst URLs for other sites.  Administrators can use the roster to view all site participants.  The schedule represents a calendar with deadlines and events.  The system includes an internal search engine.  Teachers can add a Syllabus to a course.  Tests and Quizzes can be administered through the system as well.

The system will also allow for customizations to layouts and templates.  You can add custom css to control the appearance of the site.

There is much more to Sakai than this list of features and over the last couple of days, I’ve only scratched the surface of this tool.  So far I am impressed by the depth and breadth of the offering.  It makes me wish that I was still teaching and I could set it up for a real class.

If you are a teacher, it is worth the time downloading/setting up Sakai and experimenting with it.  It could prove a useful element in your toolbelt.

Have you used Moodle? (http://moodle.org/) I'd be curious to know how they stack up against each other.

I think you'd want to check out both - like CMS systems, as it all comes down to the tension between flexibility and built in features.  That said, both Moodle and Sakai have great feature sets and active communities.  Moodle seemed slightly easier to me to set up than Sakai - but neither was horribly tough.

Moodle seems clunky and I was not able to do much with it, but have not spent much time with it either. I was going to try Sakai, but the Java and Tomcat requirements put me off.

If I can't just upload and install on a shared hosting account then I'm not going to try it at this time. Maybe someday when I really need something like this.

Using the All-in-one installer takes care of Tomcat and Java for you.  It really isn't tough to set up to evaluate.