[Using Sakai] URGENT: I must choose between Sakai and Moodle within 24 hours

[Warwick Chapman]

Hi All

Please accept my apologies for the cross-post of some of this email with the
production mailing list.

I've been tasked with deploying a learning platform for the Democratic
Alliance (www.da.org.za), the official opposition political party in South
Africa.  We want to use this platform to further and more effectively train
all our public representatives and staff around the country.

I have a report detailing the outcomes of a scoping workshop which I can
make available to anyone should they be interested but basically, the
requirements of the platform are as follows:
1. Online courses
2. Knowledgebase
3. Chat module for learner support
4. Forum
5. Must work on dialup-speed connections, though we expect most people to
have 256kbps-4096kbps connections
6. Simple to create and manage courses and assessment tools
7. Support multiple languages (SA has 11 official languages)
8. Work on mobile devices

The more I look at Sakai, the more it appears to me that out of the box it
meets more of these requirements than Moodle does, and it seems to me to be
better built and more sensible.  As much as it seems the learning curve is
steep, deployment significantly more complex and hardware requirements
higher, I am drawn to the longer term sensibility of deploying this solution
using Sakai as opposed to Moodle.

-- BUT --

I have been in the IT industry for 15 years as a developer, project manager
and executive focusing on Open Source solutions and Sakai is making me feel
like a real dum dum.  I have 2.6.2 demo running and am using Packt's "Sakai
Courseware Management" as a guide.

Something as simple as following the steps in "My First Project Site" are
leaving me wondering if Sakai is well documented enough for the average
non-University IT department user to deploy and manage.  I cannot seem to
find a "new" link in Worksite Setup when logged in as a non-admin user and
as an admin, I cannot find where to grant permission to the non-admin user
to create a project site.

After staring at the documents and book for several hours, I am worried that
the Sakai learning curve is just too steep to make it a responsible
technology choice for a platform which will initially be deployed and
managed by one person, me.

Also, I cannot seem to easily find details relating to what hardware
requirements I should expect for a low-use deployment.  Pointers?

If I must just settle on Moodle and try make it pretty and work nicely, and
struggle with the rather painful course maintenance and assessment, please
just let me know and I will get cracking.  As lame as it sounds, our
Democracy needs this system now and it needs it working well.  A better
skilled and informed opposition makes for a more vibrant and functioning
Democracy.  I am sure we will all agree that in Africa, that can only be a
good thing.

Be little a part of making that happen, and help a brutha out please! :)

Warwick
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