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

[kara.stiles at rsmart.com]

If you want to give a "standard" user the permission to create new courses or projects, complete these steps:

1. Login as admin
2. Click on the Administration Workspace
3. Click "Realms"
4. Select the !user.template realm
5. Click the .auth role
6. Select the checkbox next to site.add and site.add.course
7. Click Save (you may want to repeat steps 4-6 with the !user.template.registered and !user.template.maintain realms if you plan to use these realms)
8. Next, click the memory tool in the Admin workspace
9. Click "Reset All Caches"

Sakai is somewhat complex to install and configure, but that's also an advantage because Sakai is SO configurable and you can make it to lots of stuff that you can't make Moodle do.

If you want to try Sakai in a stable environment, you can register for a login at

http://mysakai.rsmart.com

You can also take a look at this webinar for more information on Sakai configuration:

http://www.rsmart.com/resource/learn-many-ways-configure-sakai-your-faculty

Thanks and good luck, I hope you pick Sakai.



Kara Stiles
Senior Functional Consultant
rSmart
http://www.rsmart.com
ICQ: 396517169

----- Original Message -----
From: "Warwick Chapman" <warwick at thusa.net>
To: sakai-user at collab.sakaiproject.org
Sent: Monday, February 22, 2010 11:49:31 AM GMT -07:00 U.S. Mountain Time (Arizona)
Subject: [Using Sakai] URGENT: I must choose between Sakai and Moodle within 24 hours


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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