Course Management Systems for Distance Education Open Source v. Proprietary Michael Simonson, Ph.D. Program Professor Instructional Technology and Distance Education Fischler School of Education Nova Southeastern University Florida, USA Change Our Thinking

What do we know? Should we Worry?Worry?

Staggering Growth of DE

Teacher as Skeumorph

Face to Face Instruction Distance Delivered Instruction Teaching

Open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials — typically its source code — allowing users to create user-generated software content. Some consider it a philosophy, and others consider it a pragmatic methodology. Before open source became widely adopted, developers and producers used a variety of phrases to describe the concept; the term open source gained popularity with the rise of the Internet and its enabling of diverse production models, communication paths, and interactive communities. Subsequently, open source software became the most prominent face of open source practices. The open source model can allow for the concurrent use of different agendas and approaches in production, in contrast with more centralized models of development such as those typically used in commercial software companies. "Open source" as applied to culture defines a culture in which fixations are made generally available. Participants in such a culture are able to modify those products and redistribute them back into the community

Open Source v. Proprietary Myths Open source: “is like herding cats!” “requires a doctorate in computer science!” “makes sense only for large organizations!” “is designed for only small schools!” “are free!” Proprietary systems: “require you to give away your intellectual property!” “cost too much!” “lack flexibility!” “almost never malfunction!”

Open Source v. Proprietary? Traditional v. Distance Education Teacher Controlled v. Teacher Moderated Digital v. Physical Content Formal v. Informal Structure Decision Cycle

Moodle (Modular Object-Oriented Dynamic Learning Environment)

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