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OSS Not Ready for Prime Time in Education?
cel4145 writes "Inside Higher Ed reports that the Alliance for Higher Education Competitiveness has released a new study, The State of Open Source Software. Is it true that open source is 'not quite ready for prime time' in education? Or, as I suspect, is the study just another proprietary software vendor funded report for discouraging the adoption of open source software?" From the article: "Lack of vendor support is one of the largest hurdles limiting the adoption of open source in higher education, Abel said. 'The biggest thing is it takes more physical labor to implement open source because it isn't pre-packaged,' Abel said. "You have to have software developers that can make this stuff work.'" Are the staffing issues associated with OSS enough to outweigh the benefits?
Hi All- I've read the comments with extreme interest and wanted to share a bit more on the report.
First, this study is only about higher education - nothing to do with schools, K-12, etc.
Second, it broke open source into two categories:infrastructure area (Linux, Apache, etc.) and higher ed specific applications (course management systems, finance systems, etc.). I seen many comments that it is negative but the report itself is not negative at all. I think that is the impression from the Inside Higher Ed article that interviewed many other sources. But, the overall message is not negative. In the infrastructure area (Linux, Apache, etc.) open source is doing very well in higher ed. The application area (course management systems, finance systems, etc.) is where there is no tremendous interest but not a lot of fruit yet. That doesn't mean there won't be - long way to go.
Third, the study was funded by Sun Microsystems, Unicon, and SCT. While commercial companies all three have been leaders in promoting and implementing open source in higher education.
Fourth, the study was conducted from day 1 under the auspices that only those who participated in the research and the sponsors would receive the full report. That's how we attract support and involvement. If we made it all available for free no one would see why they should pay or participate (I know because I've tried it that way).
Fifth, IMS has had no involvement - other than me. We're making the A-HEC research a benefit of IMS membership starting with this and in the future.
Sixth, IMS is not just commercial vendors - far from it. Members include open University, Stanford, Michigan, Indiana, MIT, etc.
Seventh, I wrote the report and the sponsors helped make minor editorial comments. So, it is my work and I don't perceive myself as biased but then does anybody? Finally, those that have actually read the report from the higher ed open source community have so far commented that it is on target. I think if anything it is very hopeful about the future but giving statistically valid accounting of the current situtation.
If at some point in the future this research track becomes well enough subsidized that I can afford to open it up to the whole world I will. That may happen under the IMS umbrella. I certainly hope so. You won't find Gartner, Eduventures, or even Educause providing as much open info on teir web sites as A-HEC has published - and we are much less funded.
Lastly, A-HEC is a very legitimate honest organization that has had numerous volunteers from the higher education community participate and benefit from sharing of best practices. I personally donated a year of my time getting A-HEC going because I believe in it. It would be nice if folks would get involved and understand what we do before criticizing. Especially when this whole thread started on an ewrroneous premise that the report was negative!
Thanks for your interest in this, Rob