Advantages of LMSs Introduction to Learning Management System (for SEAMEO SEAMOLEC)
Learning Management System 35
• Ensure that quality control requirements are met by providing a standard vehicle for collecting the required information.
• Facilitate the integration of distance and campus-based learning or of learning on dif- ferent campuses.
You may find other advantages that can be added to the list
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There three choice of LMS that can be used to manage e-learning: 1 create “home brand“ LMS, 2 buy commercial LMS, or 3 use the downloadable free open-source LMS from
the Internet. If the educational institutions don’t want to manage their own LMSs to serve e-learning, they also can use LMS hosting, which provide space and facility to manage e-
learning. This alternative may be the simplest way to get start with e-learning, but every- thing may depend on the hosting organization. Training organization has no free custo-
mization of the LMS used by the hosting organization until the hosting company provides customizable choice usually with extra costs. There is a growing number of on-demand
LMSs which dont require any software installation. One example of LMS hosting is LMS Hosting Service:
http:www.e-learningconsulting.comproductslms-hosting.html .
Some free open-source LMS sites also provide LMS hosting for trial but without technical supports nor warranty of undeleted data.
The first choice requires high skilled-programmers to develop LMS that meets the institu- tion requirements. To develop own LMS may also take time, but the developed LMS will
fully satisfy all requirements specified by the institution.
Choosing commercial product will require extra costs because usually commercial LMS charged based on number of users and require annual payment. However, there is usual-
ly full support from LMS vendor, which mean the institution may not need to hire high- skilled IT professional to maintain the LMS.
While most systems are commercially developed, free and open-source models do exist. Other than the most simplistic, basic functionality, all LMSs cater to, and focus on differ-
ent educational, administrative, and deployment requirements.
For those who wishing to deliver e-learning there are many free open source and several proprietary LMSs available for use. Open source LMSs are increasingly popular and can
be easily installed and customized with little programming knowledge. On-demand e- learning services are also a popular choice because they can be deployed in minutes and
dont require instructors institutions to run their own servers.
Setting up an LMS that is not provided on-demand typically requires access to a web server which supports the language that the LMS is written in PHP is common, as well
as a database backend. MySQL and PostgreSQL are popular whilst proprietary backends like MS SQL and Oracle are not frequently used with open source LMSs.