A Bridge Between Blackboard and Open Source?

As the competition heats up in the land of Learning Management Systems (LMS), Blackboard is offering to partner with Syracuse to develop an open source plugin that will send data back and forth between Sakai and Blackboard. Some see this as Blackboard's way of trying to put everything under 1 roof (their roof). Others see it as being good for the community at large as one might be able to choose which technology to use for various scenarios. For example, a school might have blackboard as their portal and LMS, but maybe they would like to use Moodle as the LMS and keep Blackboard as the portal. It sounds like this plugin may offer that solution. Personally, I think most major Learning Management Systems are capable of performing quite similar functions these days, so one must accurately count the cost of each system at their institution. I think more and more of the LMS market is moving open source because of its high quality, low cost, and intelligent community, which might be frightening if one is trying to sell a product that others are giving away for free. Just my take. What is yours?

A Bridge Between Blackboard and Open Source? :: Inside Higher Ed :: Higher Education's Source for News, Views and Jobs

A Bridge Between Blackboard and Open Source?

Blackboard, the dominant player in course management software, has the ability to inspire devotion and, for the more fervid open-source adherents, not a little contempt. So today’s announcement may cause a stir among those more apt to liken Blackboard to the devil than a gentle giant: The company is partnering with Syracuse University to develop a way to integrate Blackboard with Sakai, one of the primary open-source alternatives.