SAKAI UPDATE
MICHAEL KORCUSKA
March 17, 2009. Nagoya, Japan
About Sakai
Sakai History
Courseware Management
System
Started in 2004
Michigan, Indiana,
Stanford, MIT (and
Berkeley)
Mellon Foundation Grant
2.6 release in QA
Why Start Sakai?
5 Schools with Homegrown
CMS
Inefficient to build 5
systems
Wanted to maintain control
Experts in teaching and
learning
Desire to work together
and share knowledge
Why Sakai?
Stanford wrote about 20%
of the original code in
Sakai. What we have
received in return is five
times what we have put in, a
tremendous return on
investment. The value of
community source is very
to us.
Loisreal
Brooks

Director of Academic Computing
Stanford University
Coursework, Stanford University
Defining Sakai: Product Scope
COURSE MANAGEMENT — all the
tools of a modern course management
system.
RESEARCH & COLLABORATION —
project sites for research and work
group collaboration.
SAKAIBRARY — Library-led
component to add citations directly
into Sakai.
PORTFOLIOS — Open Source
Portfolio (OSP) is a core part of Sakai.
Course
Management
Research &
Collaboration
Sakaibrary
Portfolios
Defining Sakai: Community
COMPOSITION — educational
institutions & commercial enterprises
working in partnership with
standards bodies & other opensource initiatives.
GOALS — work collaboratively to
develop innovative software
applications designed to enhance
teaching, learning, research &
collaboration in education.
VALUES — knowledge sharing,
information transparency,
meritocracy.
Educational
Institutions
Standards
Bodies
Open
Source
Commercial
Affiliates
Sakai on the ground
200+ PRODUCTION/PILOT DEPLOYMENTS: From 200 to 200,000 users
Sakai on the ground

5 of top 10 Universities run Sakai
 Stanford
 Berkeley
 Cambridge
 Columbia
 Oxford

#11 also runs Sakai (Yale)
Sakai on the ground
Users
Institutions
130,000+
Indiana, UNISA
60,000+
Michigan
11,000 50,000
Berkeley, Cape Town, Etudes
Consortium, New England
(AU), Valencia, Virginia Tech,
Yale
1,000 10,000
Cambridge, Cerritos, Charles
Sturt, Fernando Pessoa,
Lleida, Mount Holyoke,
North-West, Rice, Roskilde,
Rutgers, Saginaw Valley, UC
Merced, Whitman,
Arteveldehogeschool
CTOOLS, University of Michigan
First production Sakai deployment, 2004
Defining Sakai: Code
OPEN LICENSING — Sakai’s software is
made available under the terms of the ECL,
a variant of the Apache license. The ECL
encourages a wide range of use, including
commercial use.
NO FEES OR ROYALTIES — Sakai is free
to acquire, use, copy, modify, merge,
publish, redistribute & sublicense for any
purpose provided our copyright notice &
disclaimer are included.
NO “COPYLEFT” RESTRICTIONS — unlike
GPL redistributed derivative works are
neither required to adopt the Sakai license
nor publish the source code as open-source.
EDUCATIONAL COMMUNITY
LICENSE (ECL)
Increasing Global Diversity
In 2006, 81% were in North America
Defining Sakai: Foundation




MISSION — manage & protect intellectual property;
provide basic infrastructure & small staff; help coordinate
design, development, testing & distribution of software;
champion open source & open standards.
GOVERNANCE — ten board members elected by member
reps to serve three-year terms; Executive Director manages
day-to-day operations.
PARTNERS — over 100 member organizations contribute
$10K per year ($5K for smaller institutions).
BUDGET — funds 4-6 staffers, admin services, computing
infrastructure, project coordination, conferences, Sakai
Fellows Program, advocacy & outreach activities.
Why Sakai?

UCT decided to move to open
source in 2004, migrating from
WebCT & a home-grown system.
Open source offers the advantages
of flexibility & avoids the risks of
vendor lock-in & escalating license
costs. We were attracted to Sakai
by the size & expertise of the
community around it.
Stephen Marquard, Learning Technologies Coordinator,
University of Cape Town
Why Sakai 3?

Changing expectations
Google docs/apps, Social
Networking, Web 2.0
 Success of project sites =
Sakai beyond courses


New technologies

Standards-based, open source
projects
JCR (Jackrabbit)
 Open Social (Shindig)


Client-side programming

JavaScript/AJAX
Sakai 3 Themes
Content Authoring and
Management
Academic Networking
Breaking the Site
Boundary
Academic Workflows, not
(just) Tools
Sakai, Thick or Thin
Sakai Everywhere
Content

Content Basics:






Interactive Widgets
Everything is content


Simple page creation (wikilike)
WYSIWG Editing
Template-based authoring
Versioning
Searchable, linkable, portable
Unified content repository
Sakai 2
Site A
Site B
?
Finding something requires
knowing which site it belongs to.
Sakai 3
Tags: System,
Organizational & User
Search + Smart Folders
Academic Networking

Academic Networking
 People
are important, but “friends” aren’t enough
 Content-based – Who is reading the same articles?
 Activity based – Who has taken the same classes?
Sakai 2: Users & Sites
Site A
Site B
User 1
User 2
User 3
User 4
User 5
.
.
.
User N
User 1
User 2
User 3
User 4
User 5
.
.
.
User N
Group A1
Users and groups exist within the context of a site.
Group B1
Sakai 3 Groups & Sites

Groups & Sites (call them spaces?) Separated
 Member
of a group – People with something in common
 Access to a space – Collection of content & functionality
 Support for hierarchy
Space A
Space AA
Space AB
Group 1.1
Group 1
Group 1.2
Space B
Group 2
Space C
Group 3
Sakai 2 Architecture
Tool
Service
Kernel
Service
Tool
• Facilitates independent tool
development
• Resists intuitive workflows
• Contributes to inconsistent
user experience
Sakai 3 Architecture
Service
Kernel
Service
• Workflows built across
services
• Encourages presentation &
service separation
• Services need to respond to
more customers
• UX oversight is more
complicated
Academic Workflow

Beyond Tool Silos
 Academic
work flows often cross tool boundaries
 Anything
can be graded!
 Anything can be discussed!
 This
is beginning to appear in Sakai 2
 But

more needs to be done
Example: Instructor puts into syllabus an assignment
to create a discussion post that will be graded.
4
tools for both instructors and students!
Academic Workflow Example
Week
1
2
Readings
Activities & Assignments
All Course Policies
Jackson1Response
MediaTextbook Chapter
Forum (3
Images
Textbook Chapter
2 posts)
Write a response to Jackson
Videos
Jackson Article
article & post to discussion forum
Audio
Create Assignment…
Name: Jackson Reading Response
Forums
Class
Intro
Forum
Due Date: September 10, 2009
Tests
(27 posts)
Points:
10 (of 150)
Site Pages
Type: Individual
Polls
Description: Respond to the Jackson article in no more than
Forum
500Some
words.Other
Post that
response to the class discussion forum.
Link(0To:posts)
Select...
Advanced Options…
Link to Something
Cancel
New…
Select text & click
“Create
Assignment”
Edit Assignment
Information
Create
Choose
Student View
Week
Readings
1
Course Policies
Textbook Chapter 1
2
Textbook Chapter 2
Jackson Article
Activities & Assignments
Write a response to Jackson
article & post to discussion forum
Assignment: Jackson Reading Response
Due Date: September 10, 2009 ( due tomorrow)
Status: Not submitted
Points: 10 possible (of 150).
Description: Respond to the Jackson article in no more than
500 words. Post that response to the class discussion forum.
Read more…
Link(s): Jackson Response Discussion Forum (Create Post…)
Student View, Graded
Week
Readings
Activities & Assignments
1
Course Policies
Textbook Chapter 1
2
Textbook Chapter 2 Write a response to Jackson
Jackson Article
article
& post
to discussion
forum
Assignment:
Jackson
Reading
Response
Due Date: September 10, 2009 (due date passed)
Status: Submitted and Graded
Points: 9/10 (of 150). View feedback
Description: Respond to the Jackson article in no more than
500 words. Post that response to the class discussion forum.
Read more…
Link(s): Jackson Response Discussion Forum (go to Forum now)
Sakai, Thick or Thin

Multiple Configurations
 Sakai
as CMS
 Sakai as Collaboration System
 Sakai as Portfolio System

Sakai Integrations
 Google
Applications
 Social Networks (Open Social, Facebook)
Sakai Everywhere
Sakai 3 Demo
http://3akai.sakaifoundation.org
Sakai 3 Technology Goals

Scalability
Remove bottlenecks from Sakai 2
 Improve cluster support


Developer Productivity
Faster builds
 UX & back-end development separated


Code Quality & Maintenance
Reliance on other open source efforts
 Increase unit testing


Easier to install/build

To improve initial experience for new developers
JCR as Content Store

Standards-based
 JSR
170
 Ships with Apache Jackrabbit, but can be changed

Everything as content
 Discussion
post, User profile information, etc.
 Components put Content into JCR Content store
 Sakai Kernel creates relational indices in DB
 Component
doesn’t need to do anything
 Automatic tracking of most events by kernel
JSON



Sakai Kernel supports JSON microformat
Components use REST calls to interact with Kernel
Again, standards based
 JAX-RS

currently in Kernel (JSR 311)
Benefits
 Back-end
services stay Java-based
 UX programmers more often skilled in JavaScript
 Easier
 Tools
UX developers can work on Sakai
like GWT can be used for Java-based UI
 Components can be written using other languages
Sakai 3 Participation

K2 Working Group
 http://groups.google.com/group/sakai-kernel

UX Design Work
 UX
list
 http://groups.google.com/group/3akai

How would you like to be involved?
 Development
 Java
& JavaScript
 Design
 Conceptual,
interaction and visual
When


Q1 2009: Sakai 2.6
Q3 2009: Sakai 2.6.#


A maintenance release for fall production
2010


Q1: Sakai 2.7 (New assignments tool and gradebook?)
Later: First versions of Sakai 3




Not functionally equivalent to 2.7
Suitable for new adoptions
“Hybrid” version for existing Sakai schools
2011



Sakai 3 as full replacement
Maintenance releases for Sakai 2.7 through 2013
No version 2.8
ありがとうございました