During the time I posted my last post – The LMS – Will it survive? and continuing after that, there have been some interesting discussions around LMS by Clark Quinn, Jane Hart, Harold Jarche, Dave Wilkins and others debating the need of an LMS, raising questions from why we need it, whether we need it, how it should be viewed, will it survive, etc. You can read some interesting posts around these questions here – LMS is no longer the center of the universe, What is the future of the LMS?, When to LMS, A case for the LMS?, Why bash the LMS?, A Defense of the LMS (and a case for the future of Social Learning).

It seemed the LMS was under fire recently from many corners and questions were being raised about its very future – Jane Hart recently posted what is the future of the lms reviewing the useful of an LMS, followed up by a similar post by Harold Jarche suggesting the LMS is no longer the centre of the universe.

Clark Quinn brought in a little balance by highlighting what the LMS could be used for and to what extent in his post – a case for the LMS.

Moodle is a good LMS with which has grown over the years and offers a host of functionality and features that are very useful to have in an LMS. Add to it the fact that its open source which makes it free to use, has made it very popular.

Moodle has been able to sustain itself and keep evolving through its community, resulting in its emergence as a good option for anyone wanting to use an LMS. But is Moodle or any other open source LMS (there are a few good ones like the ones mentioned here) really free? Though they may be free at a tangible expense level, they do carry a cost which the organization implementing the LMS should be aware and careful of.

The LMS market is heating up by the day for past many months now and it looks like it is going, more or less, as predicted by Bersin & Associates about 6 months back – The LMS market: hotter than ever. I have seen a significant increase in attention towards LMS both in terms of technology and also in terms of the end value being delivered by it to an organization, its end users (learners, instructors, and administrators). To keep up with the happenings, trends, innovations, and other information on LMS and to ensure our teams at Upside involved in core LMS development, client implementations, client support and Innovation team are in tune with the industry we follow a host of blogs that focus specifically on LMS, learning technology, and related topics.

A recent post on our blog poked fun at Learning management systems and underlined the disconnect that is possibly present in organizations that use an LMS to create, deliver and manage learning. In this post I attempt to illustrate how, by adopting some simple methods, you could use the LMS better and also get some aid in Learning measurement.

Learning measurement, it looks like, is not an easy term to define. I couldn’t find it on Wikipedia and Google didn’t help much either.

LMS is a fairly common and used (or over-used) phrase in eLearning parlance and means, primarily a software system that allows customers to do a few or many things when it comes to adopting eLearning as a part of the overall Learning strategy. For quite some time now I have been trying to understand – how does a customer look at the LMS? Are more customers looking it as a mere tool which automates tasks and increases the productivity and efficiency of training department or are they looking it as a ‘solution’ or maybe something much bigger than that as well – strategy?

Recently we’ve made the UpsideLMS compatible to mobile devices and also launched a new version – UpsideLMS Version 4.0. While ensuring compliance, we encountered some interesting issues in the implementation of SCORM and found very little help online about implementing SCORM for mobile devices. So we thought sharing that experience might help.

Mobile devices have limitations:

- Screen size
- Availability of required technology/software like J2ME, a compatible browser
- Availability of consistent internet connection

In the past I have written a few posts mainly focused on making the process of selecting the right LMS for your business need – be it internal training management or selling training as a business. We looked at a series of things focusing on the right way to go about open source LMS, in case you are switching to a new LMS system, the critical consideration on how to decide between hosted and behind-the-firewall option, and even a few tips on what not to do while selecting an LMS.

As responses to a recent post where I listed five things not to do while selecting an LMS I received a couple of queries about using an Open Source LMS, customizing it to suit the requirements and if it is advisable to do so. There were also questions around the best approach to use an open source LMS and on how to estimate the amount of maintenance such might require on an ongoing basis. This post is for people exploring an open source LMS as an option either for a new LMS setup or for a switch-over.

Following the recent release of UpsideLMS Version 4.0 we have now introduced a reseller program for the product and related services. We invite independent organizations and individual professionals to the program. We aim to expand our reach to markets and customers needing reliable eLearning solutions.

For an eLearning initiative to be successful, strong leaders and champions are needed in the organization. It also needs a robust and reliable LMS solution amongst others (great courses, proper alignment of the training function with the LMS, technical support for the entire setup, etc.) The LMS remains a key link in the success chain.