Moodle / Joomla / JFusion - best development platform for e-learning, communication and information portal?

Question

I've been asked to develop an information and e-learning website with an emphasis on community aspects that will also encompass a lot of other areas. There is a tight budget to this project, so I'm looking to use off the shelf products where possible - but I need to make sure I pick the best possible platform to begin with.

I am a php developer with extensive database knowledge, so I'm envisioning a degree of active development.

The main requirements are:

• User Contribution / Community Building
• General Content
• E-learning
• Forums
• Blogs
• Articles
• eCommerce
• Listings Directory
• Wikis

Future areas that have been discussed by the organisation include social networking, so there is a definite emphasis on the community and user contributory aspects.

I know that Moodle is regarded as a leader when it comes to developing e-learning solutions, but I'm fearful it will fall short in the many other areas that the site requires (I'm aware there are plugins / modules available for Moodle, but I'm not sure if generally there is enough development in these areas).

A solution which looks promising to me is JFusion, which is an open-source bridge to combine several different systems (in terms of structure and user authentication) - this is built around Joomla, but supports Moodle and several forum software products, along with Magento eCommerce. This would also open up the massive world of Joomla extensions, which I think would cover all the requirements above.

So, to summarise, my question is - should I try to stick within the confines of Moodle, or should I look to other solutions to cover all angles?

I'd be very interested to hear from developers who've used both platforms - or perhaps know of more suitable platforms on which to base things.

Answer 1

Is your primary task to provide a featured LMS, custom social-type extension around an LMS, or merely content?

Moodle is an excellent product, and I think it's likely that you can do what you need around that, but the JFusion solution you're outlining sounds promising to me on the face of it. At that point I'd go with whichever suits your teams technical skills and comfort better.

Answer 2

At my company, I've been able to achieve a little of what you've described, I believe. We run our company homepage with marketing, enrolments and community (read: a forum) on Joomla 1.5, and this has been linked to our Moodle site for the courseware. A slightly modified Moodle authentication "external db" plugin lets users have a single sign-on between the two sites.

Though it looks as though Moodle has been pushing towards being a bit of a "portal" solution (being able to cover generic homepage and community functionality as well as courseware), it seems a little underdone and clunky currently. Joomla 1.5 has been a big step forward and the much more active plugin community of Joomla will serve you well.

I would be interested to know how you got on with JFusion though..?

Answer 3

Integrating Moodle with other solutions is the way to go - Joomla, as you've suggested, and also take a look at ELGG (version 1.5 just released). Moodle is working towards a repository API of some kind - the Open University, in particular, is writing code for this at the moment.

Answer 4

Moodle can be integrated really well into Joomla. Even a universal portal generator like Joomla-Builder afford to rely on JFusion integration and include it into their builds in production. I personally know at least one serious company that relies on Joomla+Moodle solution for their distant learning projects.

Answer 5

Hi,

Can some one post some lights on what to do in Joomla and what in Moodle.

For example, Discussion forum is in Joomla as well as in Moodle. Which one to use and why?

Any pointers in this direction would be really helpful.

Regards, Krishna

Answer 6

Efront (www.efrontlearning.net) will meet your needs. Its blows Moodle away in terms of UI and social features. You can also look at integrating Efront and Joomla , using JFusion's efront plugin.

Answer 7

Well both platforms have forum features in the ordinary sense. Beyond that, forums in moodle can be graded, and the grades automatically added to learners C/A.