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From Conception to Production The Yale Sakai Story

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Title: From Conception to Production The Yale Sakai Story


1
From Conception to Production-- The Yale Sakai
Story
  • Chuck Powell
  • April 11, 2007

2
Agenda
  • Some history to help understand
  • Why we chose Sakai
  • What we did to make it a good solution at Yale
  • Culturally
  • Technically
  • In the trenches
  • Why were headed in certain directions
  • How were doing things today
  • What we learned along the way

3
Humble Beginnings
  • From Chuck Powell
  • To Lois BrooksDate Nov 10 2003 - 310pm
  • Lois,
  • Any chance I could set up a time to call and
    learn more about "Sachi (?), Saki (?)"? Intrigued
    at this end and would always rather be ahead of
    the wave rather than behind it.
  • Chuck
  • From Chuck PowellSent Thursday, December 04,
    2003 413 PMTo Wheeler, Bradley C.Subject Re
    Announcing the Sakai Project and the Sakai
    Educational Partners Program
  • Brad,
  • Please count Yale in as a SEPP member. I'll be
    the initial contact point.
  • Chuck Wheeler, Bradley C. wrote We
    believe the time is right for advancing a set of
    open source

4
Todays toddler
  • Date May 18, 2006 434 PM EDT
  • From Drew Mazurek drew.mazurek_at_yale.edu
  • SubjectTesting again
  • We're now in production with 2.1.2. No need to
    respond if you receive this message. - Drew

5
ClassesV2
6
Progress Summary
  • ClassesV2 adoption exceeded our expectations.
  • One new tool built, several new services being
    prototyped. Weve focused on modifying or
    integrating existing Yale tools like the Photo
    Roster and Online Course Selection
  • Still aiming to retire the original Classes
    server by Fall semester 2007
  • A long list of features and bugs and wishes to
    potentially be addressed.

7
(No Transcript)
8
In the beginning (circa 2003)
  • Classes.yale.edu had served central campus well
    since the late 90s
  • Homegrown, every line of code written at Yale,
    built in Java running on Windows
  • Easy to use, basic instructional tools, well
    known space, full support for end users
  • Strong buy-in and heavy usage
  • Features lagging behind the competition,
    organic growth of code difficult to support
  • Law School running Bb, Med campus using a
    different version of Bb and School of Management
    using WebCT

9
In the beginning (continued)
  • Student portal (using uPortal) was quietly
    rolled out in summer 2003 with no incremental
    budget/staffing
  • Student Financial and Administrative Services was
    also increasing its online services in response
    to growing student and faculty demand, e.g.
    online access to Banner, Online Course
    Evaluation, Photo Roster and the Facebook.
  • The Library was invested in a significant array
    of online resources and had extensive plans for
    more integrated access to digital materials. Also
    a growing number of Web-based library services
    such as reference and reserve, course support and
    more.

10
The User Experience in 2003
Student Portal
Classes
WebCT
Blackboard
Orbis
BannerWeb
Facebook
OCI
OCE
WebMail
News, etc.
HR Records
Directory Info
Banner Data
Library Resources
11
The Desired User Experience
12
Vision
  • Yale will deploy a next generation collaborative
    learning environment to provide excellent online
    support for the administration of courses, a rich
    set of tools to support teaching and learning and
    with integrated access to the emerging digital
    materials under development at the Library,
    museums and across Yale. Yale will develop and
    deploy an institutional strategy for continuous
    evolution of the learning environment to
    accommodate accelerating technology change and
    development of digital material.

13
For Those Who Dont Speak Vision
  • Replace our homegrown CMS with Sakai
  • Deploy Sakai with a strong interest in supporting
    research and administrative collaboration
    common tools different groups
  • Aim for a future framework where uPortal and/or
    Sakai interoperate seamlessly and tools are
    interchangeable

14
Original Schedule
  • Phase I
  • Pilot replacement for classes.yale.edu (5-10
    courses) and draft portal views for
    undergraduates, graduate students and faculty
    which highlight access to the course web system
    and related services
  • Goal Begin immediately and conclude Spring
    Semester, 2005
  • Phase II
  • Expand number of courses in pilot (few hundred)
    and add one content tool/service.
  • Introduce full SAKAI-based portal with improved
    views for undergraduates, graduate students and
    faculty
  • Goal Begin immediately following phase I and
    conclude within Fall 2006
  • Phase III
  • Full replacement of classes.yale.edu
  • Phased integration of library content and
    services
  • Goal Begin immediately following phase II,
    conclude within Fall 2007

15
Deployment Summary
16
Governance
  • Provostially appointed TL Portal Committee with
    cross campus faculty participation and sponsored
    jointly by ITS, Library and SFAS
  • High level steering and guidance not a committee
    to compare products
  • General assistance with prioritizing work and
    acquiring additional resources
  • Additionally, a lot of grassroots communication
    has paid huge dividends around the campus

17
Technical Architecture (a.k.a. the lineup)
Apache Load Balancing
(Stengel Ruth)
(Gehrig, Scooter, Guidry Winfield, Howard, Maris
Mantle)
Multiple Tomcat Sakai App Servers
NFS Servers
(Torre Jeter)
iSCSI SAN devices
Oracle Shared Server
18
Things Weve Done
  • Tweaked the syllabus tool and a few others plus
    develop local scripts/tools for administration
  • Lots of integration with existing systems on
    campus
  • Selective replacement of Sakai tools with local
    preferences like Jive and the Shopping Cart
  • Continuous work with Sakai and AuthZ (via CAS)
  • Lightweight integration of other Yale resources
    and services (e.g. the Librarian role, the Photo
    Roster)
  • Customized and augmented the documentation for
    Yale faculty and students
  • Focus on faculty support

19
Things We Havent Done
  • Incremented staffing by more than two!
  • Stopped supporting both systems well
  • Skimped on infrastructure
  • Let wants and needs become show-stopping
    requirements
  • Completely solved our final technical hurdle
    (i.e. Sakai as web server)

20
The Road Ahead and Priorities
  • Lots of opportunities to do more! We have 75
    items currently that wed like to work on -- they
    are a good start not an exhaustive list.
  • Current estimate given current resourcing is that
    it would take us 3-4 years to complete just
    these.
  • How to balance needs, impact, transition costs,
    future expansion and patience in a community
    setting?

21
What Chuck Learned
  • Its the support stupid!
  • Collaboration and communication on campus were
    essential to success and a good thing in and
    of themselves
  • Community source and collaboration within the
    Academy are hard, frustrating, and slow but worth
    it
  • Think globally, act locally
  • Community source breeds freedom of choice not
    freedom from cost or freedom from risk!

22
Two Quotes to Remember
  • I figure I only get one course management system
    conversion in my career Malcolm
  • I never want to beg, borrow, or buy another CMS
    in my lifetime -- Chuck

23
Sir Isaac Newton said
  • If I have seen a little further it is by
    standing on the shoulders of Giants.
  • David Hirsch (david dot hirsch at yale dot edu)
  • Gloria Hardman (gloria dot hardman at yale dot
    edu)
  • Mike Appleby (michael dot appleby at yale dot
    edu)
  • Cheryl Wogahn (cheryl dot wogahn at yale dot
    edu)
  • Jen Bourey (jennifer dot bourey at yale dot edu)
  • Plus many more like Kalee Sprague, Andy Newman,
    Paul Lawrence, Andy Zygmunt, Drew Mazurek, Greg
    Soltesz, Hong Ko, Cheryl Boeher, Emily Horning,
    Matt Wilcox and on and on and on

24
Background materials
25
Why Not Buy?
  • A suite of collaboration and learning tools have
    become core to the IT infrastructure and
    simultaneously is perceived as core and unique to
    the Universitys business something we
    shouldnt necessarily outsource to a vendor
  • Were better positioned to integrate these tools
    with other campus infrastructure and enterprise
    tools
  • We (collectively) have vastly more experience in
    what is needed than any vendor
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