[Year 12 IT Apps] CMS on networked computers

[ken price]

Hi Mark

I have been running Drupal and Moodle on a local computer using the MoWes
software for some time, as a development environment.

The MoWes (Mobile Webserver) lets you bundle the CMS and LMS along with the
server stuff they need to run ( Apache, MySQL, PHP etc) on a student
computer, or USB drive or external hard drive. The students can then have
complete admin ability over their own installation. If you do it with a USB
stick or external hard drive, their applications AND their data (the actual
web site) all live on the device and can be taken home and worked on.

There are several similar environments that do the same thing but I've found
MoWes to be the easiest to use as the whole install is one zip file.

This (to me anyway) seems a better alternative to trying to manage a school
server with multiple CMS and LMS installations for students. Plus it is
accessible from home. Kids just need a $10 USB drive. MoWes is free.

It has the disadvantage that each student's installation is local so they
can't have a classroom-wide wiki. Actually they probably could with some
configuration but as soon as things start to travel on school networks there
is a security etc risk to be considered.

Oh - there were some people who had problems with using MoWes when Skype is
running - this can be fixed by terminating Skype, though I just noticed with
my latest install that it seems to work OK with Skype now.


Hope this helps,

Ken




On Wed, Oct 13, 2010 at 9:08 AM, Mark KELLY <kel at mckinnonsc.vic.edu.au>wrote:

> Hi all. I'm seriously thinking about ditching Dreamweaver for a CMS for
> U3O1 next year.
>
> A CMS is far more meaningful for modern websites, especially
> community-based, interactive sites like wikis, forums and blogs.  Less
> simulation will be required, for a start.
>
> The minimum features list says the required skills for webpage editing (
> http://www.vcaa.vic.edu.au/vcaa/correspondence/bulletins/2010/July/vce_study.html#2)
> are:
>
>    - cascading style sheet
>    - edit and format content
>    - links (relative and absolute links, internal and external links)
>    - navigation
>    - buttons
>    - screen layout
>    - tagging (metadata tags, alt tags)
>    - forms
>    - incorporate images/sound
>
> and all of these appear in a CMS, as far as I can tell.
>
> So the big question is: has anyone successfully put a CMS like Joomla or
> Moodle onto locked-down school computers for student use?
>
> I'd like to hear about it.
>
> Regards
> Mark
>
>
>
> --
> Mark Kelly
> Manager Information Systems
> Reporting Manager
> IT Learning Area Manager
>
> McKinnon Secondary College
> McKinnon Rd McKinnon 3204
> Victoria, Australia
> Direct line / Voicemail: +613 8520 9085
> Fax +613 9578 9253
> kel at mckinnonsc.vic.edu.au
>
> VCE IT Lecture Notes: http://vceit.com
> Moderator: IT Applications Edulist
>
> For no reason, my friend became a square, flat surface with four legs. I
> rushed him to hospital. His condition is table.
>
>
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