Choosing an LMS to conduct training in your company or educational institution is not an easy task. One of the best choices is to run open-source LMS first to have a wide view of its capacities. Among the things and factors of your business that should be taken into account are budget, the Return on investment, a platform cost-effective, the number of employees, the training and learning goals, etc. Let’s take a look at some of the top open-source LMS out there.
Many learning management systems are designed for large corporations, others can adapt to the size of the company, or there are even those who think of providing services in the cloud for free to allow smaller companies to experience the benefits of the eLearning, like open source systems
Open-source Learning Management Systems have become extremely popular in recent years, but what does open source mean? Open Source technology is a technology where the source code is “open”, that is, the code is available to the public and free to be modified. Improvements can be made by developers and it can be spread or sold to the wider community. So, why should an organization choose an open-source Learning Management System as opposed to a homegrown or proprietary LMS?
First of all, if a company uses a proprietary LMS, they must rely on the provider to maintain and service the LMS, as well as provide support when problems occur. As the code is widely available in open source LMS, many developers read and examine the code, resulting in bugs being identified and fixed much faster than proprietary programs.
Open Source technology is very beneficial to schools, universities and other educational institutions as well as corporations. Open Source LMSs are fully flexible and customizable, so they can be designed in line with your school/organization brand image. There are no license or hardware costs associated with open source technology so it is free to start using it and carries minimal risk.
Open Source LMSs can also be converted to social learning platforms. You can create an online community through your LMS. As an example, your learners can chat, blog, connect to social network sites (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc.) and have polls on your open source LMS.