Week Ending May 25, 2012

Well it’s apparently been quite a while since the last time I posted some updates. To be honest, everything is pretty status quo at the moment. Summer sessions are in full swing and other than that, everything is quiet on the Western front. Here are some status updates.iTunes UWe have made some progress with the project. We found out that creating a public iTunes U site is done separately from our private site, so that both sites could technically exist side-by-side. We completed our application for the public site, however we found out that it had been declined. University Communications & Marketing (UCM) is following up on why we were declined. Hopefully I’ll have some updates on this the next time I post.WordPressThe WordPress platform is currently at a standstill. The “pilot” term has ended and we are at the point of making a decision on the future of WordPress. I can’t remember if I mentioned this previously, but WordPress falls within the social media policies that UCM is creating. I’ve been pestering them for updates and it seems that the draft has been sent to General Counsel and the other approvers of the document. I’m hopeful that the policies will be finalized in the next month, however I’m also realistic that this could drag on for much longer. In the meantime, my list of potential users is growing rapidly…Video Working GroupThe group has met several times in the last 2 months and has made some headway. We are currently drafting our first statement of direction, using Video on Demand as the guinea pig. Once we finish this document, we’ll begin looking at statements of direction for the other main projects. Then, it’s on to the use cases…Training & Support SiteOur training & support site for Niihka, our instance of the Sakai Learning Management System, is undergoing a refresh. I’ve been working on creating training videos for all possible tools/tasks and ensuring that the videos are consistent and specific. Along with each video, a PDF with step-by-step directions for those that prefer text instructions rather than video. As of this morning, I have 4 videos completely done and another 3-4 that are close to being complete. I haven’t begun the PDFs, however I expect that those will take some time. Hopefully I’ll have some of them done in the near future. In addition to making the videos available in Niihka, I’ll also be posting them on a YouTube channel that I’m creating so that users can view the videos outside of Niihka. My hope is that we can use these videos as contributions back to the Sakai community.I think that’s it for this time. Next week I’ll be in Washington D.C. for the Lilly Conference. Since I probably won’t make any progress on my projects, I may forego a weekly update. Thanks for reading!-M