Searching for providers of appliactions to create online courses

Hello,
we are offering courses for overseas students and therefore we would like to build a distance learning platform. Now we are searching for companies, which offer solutions to easily create and maintain online classes and courses. I hope that some people here may know some providers and post them here
Many thanks in advance.
Michael P.

 

Take a look at .LRN from MIT. It's in an "alpha" state right now, but it's free. It's based on the OpenACS platform.

 

Here is a pretty good resource: someone reviewed 56 Course Management Systems: http://www.c2t2.ca/landonline/
(See the link off to the right for "56 reviewed.")
Some of these are pricey commercial products and some are freebies.

Here you'll find a link to a story about the "Manhattan Virtual Classroom": http://www.opensourceschools.org/stats.php
This is a freebie, if you have a Linux weenie. Don't expect much support, but the self-service for this is excellent. It is being used by a few schools, including the developer's school (Univ. of New England, if memory services). I loaded it and played with it for awhile.

 

An open source solution discussed here at one time: MimerDesk.

 

Smartforce at www.smartforce.com .

 

There are many in the market, but so far the best I've seen is FirstClass.

www.centrinity.com

 

By a wide margin, the course development/management systems used by largest number of US colleges and universities are Blackboard and WebCT.

Blackboard tends to be the easier system to use initially, while WebCT tends to be the more robust system. There is a large network of user groups and support for both systems.

Blackboard Website

WebCT Website

Tony Pina
Adjunct Faculty, Instructional Technology
California State University, San Bernardino

 

I'm using eCollege. See http://www.ecollege.com/solutions/Freetrials.html for a trial.

When I signed up for the eCompanion course builder, they offered me free use for (six months? A year? I forget) if I would agree to fill out a survey at the end. It's been more than 6 months and the system has worked wonderfully -- much better than Blackboard ever did. It's more powerful and flexible, as well.

It does have its quirks, but overall I'm happy with it.

 

just the hardware?

It sounds like you are just looking for the hardward support?
Capella has an interesting sounding series of courses on developing courses for the internet. But they don't necessarily provide the hardware.
All the best!