[Webcom] Install: Moodle, journal, conference systems

[Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo)]

Hi everyone, I've been testing out a few different systems that  
various committees, projects, etc. pointed me to and am ready to  
install them on osgeo1.

The applications in question are:
  * Moodle: http://moodle.org/ - course management system for online  
learning (for Edu Com), already in use by some EduCom curriculum  
contributors, comes with good recommendation and familiarity by others.

  * Open Conference System (OCS): http://pkp.sfu.ca/ocs/ (for  
Conference Com), to improve committee level access for event  
planning, session tracking, file management, maintaining a legacy of  
conference information, etc.  To serve minimally as an easy way to  
handle preliminary planning, hosting some files, etc.  Potentially as  
a year-to-year system for tracking our main events.

  * Open Journal System (OJS): http://pkp.sfu.ca/ojs/ (for Journal  
project), to improve the set up, review, creation, publication,  
indexing, etc. of OSGeo Journal.  This is primarily a workflow  
application that helps tie together various stages of journal  
preparation.

All of the above are stable, mature projects built using, in our  
case, MySQL and PHP.  While it is theoretically possible to mirror  
their functionality using custom Drupal development, I believe that  
is not the best approach, nor feasible at this point in time.  There  
are others I've talked to that have a similar set up as ours, Drupal,  
plus these other apps, plus LDAP and mediawiki.

They also all support LDAP.  There is also some work going on to  
supply a php-based single-sign-on for these projects.  My experience  
using them has also been positive - the systems are highly  
responsive, easy to install and compact in size.  But the biggest  
impact will be when it has made it easier for others in our community  
to maintain the content in their systems.

If anyone has any questions, concerns or issues they want to discuss  
before I proceed on installation, please let me know.  I would like  
to start this soon.

Tyler