Eduforge is “a virtual collaborative learning and exploratory environment designed for the sharing of ideas, research outcomes, open source educational software, and tools within a community of learners and researchers.” In the learning resources section is a case study about a hospital in Ireland that decided to shift to an open source IT infrastructure. This included e-learning, and the selected platform was Claroline. The case study provides figures (costs in Pounds) about the difference in total costs:
Initial Cost: 1,000
Total Cost / 5 years : 4,000
Closed Source Solution (Name not disclosed)
Initial Cost: 35,000
Total Cost / 5 years : 175,000
Here is an interesting comment from the Beaumont Hospital IT manager:
Consulting services from qualified professionals were just as necessary as they would have been with closed source solutions. It’s not all free, but the Beaumont Hospital staff seem to be happy with their solution.
