Ed-Tech @ DU

Gartner, Inc. is the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company. They are an independent and the information in their reports is considered unbiased.

Recently, they have released a report of Coldfusion 8 – a server technology behind many university applications such as CourseMedia™, GSSW Internships, ALORA, and many others.

While not 100% positive in it’s findings, the report is balanced and mostly favorable. It should provide some confidence to those on campus working with Coldfusion.

This is very timely, with Coldfusion 9 on the horizon.

Check it out.

According to the New York Times, the July edition of the Elance Work Index top 10 includes technologies that the University of Denver Ed-Tech community is actively involved in.

1. PHP – Used in many smaller projects across campus as well as custom coding for various Content Management Systems employed by different units.
2. Graphic Design – Heavily used, fundamental skill here in the CTL and among other units. Your project won’t get very far if the design isn’t there.
3. Adobe Flash – Heavily used across campus in applications such as CourseMedia™ and the various ALORA and Flash Media Server interfaces across campus. Also used in various smaller projects and websites.
4. MySQL – Just about every application we write requires some sort of database backend. This is almost always MySQL.
5. HTML – If you’re delivery mechanism includes a web browser, it includes HTML.
6. Web Content – Content is king. Can you image using using something like CourseMedia™ if there was nothing to populate galleries with?
7. Article Writing – It used to be tolerable for anyone to just throw up content to a website. Users expect more now and professional article writing is becoming a skill worth having.
8. Joomla! – The CTL website runs upon the Joomla! Content Management System.
9. CSS – If you’re delivery mechanism includes a web browser, it includes CSS.
10. WordPress – Chancellor’s weblog, Sustainability Council website, and many other entities across campus rely on WordPress as a publishing platform.

This is both a form of validation that the DU Ed-Tech community is exploring the right avenues and that DU is well-positioned to be reflective of current trends outside of educational institutions. Students should also pay close attention to this and studies such as the SoDA 2009 Digital Marketing Outlook.