Guru
Version
2.1.7 (last update on Jun 25, 2012)
Rating
Compatibility
Reviews
3
License
GPLv2 or later
Commercial
Type
Date Added
18 October 2011
Need elearning for Joomla? Looking for an open source Joomla LMS (Learning Management System)? Guru is a powerful Joomla eLearning solution.
It allows you to to create an online school or university with classes, courses, modules, quizzes, students, teachers and much more! This Joomla e-Learning solution will allow you to make passive income by selling online courses!
Give students certificates!
Integrated with Kunena forum!
Online training management has never been easier!
Please visit our site for detailed information about each feature, including videos.
Home page:
http://guru.ijoomla.com/
Demo front end:
http://joomla25.ijoomlademo.com/index.php?option=com_guru&view=gurupcategs&Itemid=55
Demo backend:
http://joomla25.ijoomlademo.com/administrator/
SEF Support:
* sh404
* AceSEF
* SEF Advanced
* Core Joomla SEF
Documentations:
* Manual
* Video Tutorials linked from backend
* Tool tips on each field on the backend
ROAD MAP:
Phase 1:
* Release of the first version of Guru for Joomla 1.5 and Joomla 1.7.
Phase 2 (completed in 11 months)
* Free courses - completed (3/9/2012)
* Migration tool - from Joomla 1.5 to Joomla 2.5 - completed (5/12/2012)
* Gradual release of lessons - completed (8/18/2012)
* Exporting quizzes results - completed (8/24/2012)
* Tracking of student progress - completed (8/24/2012)
* Monitoring of quizzes - completed (8/24/2012)
* Email notifications on new lessons - completed
* Final exams - completed (9/27/2012)
* Course certificates - completed (11/9/2012)
Phase 3 (est. 1-2 months to complete)
* New student page - My Quizzes/ Final Exams - Completed (11/19/2012)
* Kunena Integration & Comments - Completed (12/28/2012)
Phase 4 (est. 2-3 weeks to complete)
* Responsive design (Bootstrap back and front)
Phase 5(est. 1-2 months to complete)
* ACL support
* Improve Student Manager on backend
* Prerequisite courses
* Restrict courses to users
* Hide correct answers on quizzes results
* Improve gradual release of lessons, release by modules and more
* Allow to choose more than one teacher for a course
* Courses module - 90% done
Phase 6 (est. 2-3 months to complete)
* Conversion to Joomla 3.x
Phase 7 (est. 3-4 months to complete)
* SCORM compliance.
Phase 8 (est. 2-3 months to complete)
* Front-end course creation by teachers.
* Search plugin
* Student Profile
* Lessons commenting and social media
* Lesson notes
* Add Joomla! custom fields on Guru registration page
Phase 9
* Advanced features such as course actions
* More types of questions for quizzes
* Gradual release - enhanced features
Images
USAGE
I've been testing Guru for about 30 days and will be using it for offering life coaching courses.
PROS
There are a lot of things I really appreciate about Guru. I find it easy to use and navigate in the back end. Drag and drop functionality for reordering modules and lessons is great (although didn't work well for a sequential course). Adding and organizing media and setting up the course for nice display on the front end are all great. The front end is also quite simplistic for students to use and looks clean. Training videos and documentation is all excellent and very useful (thanks Merav!).
CONS
For my needs and in comparing Guru to other professional LMS’s, Guru falls short in these ways:
- Cannot cap the number of students allowed to sign up for a course
- The sequential release isn't configurable beyond presets. Also, first lesson shows as available immediately upon purchase even if you set a publish date that is further out, making it difficult to have an official class/course start date.
- If a student signs up for a course that you made free to existing students and you later convert the free course to a paid course, you cannot remove students who had signed up when it was free.
- Kunena forum is great but the integration is not. New boards auto-created for lessons default to public view so you have to remember to change the user group in Kunena component (and make sure students are in the right user group for a particular course) in order to keep it private to the users who paid for the course. Also, if you’ve removed the integrated discussion board from a lesson, it often reappears – requires a watchful eye to ensure you don’t suddenly have a bunch of unauthorized public forums for your lessons.
- I haven't found a way to offer money-back guarantees or require a customer to check a box that they have agreed to Terms and Conditions as they move through the purchase/payment process.
- The quizzes are limited to one format and no ability to 'fill in blank' or provide free-form text response. It would also be nice to have a course survey/feedback option, especially anonymous.
SUMMARY
Again, for the money, Guru is a good LMS option. The fast learning curve and ease of use are nice and support forum admins are responsive to questions. Though I will eventually need the features above, I plan to continue using Guru and can make it work for most of my course needs for now. I look forward to seeing continued development for this component.
I've been testing Guru for about 30 days and will be using it for offering life coaching courses.
PROS
There are a lot of things I really appreciate about Guru. I find it easy to use and navigate in the back end. Drag and drop functionality for reordering modules and lessons is great (although didn't work well for a sequential course). Adding and organizing media and setting up the course for nice display on the front end are all great. The front end is also quite simplistic for students to use and looks clean. Training videos and documentation is all excellent and very useful (thanks Merav!).
CONS
For my needs and in comparing Guru to other professional LMS’s, Guru falls short in these ways:
- Cannot cap the number of students allowed to sign up for a course
- The sequential release isn't configurable beyond presets. Also, first lesson shows as available immediately upon purchase even if you set a publish date that is further out, making it difficult to have an official class/course start date.
- If a student signs up for a course that you made free to existing students and you later convert the free course to a paid course, you cannot remove students who had signed up when it was free.
- Kunena forum is great but the integration is not. New boards auto-created for lessons default to public view so you have to remember to change the user group in Kunena component (and make sure students are in the right user group for a particular course) in order to keep it private to the users who paid for the course. Also, if you’ve removed the integrated discussion board from a lesson, it often reappears – requires a watchful eye to ensure you don’t suddenly have a bunch of unauthorized public forums for your lessons.
- I haven't found a way to offer money-back guarantees or require a customer to check a box that they have agreed to Terms and Conditions as they move through the purchase/payment process.
- The quizzes are limited to one format and no ability to 'fill in blank' or provide free-form text response. It would also be nice to have a course survey/feedback option, especially anonymous.
SUMMARY
Again, for the money, Guru is a good LMS option. The fast learning curve and ease of use are nice and support forum admins are responsive to questions. Though I will eventually need the features above, I plan to continue using Guru and can make it work for most of my course needs for now. I look forward to seeing continued development for this component.
This is my first review on Joomla Extension. The beauty of component made me to write. I am not a programmer or developer. For quite long I had been looking for a component for my e-learning site (yet to be built). Tried several components, none of them were creative enough. Guru is one of most creative Joomla component.
It is simply beautiful. Congrats to the iJoomla. I am looking for implementation of SCROM which must for any LMS and which in the To Do list of the developers.
Great Job and Congrats to the team!!!
It is simply beautiful. Congrats to the iJoomla. I am looking for implementation of SCROM which must for any LMS and which in the To Do list of the developers.
Great Job and Congrats to the team!!!
I am VERY impressed with what the Ijoomla team did with Guru.
It is very easy to master. It is simple in it's approach yet offers MANY features that will surely enhance ANY training/subscription based website.
I have used other Joomla LMS apps and I can attest that this is the one you should be looking at for your site.
The roadmap indicates that there will be frontend course editing/adding amoungst other great features.
From the backend - creating and editing a course is painless. The whole app can be mastered in about 20 minutes.
The frontend looks clean and I have yet to find anything wrong with the styling or presentation.
I use dozens of Joomla addons for dozens of clients and GURU is certainly going to be one of my top 10 addons.
I am not affiliated with Ijoomla in any way, shape or form :) Im just very happy with the work they have done and they certainly deserve the credit.
The price is a mute point considering the level of professionalism that went into the final product. For any professional training website the price shouldnt be a hinderance. For me, it is far better to bill out the cost to a client and work with a solid system than to try to backwards engineer one that might not fit our exact needs.
Great job!!!
~ Dave Flook / Pure Web Group
It is very easy to master. It is simple in it's approach yet offers MANY features that will surely enhance ANY training/subscription based website.
I have used other Joomla LMS apps and I can attest that this is the one you should be looking at for your site.
The roadmap indicates that there will be frontend course editing/adding amoungst other great features.
From the backend - creating and editing a course is painless. The whole app can be mastered in about 20 minutes.
The frontend looks clean and I have yet to find anything wrong with the styling or presentation.
I use dozens of Joomla addons for dozens of clients and GURU is certainly going to be one of my top 10 addons.
I am not affiliated with Ijoomla in any way, shape or form :) Im just very happy with the work they have done and they certainly deserve the credit.
The price is a mute point considering the level of professionalism that went into the final product. For any professional training website the price shouldnt be a hinderance. For me, it is far better to bill out the cost to a client and work with a solid system than to try to backwards engineer one that might not fit our exact needs.
Great job!!!
~ Dave Flook / Pure Web Group
Owner's reply
Dave,
We appreciate the positive feedback! It's for customers like you that we work hard to create quality products :-) Thanks for taking the time to jot down a review!
