Python & Zope Based Open Source SchoolTool 1.0 Released

The Shuttleworth Foundation has released SchoolTool 1.0, a web-based open source student information system and calendar server for primary and secondary schools around the world.

SchoolTool includes customizable student demographics, parent/contact management, attendance, gradebook, calendaring, resource booking and report card generation. SchoolTool is scalable to multi-school deployments.

SchoolTool is 100% free and open source software, built with the Python programming language and Zope 3 framework.The code for the Schooltool can be found on the Schooltool Launchpad site. Launchpad is a collaboration and hosting platform for software projects.

SchoolTool was conceived in Cape Town by Mark Shuttleworth, and The Shuttleworth Foundation hired a team of developers and systems analysts to work on the project. The development team, using a Java platform and client/server design, created a pre-alpha platform. Mark terminated the project as it was distracting more and more resources from the core focus of the Foundation, and appeared not to be headed in the envisaged direction. SchoolTool was reborn, using the Python programming language.

src – schooltool book