Several learning standards address the issues of integrating eLearning applications (and other types of learning applications) into LMS applications. The common standards are created by committees who formulate technical recommendations. The standards organizations can also certify that an LMS or specific learning applications are compliant with their particular standard.
In the past, the most common type of LMS has been a custom application that an organization creates to manage its own courseware. The developers create a custom method of storing and passing data to and from the learning applications. Unfortunately, an organization is locked into this application because any change would mean it needs to redevelop all the courseware to work with a new system.