Searching through some demo files and such at a site i use for that.
Im looking for something Star Wards having just bought and finished KotOR.

Is Jedi Academy the most recent in the Jedi Knight series?
Is this series the one where you have to be Kyle Kattarn (or whoever he is)?

Whats the chronology?

Dark Forces
Jedi Knight: Dark Forces II
Jedi Knight: Mysteries of the Sith (expansion for JK)
Jedi Knight II: Jedi Outcast
Jedi Academy

KotOR is set 4000 years before the JK series, right after the Sith war. In the first 3 games, you play as Kyle Katarn, but in JA you play as a padawan of Kyle's. Kyle is a merc turned jedi. IMO, Mysteries of the Sith is probably the best in terms of story, followed by JK, DF or Outcast, then JA.

I assume you weren't counting Mysteries of the Sith in whichYou are only Kyle for the first few levels. After that you are Mara Jade.

A lot of JK fans are saying they didn't like JA as much, but I found it very fun. A big part of it is the cheats (shown in the top thread here) include turning yourself into another character. For example, playermodel Kyle turns your player into kyle.(note: cheating to become a bad npc changes your team. To switch it back, type playerteam player)

i only got into the jk craze with jo and then followed it up with jka...and i must say that i like them both equally :-)

Unfortunately, the opening scrolls have gotten the dates all messed up. AS best as we can tell, JO happened 8 years after ROTJ, and JA is at least 13 after ROTJ - but those dates are not only contradicted by other sources, they've been contradicted by LA itself - and they contradict themselves in that the games in the series don't line up as far as the opening scrolls are concerned.