Being new to Moodle and the OU, I have been allowed the task of creating a mechanism to enable this process as fully as possible during the creation of "New Courses" whilst being Restored from existing ones.
Currently this requires a Course Backup followed by a Restore ( with loads of clicking) and then manual changes to things like the Course Code, Title, Start Date, and changes to any individual modules with dates applied.
The way I understand it, it should be possible to modify the 'Restore - Create New Course' process slightly to accept these as parameters during the restore process, and pass them on to the individual modules to do any updates.
I'd like to be able to do this with as little user intervention as possible, so that it could be automated to Roll Forward one or more courses as easily aspossible.
I will be raising this as a Feature request within the tracker and we're hoping to get this feature in to the next major release, but before doing that I'd like to make sure I get the process defined as accurately as possible, for that I need your help.
This would be terrific! If I were going to design a roll forward for teachers, I would want to have some checkboxes and a couple of places to put updated information (as you outlined above).
a) teacher would be the same in most cases; for those that don't fit, we can just have a manual restore? So current primary instructor would remain.
b) course full name should be the same
c) shortname will need to be unique. There should be a place to put the new id, because the old version might be left on the server for some time to allow for grade challenges, etc. (you said that, manual changes to Course Code)
d) category would remain the same
e) are you planning to not include students as default? If not, you get into what you want to keep--would require a more granular approach--all the clicking you want to avoid!
e) date new course would begin
f) option for new or blank enrollment key
g) option for student visibility on creation
Speaking for myself, I would like to have the process run through some sort of simple last minute edit and course approval prior to being created. Sort of like the request module that moodle already has--did you look at that? As admin, I would like to run my eye over the shortname field and make sure there are no other problems before releasing it. If you have an approval step, then you would need to generate emails to the admin to let them know a course is waiting for approval, and an email to the instructor identifying the course that has been created as per their request.
I guess a lot of people create the courses automatically from the registrar's system. Would you need to consider how that scenario affects use of your module as well? Or is your feature only meant to serve people who do not need automation in course creation?
I would love to have this! It would make my life so much easier!
Cheers!
atw
a) teacher would be the same in most cases; for those that don't fit, we can just have a manual restore? So current primary instructor would remain.
b) course full name should be the same
c) shortname will need to be unique. There should be a place to put the new id, because the old version might be left on the server for some time to allow for grade challenges, etc. (you said that, manual changes to Course Code)
d) category would remain the same
e) are you planning to not include students as default? If not, you get into what you want to keep--would require a more granular approach--all the clicking you want to avoid!
e) date new course would begin
f) option for new or blank enrollment key
g) option for student visibility on creation
Speaking for myself, I would like to have the process run through some sort of simple last minute edit and course approval prior to being created. Sort of like the request module that moodle already has--did you look at that? As admin, I would like to run my eye over the shortname field and make sure there are no other problems before releasing it. If you have an approval step, then you would need to generate emails to the admin to let them know a course is waiting for approval, and an email to the instructor identifying the course that has been created as per their request.
I guess a lot of people create the courses automatically from the registrar's system. Would you need to consider how that scenario affects use of your module as well? Or is your feature only meant to serve people who do not need automation in course creation?
I would love to have this! It would make my life so much easier!
Cheers!
atw
The idea isnt currently specific to any particular audience, its general only,
so an admin could roll forward an exsisting course for the next presentation period.
All approvals may already be in place, but you raise some interesting points, which I need to look in to.
I believe the idea is for a fresh copy of the existing course, no students, no current enrollments, and not visible to students at creation.
As a developer I dont yet have a feel for how the current system is used in the real world, so would want any changes to be as simple and usable as possible, for as many use cases as possible.
Al
so an admin could roll forward an exsisting course for the next presentation period.
All approvals may already be in place, but you raise some interesting points, which I need to look in to.
I believe the idea is for a fresh copy of the existing course, no students, no current enrollments, and not visible to students at creation.
As a developer I dont yet have a feel for how the current system is used in the real world, so would want any changes to be as simple and usable as possible, for as many use cases as possible.
Al
I am making progress with this feature but have identified a potential problem.
Restored events, ie course events + assignments, are not showing in the Calendar, i have tried to find if this is a pre-existing problem in the Forums and the Bug Tracker but cant find any references to it.
Is this a known problem which is explained somewhere else and I've missed it,
or could it a be Bug?
Alan
Restored events, ie course events + assignments, are not showing in the Calendar, i have tried to find if this is a pre-existing problem in the Forums and the Bug Tracker but cant find any references to it.
Is this a known problem which is explained somewhere else and I've missed it,
or could it a be Bug?
Alan
There is no problem here. This was due to an incorrect assumption/expectation as to how things should appear in the calendar, all is working correctly so far.
The Up comming events view is constrained to 21 days, so viewing the calendar for the "New Course" presentation the new dates are well outside the bracket.
However its not clear that this is occuring when the link says >Calendar and you are looking at August (2007) in the calendar any way.
Maybe the link label could be clearer.
Alan
The Up comming events view is constrained to 21 days, so viewing the calendar for the "New Course" presentation the new dates are well outside the bracket.
However its not clear that this is occuring when the link says >Calendar and you are looking at August (2007) in the calendar any way.
Maybe the link label could be clearer.
Alan
Work is progressing on this feature related to this post
http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=45493
and this bug MDL-5532 which i have been working against.
This change however only applies to Activity modules, where dates relative to the Start Date are rolled forwards.
Also I dont have access to all Activity types so havent been able to update and test the SCORM module, and have recently been made aware of the need to provide the facility to roll forwards some dates used in Blocks, this is something i need to investigate.
http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=45493
and this bug MDL-5532 which i have been working against.
This change however only applies to Activity modules, where dates relative to the Start Date are rolled forwards.
Also I dont have access to all Activity types so havent been able to update and test the SCORM module, and have recently been made aware of the need to provide the facility to roll forwards some dates used in Blocks, this is something i need to investigate.
This feature which the OU will use to Roll Forwards courses is now complete, tested and commited to Moodle1.7 Head.
This change provides the following
* New fields on Restore form to enable changes to Short Name, Full Name and Start Date
* Start Date offset added to Restore process
* Created Restorelog file in Course files area
* Activity Modules use offset to change dates
* Activity Modules write changes to Restorelog
This change provides the following
* New fields on Restore form to enable changes to Short Name, Full Name and Start Date
* Start Date offset added to Restore process
* Created Restorelog file in Course files area
* Activity Modules use offset to change dates
* Activity Modules write changes to Restorelog
Hi Alan,
Thanks for this new feature
which now has a documentation page: docs.moodle.org/en/Roll_courses_forward
Thanks for this new feature
which now has a documentation page: docs.moodle.org/en/Roll_courses_forward
Been away on a Scout Camp over the weekend so just spotted this post,
had responded to the comment in the bugtracker before leaving though.
This feature only affects the Restore of the Moodle.xml file in the zip file created during Backup.
Any errors in the zip operation must be attributable to the Backup process or the Course in question.
I tested this myself by creating a new course and restoring it, using a later cvs update, and also by restoring previously created backups, i experienced no such errors.
Alan.
had responded to the comment in the bugtracker before leaving though.
This feature only affects the Restore of the Moodle.xml file in the zip file created during Backup.
Any errors in the zip operation must be attributable to the Backup process or the Course in question.
I tested this myself by creating a new course and restoring it, using a later cvs update, and also by restoring previously created backups, i experienced no such errors.
Alan.
Hi Alan,
I just added a bug report MDL-6702 to the tracker. Could you please have a look at it?
Thanks!
I just added a bug report MDL-6702 to the tracker. Could you please have a look at it?
Thanks!
I have now completed work on this bug Petr, i have put the patch forwards for peer review here at the OU, and also added it with a comment in the tracker.
As soons as i get a favourable response to the changes i shall commit them.
This facility is applied as part of the existing Restore Process, which must be applied on an individual course basis, i believe a Bulk Upload process is being looked at else where.
As soons as i get a favourable response to the changes i shall commit them.
This facility is applied as part of the existing Restore Process, which must be applied on an individual course basis, i believe a Bulk Upload process is being looked at else where.
Typically we would want to roll forward a large number of courses in one go - is it possible to use this new roll course forward functionality as some type of batch job, or do you have to do them one by one?