Adding LTI activity breaks course "Invalid URL"

Adding LTI activity breaks course "Invalid URL"

by Donna Hrynkiw -
Number of replies: 4

While adding an LTI (VoiceThread) activity to his course today, one of our teachers badly broke his Moodle course. Every link to the course generates a Moodle error "Invalid URL". The URL worked fine earlier in the day, now it's broken.

The teacher is not a terrifically confident Moodle/computer user and was working through a set of instructions to add a VoiceThread activity to his course. It's possible he added an invalid or incomplete URL to the activity settings, or saved an incomplete activity configuration. In any case, the course is entirely unavailable to him and his students.

It *feels* as if Moodle is trying to load the course homepage, runs into the invalid VoiceThread URL during the load, gets confused, throws its hands in the air and gives up.

I found this in the Moodle forums https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=204856 but disabling and even entirely deleting the VoiceThread plugins from the site didn't help. I also found this in the Tracker https://tracker.moodle.org/browse/MDL-28483 but we're at Moodle v2.4.6, so presumably this has been fixed in our version.

Anybody have any suggestions for a fix or even a work-around? We're on a hosted service, so do not have direct access to the Moodle database. Our service provider is willing to run queries or database adjustments at our direction.

My only other recourse at this time is to attempt to delete the course tomorrow and restore it from a backup that's three days old.

 

Hrynkiw

Kwantlen Polytechnic University

Moodle v2.4.6

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In reply to Donna Hrynkiw

Re: Adding LTI activity breaks course "Invalid URL"

by Guillermo Madero -

Hi Donna,

Beforehand, I would say that it will be best to follow the restore procedure.

Could you please provide links to the plugin page and more info about the steps that caused the problem?

Please enable the Moodle debugging to get more info about the problem.

My guess is that the installation process is the one described here: VoiceThread LTI integration, Moodle, and so, did the Moodle administrator set the system as described?

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In reply to Guillermo Madero

Re: Adding LTI activity breaks course "Invalid URL"

by Donna Hrynkiw -

Hello Guillermo and thank-you for the reply.

You asked for "links to the plugin page". It's not actually a plugin, it's an LTI tool.

http://docs.moodle.org/24/en/LTI_Provider

> steps that caused the problem

In a workshop situation, a teacher learning how to use VoiceThread was following the series of steps required to add a VoiceThread activity to his course. Part of the process involves entering a URL into one of the activity setting fields. We believe he likely entered an invalid, possibly corrupt, URL into one of the fields in the activity settings page. We have been unable to reproduce the problem.

He was (supposed to be) following the instructions for adding a Course view according to the instructions found here: http://voicethread.com/support/howto/System_Integration/LTI/#Moodle (the same URL/documentation you linked to in your reply), scroll down a little to find "For Instructors".

The course URL worked fine earlier in the workshop.
When I use "Login as" the teacher, his 'My home' link also generates an 'Invalid URL' error in a slightly different format. (This is new information.)
Nobody else in the workshop experienced this problem; their VT activities and courses all work fine.

> My guess is that the installation process is the one described here (url trimmed)

Yes, exactly.

> Please enable the Moodle debugging to get more info about the problem.

I hadn't thought of that yet -- thank-you. I'll do that and post the report here.

> did the Moodle administrator set the system as described?

That would be me, and yes I did. As I mentioned, the VT activity works fine for everyone else on the site.

> Beforehand, I would say that it will be best to follow the restore procedure.

Unfortunately, it turns out there is no course backup available. If I can't figure out how to *repair* the course, the teacher and students are hooped and I've failed them.

Hrynkiw
Kwantlen Polytechnic

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In reply to Guillermo Madero

Re: Adding LTI activity breaks course "Invalid URL"

by Donna Hrynkiw -

I had to set it all the way up to Developer to get any debug messages.

Invalid URL

Debug info:
Error code: invalidurl
Stack trace:
  • line 343 of /lib/weblib.php: moodle_exception thrown
  • line 1054 of /lib/modinfolib.php: call to moodle_url->__construct()
  • line 340 of /lib/modinfolib.php: call to cm_info->__construct()
  • line 1383 of /lib/modinfolib.php: call to course_modinfo->__construct()
  • line 1804 of /lib/navigationlib.php: call to get_fast_modinfo()
  • line 1871 of /lib/navigationlib.php: call to global_navigation->generate_sections_and_activities()
  • line 420 of /course/format/lib.php: call to global_navigation->load_generic_course_sections()
  • line 152 of /course/format/weeks/lib.php: call to format_base->extend_course_navigation()
  • line 1783 of /lib/navigationlib.php: call to format_weeks->extend_course_navigation()
  • line 1160 of /lib/navigationlib.php: call to global_navigation->load_course_sections()
  • line 3018 of /lib/navigationlib.php: call to global_navigation->initialise()
  • line 766 of /lib/pagelib.php: call to navbar->has_items()
  • line 4 of /theme/arialistkwantlen/layout/general.php: call to moodle_page->has_navbar()
  • line 810 of /lib/outputrenderers.php: call to include()
  • line 740 of /lib/outputrenderers.php: call to core_renderer->render_page_layout()
  • line 243 of /course/view.php: call to core_renderer->header()
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In reply to Guillermo Madero

Re: Adding LTI activity breaks course "Invalid URL"

by Donna Hrynkiw -

We were able to locate a recent course backup archive after all. The course was successfully deleted and restored.

We won't be able to figure out exactly what went wrong, but the teacher and students are back in action.

Thank-you for your time on this Guillermo.

Hrynkiw

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