Coursepack restore problem

Coursepack restore problem

by Ken Russell -
Number of replies: 4

Hello Moodle people,

I'm running Moodle 2.5...

I am a Moodle admin and I am having a problem installing (actually, I am "Restoring") a "coursepack" that is offered by a book publisher for one of our high school courses. These are files that accompany a textbook that are in a mbz format so they can be used in an accompanying moodle course. The teacher had trouble restoring these files in her course and asked me to help. I tried restoring them to her course, but I was also unsuccessful. The publisher's page says that the mbz file is configured for Moodle 2.5.

I decided to try restoring these files to a new, clean course, so I created a new course, downloaded the mbz file, and tried restoring the file. As with the teacher's course, nothing happened. The browser tab displayed the word "Connecting..." and stayed that way indefinitely. There was no error message displayed on the page.

I contacted the publisher and asked them to verify that the file is a legitimate mbz file that will successfully install on moodle 2.5. They said they will look into it but did not give an ETA. In the meantime, school has started and I would like to do what I can to troubleshoot this problem.

I read the Restore documentation and FAQ. I turned on debugging messages and tried to restore the mbz file again and got the same outcome.

Where can I find the debug error reports? The FAQ does not say and no errors appear on the page when I click "Restore." I was hoping to include any error messages in this post but I cannot find where they are.

What can I do in addition to the above? Is it possible there is  a problem with Moodle's Restore process? I figure the problem must either be with the file or with Moodle. Moodles is working fine, there are no other issues that I am aware of. However, I seldom use the Restore Process.

Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.

Thanks very much!

Ken Russell
Moodle Admin
Bellingham School District

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In reply to Ken Russell

Re: Coursepack restore problem

by Ken Task -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers

While you are waiting to hear back from them, suggest inspecting the .mbz file.   Why?  A few years ago, helped an entity with a multiple Moodle server which had installed something similar.  Since no one in the entity actually had admin rights to these commercial sites, I hacked into one to find that most of the resources were 'phoning home' ... ie, going back to providers servers for content (this was pre-LTI and it wasn't using MNet).  Shocked to find that much of those resources were available already (and free) on the web.   The 'phoning home' went to special pages which turned around and redirected to the 'free stuff' that existed already ... wrapped in a wrapper that tried to mask the source of the content.

Not saying this is the case with what yout have ... am saying it's probably worth the time to inspect to see if you are getting what you expected.   And, i that light, you might find it's 'phoning home' (or some such) and it's your filter or network or something else causing issues.

Anyway, that's why the suggestion to inspect.   Change the .mbz extension to .zip and unzip it in a test directory.   There should be a moodle_backup.xml file contained in what has been extracted.   Opening that with a text editor one can see information concerning the real server where the course was developed, the Moodle version that was used is also present.   One can also see resources.   Should be able to determine if the backup course is 'phoning home' or it actually contains all the resources internally.

Also inspect moodledata/temp/backup/ - the directory used for restores.  There might be larger than 0 byte size .log files there that is a log of the failed restores.   Could give you a hint/clue.  Plus there might be a 'contenthash' named folder with all the resources/files, etc. contained in the course ... one has to cross reference the xml files with the related content (files.xml with course_files directory, as an example).

'spirit of thinkering', Ken

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In reply to Ken Russell

Re: Coursepack restore problem

by Alice Garrard -

Hello Ken - I think I am your publisher, I can not locate your HD ticket on our system based on this information. Perhaps this is resolved.  If you are still having this issue, can you go back to your original ticket on our system and post a comment something like ' Alice said to send this issue to her'. We will be happy to help you get the coursepack loaded. 

Thank you,

Alice Garrard



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In reply to Alice Garrard

Re: Coursepack restore problem

by Ken Russell -
Alice, I have done as you suggested and contacted the helpdesk asking them to forward the problem to you. This is Incident #203303. You can also contact me directly using my email address in my moodle.org profile. I am working with Macmillan Education Technical Support, if this is not your organization, please let me know. Thanks for your help!
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In reply to Ken Russell

Re: Coursepack restore problem

by Thomas College -

Hi Ken,

We have a similar problem. Where you ever able to resolve this issue?

Thanks

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