The access to courses in Moodle is now
- open (no restrictions, no icon in course lists)
- access key (password protection, key icon)
- paypal (fee-based access)
Courses can also be hidden, of course. Do I miss anything?
Now, the access key mode is used in at least 2-3 ways:
- password is actually given to students in class (key icon)
- password not given - students signed up manually (key icon)
- password not given - no student access (key icon)
The latter may sound like irrelevant case, but it is exactly what I had to add to our Moodle: to have courses that are visible to students while making clear they have no access to them (I show a different icon). Further modes or distinctions:
- password not given - manual signup based on registrar list
- password not given - manual signup upon request from student
- password not given - automatic signup from registrar list (ldap, dbase)
- password not given - all students pre-signed (ie text import)
I am sure others can add more options. What is missing in Moodle IMHO is visual distinction between at least some of those variations as seen from user perspective. I am essentially talking about replacing or varying the key icon.
I have hacked something (rather primitive) for us but I wonder whether a more general solution would not be in order: course settings could include an explicit assignment of course access/enrolment type, just like we have a popup with login modes for users, so Moodle knows a) which icon to show in course lists, and b) how to handle enrolment.
I read that more commercial options are coming as well as options to generate short-lived or individual keys. I think that formalizing "course access type" (enrolment mode) could/should be added in 1.6 -- it would allow us for cleaner presentation of the various access types to teachers and users as well as allowing us to customize Moodle better/easier for our needs.
IMHO this feature would also complement multi-enrol very nicely.
Have you tested the Multi-enrol patches? I think they address most (all?) of what you're after, including having courses that are currently being taught bit are not available to enrol into now.
Get a checkout of it -- feedback (and patches) welcome!
Get a checkout of it -- feedback (and patches) welcome!
It seems that Multi-enrol is for 1.6. I am running 1.5. Besides the installation instructions sound sort of gibrish to me. I could check it out if it is part of the 1.6dev distribution in the downloads section of moodle.org.
I read the long thread about Multi-enrol and it indeed sounds like going into the right direction, although the focus is somewhat different than what I presented. It seems that Multi-enrol essentially allows us specifying multiple modes of enrolment for a given course. The discussion was about technicalogies it delivers whereas my focus was on user interface.
I am curious to see how what students see differs from 1.5.x. It is not clear to me how some of the distinction I mentioned are accomplished -- for example, the distinction between a course closed for enrolment, a course that requires manual enrolment by teachers, and a course that requires students to enter an access key.
I read the long thread about Multi-enrol and it indeed sounds like going into the right direction, although the focus is somewhat different than what I presented. It seems that Multi-enrol essentially allows us specifying multiple modes of enrolment for a given course. The discussion was about technicalogies it delivers whereas my focus was on user interface.
I am curious to see how what students see differs from 1.5.x. It is not clear to me how some of the distinction I mentioned are accomplished -- for example, the distinction between a course closed for enrolment, a course that requires manual enrolment by teachers, and a course that requires students to enter an access key.