Dear Dan and All,
Apologies if my questions will appear very basic, but I just can't get the Attendance's automatic feature to work like I would want..
I'm using version 3.5.6 on Moodle 3.5.2. Tried a few sites.
Is there a configuration that would allow me simply to:
1) automatically set student status in a session to Present if s/he has accessed the course at the required time period (from an IP controlled machine).
2) automatically set student status to Absent under other conditions.
I want this to be done **fully automatically** - without students having to click on "Submit attendance", and ideally without even displaying that "Submit your attendance" button at all.
I assume the two crucial pages for me are
(1)
Attendance > Status set
Do I need "Available for students (minutes)" to be set in any way at all? I believe not (unless I care if a student was late for class etc.). The statuses are thus "available" throughout the duration of a session? And the highest available ("Present") can be selected "automatically" when needed, right? (cf. point 2 below) However, does this setting only work with the "Submit attendance" button? Does the timing of the students'' interactions with the course come in here as well ? If so, do they do so in any specific way, time-wise? Maybe there any restrictions that my reckless tests have been bypassing.. Any recommendations for my needs?
"Automatically set when not marked" - I set the radio button for "Present" here. Is this the correct setting for me ..? I was thinking this would work if he student did not press the "Submit attendance" button but was appropriately logged as active in the course. But it didn't work .. Hmm.
I'm not sure I understand how these options above interplay with each other and with the session settings below.
(2)
Session > Edit session
I thought the natural settings for me were :
Automatic setting: Yes - I just wonder why this is enabled only when "Allow students to record on attendance" is on..? Just how much automatic is "automatic"? Is this the setting to avoid pressing "Submit attendance"? But I still can see that button there...
(Another puzzle, why do the other two options require a possible password..? However, I don't think i need to undersand that right now if it does not concern my problem.)
"Automatically select highest status available" - I assume this reads the "Available for students (minutes)" statuses of a given session , right? So I have that selected.
Require network address: Use default or enter manual value - this works.
Prevent student sharing ... - I don't need this now, but why does the "Yes" setting throw the "Invalid minutes to release" alert..?
My problems seems close to what I found here:
https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=364282 , but I just could figure out the settings..
Please advise, whoever can.
Many thanks.
Przemek
