Hi,
Like most of you, I often create Moodle material with some kind of media files embedded: images/animations/videos, linked files (mostly pdf), etc. interspersed within text in quiz questions, book/lesson pages, etc. I am talking about own resources, not internet resources you can simply link.
I know they are at least 3 ways to store all these related files within Moodle:
- Create ad-hoc Moodle resources on the Course main page and put links to them into other pages. This works if the linked resources have significance on their own (i.e. makes sense to view them separately) and if their number are small (to not clutter the main course page). Doesn't work, for instance, to display an image into a quiz question.
- When editing text you can insert an image/video to be displayed, or you can create a link pointing to a file. In those cases a "file picker" dialog appears and you can choose to "upload a file" which, if I'm correct, will end up being stored and indexed into the Moodle's "filedir" area so this will not be duplicated if inserted/referenced more than once. In my opinion, the main drawback of this method is that the files remain somewhat "buried" inside the Moodle's bowels and it's difficult to know hown many files, and which ones, we have stored.
- Create some repository resource and upload your materials there, then pick them up from there when editing your texts. I understand that when you pick a file this way you're offered the choice of "linking" the file or "copying" it and, in the latter case, the file ends up being stored in the "filedir" area like before. But if you always select the "link" option you're not duplicating information and you can
So, I would like to know your opinions on which method should be preferable regarding aspects like ease of using and maintaining, backup/restore resources with this embedded material on the same site or other sites, etc. Which system do you use? Do you have any other suggestions?
Thaks in advance.