Activity Date Changer

Activity Date Changer

by Timothy Takemoto -
Number of replies: 5

I am still using Moodle 1.6.2 and 1.6.3 from 2006 for online quizzes, and assignments. It works well but alas it is not fully adapted to secure, encoded https so "modern" browsers keep telling the students that the site is insecure. Our system staff tell me that if the server is upgraded to provide full https (not only on the login page) then older versions of Moodle will not work.

The problem with upgrading, or moving to the university installation, for me is that on my 1.6.2/3 I have a date changing functionality via the course date manager that lets me change all the dates of the quizzes by 6 months or a year and then change subsets of the quizzes by a week or so to move their to match the new semester with its different holidays and make up-days, and then tweak a few more to absolute dates all on the same page.

I understand that the core can now update courses changing all the dates, but I don't think that the current date module has the functionality to change a subset of the dates at once.
https://moodle.org/plugins/view.php?plugin=report_editdates

I see that there is a date manager for quizzes only kindly provided by  for Moodle 2.2. which is probably https compatible
https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=28361

I can use the database on my own installation but I am being encouraged to move to the university installation where I can not use mysql commands.

Is there any other way of obtaining a course date changer type functionality on current versions 3.7/8? of moodle?

Tim
tkmt

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In reply to Timothy Takemoto

Re: Activity Date Changer

by Visvanath Ratnaweera -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Translators
Hi Timothy

I wonder whether your enquiry sets a record. Moodle 1.6, released June 2006, 14 years 7 months ago! Still very interesting for the oldtimer fans.
wink

Now the statement of your system staff is inaccurate:
> Our system staff tell me that if the server is upgraded to provide full https (not only on the login page) then older versions of Moodle will not work.

HTTPS is available since decades. You don't need to upgrade the system for that. Just activate HTTPS in your web server. In Apache that would be mod_ssl.

That said, there is a problem. Firstly, SSL is not one thing. The protocol has gone through various versions. I don't know whether a version acceptable today is available for the web server driving your Moodle. Secondly, you can't just upgrade the system. That'll break Moodle. The system software a particular Moodle version supports, also have max. versions. For Moodle rel. 1.6 the PHP max is 5.6. I have no record of MySQL max. I guess it was 5.0.25. The explanation is simple: The syntax of those languages have evolved!

Ref. http://www.syndrega.ch/blog/#php-and-dbms-compatibility-of-major-moodle-releases
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In reply to Visvanath Ratnaweera

Re: Activity Date Changer

by Timothy Takemoto -
Thank you Mr. Ratnaweera

I am informed by my system personnel that https is not an option.

I am posting here to ask whether course date manager type functionality that allows me to change the dates of multiple activities (or even just quizzes) both relatively (plus or minus X days etc) and absolutely (to a specific date) is now available in the recent releases of Moodle (other than by using mysql).

I have a lot of quizzes and changing the date of opening and closing one by one using my mouse is something I would like to avoid.

Takemoto
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In reply to Timothy Takemoto

Re: Activity Date Changer

by Visvanath Ratnaweera -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Translators
Hi Timothy (in the global village we are on first names;) )

I don't understand why the IT can't just activate https in the web server, leaving everything else intact. May be they don't want to touch the very old server.

I don't know the course data manager you mentioned. From the thread you linked, "The course date mgmt. block allows you to edit the dates for all course activities in one page, rather than having to access each individual activity. At the moment, it's available from this thread" ! https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=28361#p135596 (A.D. 2005!)

For current and supported alternatives you should search in the plug-in database, https://moodle.org/plugins/. See for example Report Dates, "is actually at tool that lets you edit all the dates for all] the activities in your course on a single page". https://moodle.org/plugins/report_editdates
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In reply to Visvanath Ratnaweera

Re: Activity Date Changer

by Timothy Takemoto -
Thanks again Visvanath

The server is very old. They tell me that in order to run https they would need to update the system (linux, apache, and perhaps mysql) and that if they did that my old Moodle would not run on it. But in any event, even if they are wrong (or lying!) they are not going to do it.

The course date manager from 2005, that I have been using since then very happily for the past 15 years, allowed me to use checkboxes to select multiple (all, all in a week, or selected) activities and then change their dates by stipulated relative amount (of days, weeks, hours, minutes) or to a stipulated objective date.

I believe that the report allows changing the dates on one page but I don't think that it lets users change all selected dates by the same relative amount or all selected to the same date (or that is what my system people tell me). Am I misunderstanding things?

Tim
Timothy Takemoto
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In reply to Timothy Takemoto

Re: Activity Date Changer

by Visvanath Ratnaweera -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Translators
About HTTPS:
Even the oldest Apache 2 I have, it needs only a vhost file starting with the following three lines to support HTTPS:
<IfModule mod_ssl.c>
        <VirtualHost _default_:443>
                DocumentRoot /path/to/moodle
They must have some reason unknown to me. This might help: https://docs.moodle.org/en/Transitioning_to_HTTPS.

About the add-ons: I don't know any of them. I guess you have to ask the IT people to give you a supported Moodle version with that add-on installed for testing.
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