Itamar Tzadok

If project doesn't work for you and you still need a solution, I'm using a semi-automatic procedure for assigning students to groups in the course level. It involves creating xml member tags in excel, backing up the course users, copying the xml into the backup, and restoring. The required work is insignificant when you need to assign handreds of students to groups based on their choice or on a predefined list.

You can try setting up a simple database (activity) with the topic appearing in the introduction box and 'require approval' set to yes. The 'required approval' prevents viewing entries until they are approved so if you don't approve them each entry may be seen only by the teacher and the student who entered it.

You can also try playing with other settings such as 'Entries required before viewing' set to 2 and 'maximum entries' set to 1; haven't tried that myself though and it may have unexpected results.

Another way is to add to the course the latest news block and that will bring back the new forum.

For re-mix and re-use I prefer to store my questions neither as GIFT nor as Moodle XML but as raw data which I can format and reformat in the desired import format at leisure and with a click of a button. This way reviewing the set of available questions is also much more efficient.

Because the questions I have to deal with are usually much more complex than the standard multiplechoice, true-false etc. the GIFT format may be best for. And with the right methods for mass creation and uploading I developed over time Moodle XML is for me by now as easy as GIFT but much more flexible and hence a much stronger tool. But then again that's only my preference.