Joseph Rézeau

Hi all!
This "bug report" is not strictly related to either Tomas's HotPot nor Gordon's HotPotatoes modules but it might be of interest to anyone using HP-authored exercises on a Moodle platform.
We are using Moodle 1.4.2 at our university. I have recently authored a few sample Hot Potatoes exercises (with version 6) and have uploaded them to our Moodle server. To my surprise, the HTML exercises did not work: it looks as if the Javascript is not recognized by our Moodle installation, the buttons, etc. just sit there but can't be activated!
On the other hand I have been unable to replicate the problem on my various local installations of Moodle (1.1.3, 1.5, with various brands of Apache, etc.): locally on my machine it works fine...
I have finally found a solution: when you save an exercise to HTML, Hot Potatoes version_6 offers you the choice to save it either as one HTML file or as 2 separate files: an HTML file and a JS file. Strangely enough, an exercise thus saved and uploaded to our Moodle server works, whilst the former solution of date+code in one file did not...
If this workaround can be useful to other perplexed HP+Moodle users, then I won't quite have lost my day. On the other hand, I'd really be curious to hear of others who have had this strange experience and of other ways to solve the problem.
All the best,
Joseph_R

Hi everyone!
I still want to have my own CSS styles for my own course(s), under Moodle 1.4 at the moment...
As explained in my previous message, I have found David's workaround most useful and usable... up to a point.
That workaround relies on the  $course->id variable being transmitted by all the modules calling the current site theme's header.html file to that file, so that the header file can point to the relevant personal course CSS file placed at the root of the moodledata course folder.
I have not had any replies to my message of Jan. 26, and I have now discovered that in Moodle 1.5 (DEV) the problem is worse, since the needed  $course->id variable is not transmitted to header.html when a resource is being displayed (including uploaded files).
I am not familiar enough with the workings of the Moodle modules calling the header.html file to suggest a solution to my problem - which is now growing urgent.

I would be grateful for any help. Should I post this as a bug?

Joseph_R

PS On the same topic of "course themes", see my other posting at http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=19014

Hello!

After having used David's workaround to customize my own course CSS styles, see http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=12923 I was looking forward to the new Course Theme facility in version 1.5.
I'm a little puzzled and disappointed in the way Course Themes are going to work in 1.5.

Apparently, all that teachers will be allowed to do is to select a theme that they want to apply to their course from the list of themes made available by Admin on their institution site. Even then, in the 1.5 version I downloaded and tested this week, only a very small subset of that list appears in the teacher's dropdown list Edit Course Settings/ Force theme:, namely: OrangeWhite, OrangeWhitePDA and Standard. And I can't find the Admin setting which restricts this choice... Maybe this is just a thing with the DEV version...

I was looking forward to a more flexible system whereby teachers would be allowed to build their own CSS stylesheets and use them, without having to resort to Admin.  Something similar to David's workaround mentioned above. For instance, a \theme folder might be made available in eache Moodledata\course folder, where teachers would be free to upload any personal theme(s) they wish to use for their course.

The reason I wish to customize my course themes is that my courses are built around a number of  HTML files, uploaded and used as Resources, which have their own CSS stylesheets and I want to integrate them seamlessly in a compatible environement, not a "jarring" stylesheet imposed on a whole Moodle site by Admin. I know this may sound strange to the many moodlers who work in small institutions where maybe the same person is Admin & Teacher, or where Admin deals with a handful of teachers. My situation is quite the opposite, with one Admin and hundreds of teachers (and thousands of students).

I am looking forward to fellow-moodlers' reactions,

Joseph_R

Hi David!
Thanks for your excellent workaround to get rid of the problem of the hard-coded <font size = 3> tags sprinkled over a few Moodle (version 1.4) modules...
Actually, thanks to your message, I've realized that simply putting the following line in the CSS file of my chosen theme gets rid of most of the offending oversize fonts:
p font b { font-size:12px;}
Thanks a lot,
Joseph_R

I am strongly in favour of the 24 hour time system. I do understand that it is not familiar to English-speakers, but neither is the AM-PM system imposed by Moodle at the moment familiar to NON-English speakers...
The 24-hour system is much clearer, avoids all ambiguity of the current "midday vs midnight" problem. At the very least, Moodle settings should offer the choice between the 2 systems.
Joseph_R
PS I've posted this comment on Tim's bug report at http://moodle.org/bugs/bug.php?op=show&bugid=2281&pos=1