Course Archiver

Administration tools ::: tool_coursearchiver

Maintained by

Matthew Davidson

Archive and remove past courses with this handy tool that can also be used to send notifications to course teachers, hide courses in bulk, and has the ability for course teachers to opt out of the archiving.

Latest release: 3 months

895 sites

565 downloads

93 fans

Current versions available: 1

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Course Archiver

This tool is used to search for courses, notify the course owners, and mass hide or archive (backup and remove) courses. The courses are stored with Moodle's backup file extension ".mbz". These files can then be manually found in the user defined folder and can be restored using Moodle's built in restore feature.

Install

copy the coursearchiver folder into the admin/tool folder.

Settings

Folder path

A folder created within the moodledata folder. The tool will create this folder, however it is recommended that the folder be created outside the moodledata folder, and a shortcut be placed in the moodledata folder.

Course Hide Email

This is the template email that will be sent to the owners of the selected courses to notify them that their course(s) will be hidden. There are two required variables in the email %to (name of the recipient) and %courses (a list of courses with mailto hyperlinks to notify the site administrator that the user wishes to opt out)

Course Archive Email

This is the template email that will be sent to the owners of the selected courses to notify them that their course(s) will be archived. There are two required variables in the email %to (name of the recipient) and %courses (a list of courses with mailto hyperlinks to notify the site administrator that the user wishes to opt out)

Course opt out persistence

A course can be opted out of the archival process and future archiver searches. This setting determines how many months the opt out with last.

Archive deletion delay

When an archived file is selected for deletion, the actual removal of the file will be delayed by x days.

Archive search limiter

Archives can get very large. This limits the amount of records returned to screen at one time.

Useful links

Screenshots

Contributors

Matthew Davidson (Lead maintainer)

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Awards

Automated testing support

Early bird 3.11

Early bird 4.2

Early bird 4.3

Comments

Show comments

Amir Hossein
Tue, 9 Feb 2021, 5:36 PM
Hi, if adobe connect activities enabled in course after archive and delete , The course is fully restored , but the content has also been removed from the Adobe server and can no longer be recovered !!
Blair F.
Wed, 3 Mar 2021, 1:27 AM
Hi, all! I love this plugin! I'm just curious... why is there a maximum of 200 courses shown on the archived list?
Lynn MacDonald
Wed, 23 June 2021, 8:21 PM
Hi. Posted this yesterday in the Community Forum, but it did not garner any responses. Hoping someone might be able to suggest what to do: https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=423748
Blair F.
Tue, 21 Sept 2021, 5:45 AM
I'm just wondering if others experience time-out issues. I am only able to archive MAX 6 courses at a time.
Martin Božič
Wed, 29 Sept 2021, 9:10 PM
I guess it's better to use CLI tool for extremly large courses and large batches?
Matthew Davidson
Wed, 29 Sept 2021, 9:16 PM
@Martin Božič - Yes, if you are running into the session timeout or a browser timeout issue, it is best to use the CLI part if possible. There is a bug where the course backup can halt a batch, but then when you try again it usually works, so it has been really hard to track down.
Blair F.
Wed, 29 Sept 2021, 11:25 PM
Darn. I don't have that level of access, so I'll just do it a few courses at a time. It's still better than one at a time.
Ridhima Suri
Thu, 24 Feb 2022, 1:58 AM
Will this plugin be available for Moodle 4.0?
Matthew Davidson
Thu, 24 Feb 2022, 2:02 AM
Yes, I have a Moodle 4.0 version already working. Just haven't made an offiicial release yet.
Pete Stockley
Mon, 16 May 2022, 3:52 PM
Hi,

I couldn't find more information on this setting in the documentation. Can anyone advise on the following?

If I set "local_course_archive | timeinarchive" to 0:
a) does that mean the course will be moved directly to the Delete -category?
b) will a notification still be sent to the course teachers?
ALEXANDER ALMEIDA PEREIRA
Thu, 13 July 2023, 1:47 AM
Can I use this plugin for bulk backup all the courses in a category without delete those courses?
Matthew Davidson
Thu, 13 July 2023, 3:36 AM
Just released v4.1.4 which now includes a backup only feature.
Cathal O'Riordan
Wed, 22 Nov 2023, 8:37 PM
Hi, I'm interested to know if it is possible to disable emails being sent from the plugin when a course is marked for archiving? My institution is applying a slightly different workflow, where all faculty will be notified where a particular segment (academic year, semester etc.) of the courses on our Moodle site will be archived and removed. I'll like to remove any additional notifications if possible. Thanks.
BIANCA VAN BREDA
Thu, 20 June 2024, 4:15 PM
Hi there, I am wondering if one can set up the Course Archiver to archive a course once the course has reached its end date. Has anyone had any luck with this? I.e. Set a course with a start and end date, and when it reaches the end date it is automatically archived by the Course Archiver.
Juli MacArthur
Thu, 6 Feb 2025, 5:51 PM
Hi, are there any plans for a full 4.4+ update? Our Hosts won't install this as it's failed some tests on our 4.3.8 and this plugin is an incredible resource! Thanks!