Jenny,

The checklist plugin only allows for one set of items for each activity instance. You can set items to be for a specific grouping, so, in theory, you could create a grouping for a single group, containing a single student, and link items that way. However, that is not what the checklist is designed for - it is meant tracking the progress each student against a single list of items (that all students have in common).

Plugin's table has the column named "grouping" which causes problem with MariaDB insert and update queries as this word is reserved and Moodle doesn't add back-ticks around column names. I worked around it by hotfixing /lib/dml/mysqli_native_moodle_database.php file with:
1345: $fields = '`' . implode('`,`', array_keys($params)) . '`';
1573: $sets[] = "`" . $field . "` = ?";

Denis - I think you must be using an old version of the plugin, as the field "grouping" was renamed "groupingid" about 2 years ago.

The versions of the plugin for Moodle 3.4 (and above) and Moodle 3.9 (and above) both use "groupingid" - it is only the versions for Moodle 3.3 (or below) that have the issue (and those versions of Moodle are long out of support, so you should probably be upgrading, rather than trying to workaround issues).

Is it possible to bulk upload certificate completions? I have 30 users and 20 checklist items. We earlier used excel to track this, i would like to import the completion satus against every employees.

Vijay, the checklist plugin does not currently support importing checkmarks from an external file - it wouldn't be a huge job to add something that could import such marks as CSV files.

Please open a ticket in github (see the 'Source control URL' link above) and I may consider undertaking this at some point.

If you have some funding available to cover the cost of my time to implement this, then I could put you in touch with my employers to get a quote to implement this (which would include the cost of our QA team testing it to make sure it works reliably). Alternatively, I'd be happy to review a submitted patch that does this.

Hello Davo

We use the checklist to assign one of three predefined tasks (A,B,C) after each lesson in our course. We have created an item for each lesson and we note A, B, C for each student in the comment section which works fine.
Currently, we are using a link to a page in which the tasks are described shortly. We would prefer the task descriptions to occur below each lesson as some students could get loose the overview. That’s why we have tried to add one item per task (A,B,C) as indented “headlines”. Now we have the following questions: Would it possible to have text that is not written in bold or is there any other possibility to add text that can be formatted in an item in the checklist? As we have three tasks the headlines would also occupy quite a lot of space in the progress of each student. Is there any work around for that?

Hi, this is very useful feature. However, is it possible to show the tracker bar directly to the student on their Moodle course - rather than them having to click through to see it?
i.e. At the moment, it seems that they can only see the progress bar by clicking once on the name of the checklist that appears on their course, then they will see the progress bar in the next view. It could be more motivating for them to see it at the top of the page as soon as they log in. (Related to this, the current icon could be slightly misleading, as it seems to indicate a state of progress but is in fact static.)
Thanks,
Julian

You can use the checklist block to show the checklist progress on the course page.

Alternatively, it should be possible to extend the code to display checklist progress within the course, but I don't have any spare time to take this on in the evenings, so would need someone to pay for me to undertake this during my working day (or I'll accept a well-written patch, with behat test coverage, from another developer).

As for the icon, graphic design is not my strong point - I'm more than happy to accept an alternative icon from someone who can create something better.

Hi Davo, just wanted to let you know that your latest copy of Checklist, when I download the zip file and extract it, the extracted folder is named "davosmith-moodle-checklist-9183a0c" instead of the normal "checklist" folder name. I am not sure if you intended this to happen.

Rick - this is a recently-reported bug in the Moodle plugins directory software - it is being worked on, but there's not much I can do, as the bug is with this website.

Okay, Davo, not a Checklist problem. Your block checklist plugin extracts just fine, but this could be because the block checklist is older. Thanks for getting back to me.

I have been experimenting with the way Checklist can auto-create its list, including adapting to hidden activities and hidden topics. I notice is that Checklist does not seem to honor "groups," meaning that if the activity is not available to a student who is not in a group and thereby not visible, the activity still shows in Checklist. Is this true, or is there something that I am missing?

Incidentally, maybe you saw my Tracker item, MDL-71856, and discussion posts about Moodle 3.11 removing checkboxes. I have used your Checklist plugin for many years, and if Moodle continues not to show checkboxes, your Checklist plugin becomes even more valuable. Of course, thanks.

Rick - specifically, the problem occurs when a new version is released, the internal renaming of the directory on the Moodle website has been broken. This does not affect existing uploads and will not be solved until the bug is fixed and a new release takes place. This problem affects all plugins that have been updated since the bug occurred.

As far as I am aware, Moodle stopped supporting linking activities to groups (or, more accurately "groupings") many years ago. Instead it supports arbitrarily-complex combinations of rules to hide activities under certain conditions. This is easy to manage for a single user (there are cached + efficient functions to cover that case), but impractical to handle across potentially thousands of users enrolled on a courses (e.g. when the checklist needs to update everyone simultaneously when a checklist's settings change, or when a new activity is detected or when the teacher is viewing a report of all student's progress).

I can think of no way to efficiently support Moodle's availability rules within the checklist, but if someone out there wants to submit a patch that demonstrably scales to courses with large numbers of enrolments, then I'm very happy to review it.

Yes, I've seen the complaints about the improvements to the display of activity completion within a course. I'm glad that the checklist is helpful to some people who happen to not like this new layout.

Thanks, Davo for your explanation. As Moodle takes a few steps forward, some things take a step backward. However, overall, it is good to see so much energy devoted to improving Moodle (much better than the other LMSs.)

Another question that I have for you is about the various ways an activity can be checked off. 1) By meeting the course completion events, 2) Manually, and 3) Both. From what I notice, your Checklist plugin supports 1, 2, and then also 3. Have you ever thought about using different color "checks" to designate how a checkbox is checked? For example, use Blue when a student checks off a task, Green for when the system checks off a task, and Black when both the student and the system has checked off a task? (Colors are just examples and I am not sure what is best.)

As an example, the student takes a quiz that contains an essay question. The student is "done" and checks the box, it turns Blue. After the instructor grades the essay question and a grade is provided, Checklist changes the color to Black. Of course, the presence of any check in the checkbox means that "the student is done."

As far as the checklist is concerned, each item has the following states available:
* Checked by student (or not) - controlled by automatic completion rules as well, if checklist is configured that way - available for student / student + teacher checklists
* Teacher marks the item as yes / no / not marked (the default) - available for teacher / student + teacher checklists

There is nothing recorded about the reason why the checklist item was updated, there is absolutely no distinction in the code between an item that was checked-off automatically and one which was checked off by the student (indeed, I cannot figure out how an item could be checked off automatically and then be still available for a student to be able to manually check it off).

If you want to develop some new features for the checklist, then feel free to submit a well-written patch, with good automated test coverage (and making sure it isn't going to break the plugin for anyone who doesn't want the new features). I have no current plans to add new features in my spare time (over and above that which is needed for Moodle release compatibility).

Okay, Davo, I understand. About your question, "I cannot figure out how an item could be checked off automatically and then be still available for a student..." The scenario that I would see is that, for example, I have a quiz that allows unlimited attempts. The student is about to re-attempt the quiz as many times as they wish up until the due date. Additionally, I might want to have an activity completion requirement of "student must view." The student makes 8 attempts and calls it quits. In this scenario, the system thinks the quiz completion is finished and tags it with a "check." But the student says, "I am not finished." The student makes 3 attempts and then decides to call it quits. What does the student do? The student already sees a check, and the student might want to override this check (which they can do) manually, but there is no visual difference between the student overriding the check versus the system putting the check there. Yes, this is only one example. But I can see situations where the student might want to click "I am done, check," even before the system thinks the student is done.

I just thought about another example. Consider a quiz that might have essay questions that require manual grading by the instructor. The student completes the quiz and wants to check off that they have finished. So they go to Checklist and clicks a check (let's say it gets a BLUE check.) But this quiz is really not done because it still requires grading by the instructor. After the instructor grades the essay question, the system wants to provide a check. With only BLUE, the student doesn't know that this item is really complete. This is where the "check" might change to a BLACK, meaning that the student said they were done, and the system also thinks they are done.

Incidentally, right now, in Moodle3.11, this kind of situation exists in the Activity Completion Report. You will see me mention this on Tracker. The AC Report does use two different colors, BLUE and GREEN. (This issue was brought to attention by Leon's Moodle.org post.) I think BLUE means that the quiz still requires manual grading; GREEN means that grading has been completed.

Yep, this "Activity Completion" is getting a bit messy.

I hope that you understand what I have portrayed. At this point, I am still planning to continue my use of your Checklist plugins because I believe they do a better job at allowing my students to mark activities that they have completed manually.