End of year Moodle course rollovers

@lewiscarr #moodlerollovers

Moodle End-of-Year Course Rollovers

Who is this presentation aimed at?

● Those without a rollover procedure.

● Those without the skills or resources to hack databases and write web services.

● Those looking for a low cost core solution.

What is a Moodle rollover?

A process where we prepare Moodle for the next academic term.

Building a strategy

● What are your business objectives?

● How much does it cost? - time/hardware/storage

● Does it form part of a wider IT strategy?

● Which stakeholders need to be involved?

Defining a process

● Which method works best for you?

● How will you identify rollover courses?

● Which courses still need access?

● Will there be downtime?

What organisations currently do?

Clone a new Moodle instance each year

Backup a course then reset

Clone a course and archive

Cloned Moodle

Advantages● An exact replica● A live environment● Can be done relatively

quickly ● No tutor involvement

Disadvantages● Another server to

maintain● Another Moodle to

upgrade, patch & backup

● Requires another URL ● Requires a server for

each year (3yr+ server cycle)

● Requires downtime

Backup a course and reset

Advantages● Can be done by tutors.● Single course instance.● Can be done ad-hoc.● No downtime.

Disadvantages● Old instance is not live.● Courses need

individually restoring for access.

● Linear & Manual Process.

● Backup courses may fall behind Moodle version upgrades.

Clone a course and archive

Advantages● Legacy course is

archived yet still accessible.

● New course is populated for the start of term.

● Requires one Moodle server instance.

● No downtime.● No restore process when

access is required.

Disadvantages● Linear & Manual

Process.● Makes existing Moodle

site (slightly) larger.

How to automate the “Clone a course and archive” procedure with CSV files

Before you start

● You must be able to identify which courses you are rolling over.

● Work closely with your MIS team.● Export as much data from MIS as

possible. ● Create your course archive folders in

advance.

Step 1Archive your legacy courses to a new folder

Step 2Suspend current users on legacy course

Step 3Create new courses and restore content

Step 4Enrol your new users onto the new courses

4-step process

Step 1 - Archive legacy courses

Move the course to an archived category

(WARNING: Category must already exist)

Old Category Structure

- Science - Maths- English

New Category Structure

- Science - Maths- English- 2015 Courses

- Science- Maths- English

Create a CSV File - category must exist!

shortname rename fullname category_path

algebra algebra2015 Algebra 2015 Courses / Maths

statistics statistics2015 Statistics 2015 Courses / Maths

geometry geometry2015 Geometry 2015 Courses / Maths

biology biology2015 Biology 2015 Courses / Science

physics physics2015 Physics 2015 Courses / Science

Upload it via: Site administration > Courses > Upload Courses


For help with uploading courses: https://docs.moodle.org/29/en/Upload_courses

Congratulations!

You have successfully moved your legacy courses to an archive folder

Note: It is also possible to use the command-line

tool

admin/tool/uploadcourse/cli/uploadcourse.php.





Step 2

Create a User CSV file

username course1 enrolstatus1

[email protected] physics2015 1

[email protected] statistics2015 1

[email protected] biology2015 1

[email protected] geometry2015 1

[email protected] algebra2015 1

Upload it via: Site administration > Users > Accounts > Upload Users

For help with uploading users: https://docs.moodle.org/29/en/Upload_users

Congratulations!

You have successfully archived your legacy courses and user accounts





Step 3

Create a course CSV

shortname fullname category_path templatecourse

algebra Algebra Maths algebra2015

statistics Statistics Maths statistics2015

geometry Geometry Maths geometry2015

biology Biology Science biology2015

physics Physics Science physics2015


Congratulations!

You have successfully created your new courses with pre-populated template content





Step 4

Enrol your new learners

● Continue to use you existing enrolment methods (Manual/Self-enrolment/CSV/Database)

● Or use this as an opportunity to devise a new enrollment procedure

For help with uploading users: https://docs.moodle.org/29/en/Upload_users





Review of the 4-step process

Pitfalls

Pitfalls

● Your success is dependent on the quality of your data

● Course Categories must be created prior● It is still a large undertaking that requires

planning● The Moodle part is easy - getting the

course data is difficult● The smaller the organisation the easier

this is

Tips

● Tackle this in smaller stages● Consider one department at a time● Plan it first (map out the process)● Pull the data from a central source

(MIS)● Can be a staggered approach and last

minute changes can be accommodated also.

Bribe with biscuits

Some guidelines

● The task is easier if Moodle matches your current MIS data (i.e course codes)

● Create a checklist to ensure you know what data to ask for prior

● Do the heavy lifting in MIS and export as CSV files.

● Flowchart your procedure

Room for improvement (wishlist)

● Role replacement via CSV● Automatic Category Creation from CSV

Storage Space

Some useful links

http://www.somerandomthoughts.com/blog/2012/09/14/end-of-year-rollover/

https://docs.moodle.org/29/en/Year-end_procedures





Questions?@lewiscarr #moodlerollovers

End of year Moodle course rollovers

Education

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