Collaborative Liberal Arts Moodle Project

Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 is available for download. This release includes a number of new features including:

• Simple File Upload: Upload individual files without having to deal with the full Moodle upload interface
• Assignment ZIP: Download all the files associated with an assignment with one click.
• LAE Grader View: A cleaner, easier-to-navigate gradebook view.
• Anonymous Forums: A mod for Moodle forums that allows for anonymous forum posting (note: those in the administrator and teacher roles can still see the IP addresses associated with posts in the log file).

Full release notes and the release download can be found on the Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 project page.

The Moodle 1.9.9+Liberal Arts Edition v1.1 Beta 3 is available for download. This is a beta release meant for testing only; it is not recommended for use on production systems. The Beta 3 release includes some hack/doc developed refinements to the gradebook’s administration settings (MDL-22931, MDL-22928) and a new graphic for TinyMCE’s “Insert File” icon.

• Code freeze was 6/29/2010
• Beta 1 released on 6/26/2010
• Beta 2 was released on 7/2/2010
• Beta 3 was released on 7/14/2010
• The final version will be released on 7/15/2010

This version of the LAE incorporates a number of bug fixes and new features developed at Hack/Doc Fest VI at DePauw University. We need help testing these features and verifying that they work for you.

• Go to the project home page to download the code.

Please post feedback as a comment on the project page. CLAMP members can post feedback to the Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 Beta 3 thread in the Redmine forum.

The CLAMP Development Committee has decided to do one final beta release for — Beta 3 — for Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1. This release includes a few bug fixes from Hack/Doc Fest that didn’t make it into the Development branch and tweak to TinyMCE 3 to make the “file upload” icon clearer. The release will be posted Wednesday morning by 10 a.m. EDT; the Development Committee will then conduct its last round of testing on Wednesday and Thursday, with Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 dropping Thursday afternoon.

The Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 Beta 2 is available for download. This is a beta release meant for testing only; it is not recommended for use on production systems. The Beta 2 release incorporates a fix for Simple File Upload’s default setting and refinements to the CLAMP Grader view for Gradebook.

• Code freeze was 6/29/2010
• Beta 1 released on 6/26/2010
• Beta 2 released on 7/2/2010
• The final version will be released on 7/9/2010

This version of the LAE incorporates a number of bug fixes and new features developed at Hack/Doc Fest VI at DePauw University. We need help testing these features and verifying that they work for you.

• Go to the project home page to download the code.

Please post feedback as a comment on the project page. CLAMP members can post feedback to the Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 Beta 2 thread in the Redmine forum.

The Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 Beta 1 is available for download. This is a beta release meant for testing only; it is not recommended for use on production systems.

• Code freeze will be on the end of the day on June 29.
• We will release Beta 2 on 7/2/2010
• The final version will be released on 7/9/2010.

This version of the LAE incorporates a number of bug fixes and new features developed at Hack/Doc Fest VI at DePauw University. We need help testing these features and verifying that they work for you.

• Go to the project home page to download the code.

Please post feedback as a comment on the project page. CLAMP members can post feedback to the Moodle 1.9.9+LAE v1.1 Beta 1 thread in the Redmine forum.

CLAMP is running a survey to learn what colleges are using for their eReserves system and what, if any, integration that system has with Moodle. We’ll use answers to this survey to help guide CLAMP’s development efforts in this area.

• Take the Moodle and eReserves Integration survey.

Hack/Doc Fest: Summer 2010 is coming, we’re looking for  suggestions for bug fixes, documentation and new features for Moodle  that the community would like us to address. You can add your requests by making a comment on this blog post. You don’t have to be attending Hack/Doc Fest to make suggestions — we’d like suggestions from the entire community.

Here are some potential items for Hack/Doc:

• Moodle 1.9.9: Liberal Arts Edition: We will be doing the 1.9.8 code merge before Hack/Doc Fest, so work on this edition will focus on debugging/testing so that we can release it ASAP after the event.
• Moodle 2.0 Beta Evaluation: There weren’t many tires to kick on Moodle 2.0 in January; we’ll be revisiting the new version (currently Moodle 2.0 Preview 1)

Moodle Hack/Doc Fest: Summer 2010 will be held June  23-25, 2010 at DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana. Hack/Doc is being held in conjunction with NITLE Camp’s Moodle User Group Meeting, which takes place Tuesday, June 22, 2010.

As with prior events, Hack/Doc will feature programmers and instructional technologists coming together to improve Moodle. We expect to continue work on CLAMP’s Moodle: Liberal Arts Edition project, fix outstanding Moodle bugs, and craft new training materials.

• Learn more at Hack/Doc: Summer 2010 home page.
• Request Hacks, Docs, Bugs for Hack/Doc Fest: Summer 2010
• Register online.

Questions can be posted as comments below or emailed to Ken Newquist at newquisk@lafayette.edu.

We’re continuing to work on Moodle 1.9.7+LAE1; we’re in the final stages of bug squashing and testing, and hope to have it posted in the next two weeks.  We’ll also have stand alone versions of Assignment ZIP and Simple File Upload at that time.

Update

We’re now looking at mid-April.

Day 3 was the final day of Hack/Doc, and was our wrap-up for the event as folks finished up their code, make their final commits to Subversion, and added documentation to the wiki.

• LAE name change: Based on feedback from the community, we’ve changed our naming convention with the LAE to tie in closely with the Moodle version it’s based on. Thus LAE 1.02 becomes Moodle 1.9.5+LAE1.02  and the new release becomes Moodle 1.9.7+LAE1.0.
• Moodle 1.9.7+LAE1.0: We created our tentative list of “baked in” modules and blocks for the next release.  The big additions here are Assignment Zip and Simple File Upload; both were available as stand-alone downloads before (and will be again) but are now sufficiently bullet-proof for us to feel confident about folding them into the main LAE release. Full details available in Redmine.
  • Filtered Course Block
  • Quickmail
  • SimplePIE RSS Parser
  • TinyMCE 2 Integration
  • Assignment Zip
  • Simple File Upload
  • Numerous bug fixes
• Chat History Now Accessible: The Chat module in Moodle didn’t allow you to scroll through the full history of the chat; the fix is in the /dev branch right now and will be folded into the Moodle 1.9.7_LAE1.0 release.
• Import/Restore/Backup: A bunch of research was done on this with the goal of  a) Options to choose to restore settings/blocks to both import/restore. b) Ability for import/restore to actually do this. The research has been done, but more time/work is needed to implement the changes.
• Single Topic Backup/Restore: As with Import/Restore, this required a lot of research. WE have a good idea of how to do it, but the work needs to be done.
• Filtered Course Block: The block has been modified to allow term logic based on shortname/long name/course id, and we intend to add the ability to include multiple future/arbitrary terms to the block. This work is ongoing and likely won’t be ready for the 1.9.7_LAE1.0 release.
• Voting for Bugs: We’ve compiled a list of bugs/features to vote for in Moodle Tracker.
• Moodle Gradebook Fixes from Luther College: We spent a good deal of time evaluating Luther’s proposed gradebook fixes, which are designed to make it easier for students to understand their grades, specifically:
  • not being able to display the “real” points for categories and course unless you use “Sum of points” agg method
  • not seeing the accurate point range for categories and course total
  • more flexible User report that allows for turning on and off columns as needed
  • a User report that allows the student to easily view how the grade has been calculated (weights, etc.)
• More Gradebook Testing: We need more volunteers to help with testing Luther’s fixes; specially importing complex gradebooks into a test instance. Details can be found in Redmine.
• Blackboard->Moodle Migration Documentation: This documentation is complete and in the wiki for editing; it should be available soon.