Book Module

I've not blogged for a while because the development side of my Moodle has slowed down and I've been working on putting courses up.

BUT!  I stumbled across something completely by accident that it well suited to my needs.  That thing is the Book Module.

The Book Module works as a kind of alternative to Lessons, allowing you to put together a series of pages into a "book" which can then be exported or printed by the learner.  The navigation is simpler, there are forward and back arrows on the top right and bottom right and a Table of Contents block appears where the navigation block would normally be (top left for my site).

The Book Module in action

 The simplified navigation and boxed off content area are what appeals to me about using the book module.  The border can be altered through the CSS.  I would like to be able to theme each book so I could have different colour borders but I haven't really looked at that yet.

There is still no smooth way to go from the end of a book to a quiz and then onto a new book (I've just used links within the last page of the book and in the quiz feedback.) but there wasn't in lessons either.  You can't use the question pages in a book the way you could in a lesson but I didn't like those anyway.

There is capacity to embed a quiz or a Hot Pot quiz within a book using an iFrame but I have yet to get that working smoothly so I'll do a post about that later.

Another pretty big drawback of the Book module is the completion options.  You can only have a book marked complete upon being viewed.  So if a student looks at the first page the book is marked as complete and anything relying on that book being complete becomes available.  However, because of the simplified navigation it is not immediately obvious to the casual user that the next step is now open. 

Another thing, if a user gets half way through a book and leaves the page, their progress is not remembered, meaning next time they come back they have to start the book again.  I've been keeping the section of my courses short anyway (about five or six pages per book with a quiz in between) so it's not too bad for me but more complex courses might have to stick to the lesson module.

The Book Module is installed the same way as other contrib modules.  Download the correct file for you build of Moodle from here.  Unzip that file and upload it to the mod folder of your Moodle.  When you login as an admin to Moodle you'll have the notification page come up, just click continue at the bottom and then you'll be able to choose Book from the resources drop down in any course.

Changing a user's account.

Just been briefing a colleague on our Moodle system, I find it's helpful to talk things through with someone because you think of things you otherwise wouldn't.  He said, for example, one of the biggest problems we're going to have when the system goes live will be users forgetting their password and ringing us to tell them what it is.

Because we're letting people register themselves, I don't know what each user's individual passwords are and I haven't yet found a way to display them on Moodle.  What I can do, however, is change their password for them.

Moodle has an option for users who have forgotten their passwords to have a new one set and emailed to them.  The one it sends is a randomly set mixture of letters, numbers and non alphanumeric characters which I can guarantee my users will not change straight away when they log back in and then forget and never be able to log in ever again.

So I need to make sure everyone is the office who is likely to get a use who can't remember their password knows how to change a password for them.

Firstly go to Settings > Site Administration > Users > Accounts > Browse list of Users.  Find the user in question, you can use the search filter at the top to search for their name.  Click the Edit on their row.  There you'll see a New Password box.  Enter the new password and update the profile.

Oh, and, make sure you tell the user what their new password is.

Changing words

You can change any of the words or phrases that appear on you Moodle site.  For example, I use the topics format for my courses but I have all the lessons in one topic.  So seeing the word topic in the main menu might confuse users.

As an admin, go to Settings > Site Administration > Advanced Features > Language > Language Customization.  From the drop down choose you language (you might only have English) and click the Check Out Strings Into Translator button that comes up.  You should get a big green bar that says 100% and a continue button, click that.  This process is bizarre, I don't understand what it does but we're where we want to be now.

You'll see a list of all the different php files that generate text on your Moodle.  If you know which one has the word or phrase you want you can click it but I generally just select them all.  In the Only Strings Containing box type in the word or phrase you want to change.  You get a list of phrases your word appears in.  Find the one you don't like and change it by typing in the big box next to it.

Be aware that this will change the phrase every time it is used.  There may be placeholders in the phrase, these are how Moodle puts in a username or email address, you have to copy these exactly or they won't work.

When you're done, scroll right to the bottom and click the Save And Check In Strings Into Files button then click Continue when it comes up.  Done!

Getting More Details From Users

We keep a pretty detailed CRM (Customer Relations Management) database with all kinds of info.  To get that information from the users of the Moodle site I'm going to need to add some fields to the Create Account page.

As an admin on Moodle go to Site Administration > Users > Accounts > User Profile Fields and you'll see a page saying User Profile Fields, Other Fields, No fields have been defined.  If you want a few new fields, such as one for each line of an address, you could create a new category.  Click the button and create your category.

For a new field select from the drop down.  I want a simple text box so users can tell me where they work so I select Text Input.  Fill in the form that comes up,  I'm going to select Yes in Make this Field Required and Display on Signup Page and not change anything else.  Then click save changes.

Remember, if you export user data at any point, which I will do, having commas in the signup fields might screw up how the data is displayed as commas are often use to signify a new field to a database or spreadsheet.  For example, if someone answers my new Where I Work field with "My Office, London" I'll get My Office in the correct column but London will be in the next column, pushing all the other fields out of sync.  This could be a big problem for databases so try to keep your fields simple.  If you find users are constantly putting commas in and causing you problems you can always edit these field names, either adding another field or changing the name to be more specific.