[Using Sakai] Requesting Help In Copying Courses from One Semester to Another (without breaking links)

Fri Jan 6 14:22:58 PST 2012

Andy,

I should stress up front here that I've not addressed this issue directly 
for some time so I could be wrong about this and thus I'd encourage some 
testing before you did much with it...

I believe that when you import content from the Lessons (or Melete or 
Module) tool from one course site to another that it does actually update 
the links to include the new Site ID in the HTML link that was originally 
created.  Thus, links in the Lessons tool to Resources do not break, for 
students, upon import (again, something to verify by testing).   Assuming 
you are using the Lessons tool, you could either just have instructors 
create Modules and Content Sections and point to the Resources they want 
from those but if they really wanted to do this in their Syllabus they 
could create a Syllabus in Lessons....the little work around here to get 
that "lessons-based" syllabus to show up in the Syllabus tool is to go to 
the "print" version of the lesson-based syllabus and copy the URL to it 
into the "redirect" option in the syllabus tool...when student go to view 
the syllabus, they will see the "lesson" that was created but it will look 
like it is the syllabus.  Hopefully that makes sense.

FYI, Josh

-----------------------------
Joshua Baron
Senior Academic Technology Officer
Marist College
Poughkeepsie, New York  12601
(845) 575-3623 (work)
Twitter: JoshBaron

From:   "Valenti, Andrew P." <Andrew.Valenti at tufts.edu>
To:     "sakai-user at collab.sakaiproject.org" 
<sakai-user at collab.sakaiproject.org>, "production at collab.sakaiproject.org" 
<production at collab.sakaiproject.org>
Date:   01/06/2012 02:30 PM
Subject:        [Using Sakai] Requesting Help In Copying Courses from One 
Semester to Another (without breaking links)
Sent by:        sakai-user-bounces at collab.sakaiproject.org

Hi Sakai Colleagues!

Happy New Year!

I am writing to solicit ideas, suggestions, and solutions to problems that 
occur when links to tools & content in one course site are created using 
the Import from Site tool to bring content into a new course site. 

The Problem
In the Tufts instance of rSmart Sakai CLE 2.7 (which we call Trunk), we do 
not use Sakai Course Management.  A new course is created each semester, 
automatically triggered by the appropriate SIS information; under our 
course management process, course shells are not reused from semester to 
semester.  In some schools, it is a common practice that instructors 
create a syllabus using an HTML page in which they insert links to their 
course materials using the FCK editor and these links will be “absolute” 
meaning they point to the resources contained in the original course site. 
 The first time the course is created there’s no problem as the 
instructor/site owner has permission to access them.   Let’s suppose that 
in a subsequent semester a new instance of the course is created and the 
instructor decides to populate it  using the Import from Site tool.  If 
the instructor selects the check box for importing Resources (along with 
whatever else is needed), the tool will bring in the syllabus and the 
course materials.  If no further action is taken to modify the links that 
are in the copied syllabus, the following will happen.

To the instructor clicking on a link in the copied syllabus, the 
instructor is able to access the content and everything appears to be 
working.  To a student, confronted by an HTTP access error message, the 
links appear “broken”;  what has happened?  The “absolute” link in the 
copied syllabus points to the course material in the instructor’s original 
course site for which the student does not have permission to access. 
Thus, the instructor can see it but not the student.  Interestingly, the 
course material copied from the original site is “orphaned” with no links 
pointing to it.  Emerging from discussions with our internal support team 
and our Sakai vendor, rSmart, were three alternatives:

Option 1 – Use a non-production site as a Sakai “content repository”

a.       Create a root site that serves as a content repository and make 
the content “public”.
b.      In the original course design, ensure that the syllabus uses links 
pointing to the desired content in the repository site
c.       When the course is copied over, the links in the syllabus will 
work because they correctly point to content that has been made public. 
Since no actual course material has been copied to the new course site, 
there is no “orphaned” content.

Advantages:
Instructors don’t have to be aware of “relative” vs. “absolute” addressing
Maintains single copy of course materials in a repository

Disadvantages
Requires thinking though an “information architecture” design for content 
stored in Sakai in order to oversee and maintain protection of copyrighted 
information
Difficult to prevent multiple repository sites from proliferating which 
adds to content management woes
·         Ultimately, we’d like content to be stored in a repository 
outside of Sakai which will allow us to provide more sophisticated content 
management services such as, access control, capacity planning, and more 
sophisticated search capabilities

Option 2 – Copy content/fix addressing

a.      Change the FCK editor so that the instructor creates “relative” 
links to course material when initially creating the syllabus.
b.      When the course is copied using the Import from Site tool, the 
relative links correctly point to the course material copied into the new 
site.

Advantages:
Material is kept in course sites which simplifies the management of 
copyrighted information
Doesn’t require instructors to be too aware of “relative” vs. “absolute” 
address and doesn’t require them to set up a non-production repository 
site.

Disadvantages
Changing a pervasive tool such as the FCK editor can have unintended 
consequences which even thorough testing may not surface.  It also creates 
a fork in the application code tree that we’d have to maintain.
Course material is duplicated from site to site, gradually consuming file 
storage
Moving to an external content repository will be require scooping up 
information from individual sites 

Option 3 – Use Duplicate Site tool 

Advantages
The tool maintains the proper link addressing and might be the simplest 
solution.

Disadvantages
In our current design, the duplicates sites would not be automatically 
populated from our feed.  We’d have to undertake a manual process to 
populate them with the roster.
Currently instructors don’t have access to this tool. We’d need to think 
through this workflow.
Continues the duplication of course material.

Why we need your help
Each solution has advantages and disadvantages which might be balanced 
differently based on an institution’s LMS strategy and course management 
process.  Since the course duplication seems like it would be a fairly 
common process across the higher education Sakai community, we’d like to 
know what approach your institution has taken to populate new instances of 
a course and how you’ve overcome the aforementioned problems.  If there 
are additional options that we’ve not identified, we’d certainly like to 
hear about them!

Thanks in advance for the time you’ve taken to help a fellow peer 
institution!

Cheers,

Andy

Andy Valenti, MSc., PMP
LMS Project Manager
Educational & Scholarly Technology Services 
University Information Technology (UIT)
Tufts University
108 Bromfield Road
Somerville, MA 02144

Tel 617.627.3814
Email andrew.valenti at tufts.edu
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