Adapt Learning Community: Calling the community: authoring tool import/export

Skip to main content

In an effort to be more open and collaborative in our development processes, this is the first in (hopefully) a long line of feature development posts. In addition to simply informing you all of what's going on behind the scenes, we also hope that these posts may pique some of your interests, and encourage you to jump onboard and share your expertise with us; the more the merrier!

After much head scratching, we decided upon a list of must-have features for the next 6 months - at the top of this list, was the ability to import and export courses created in the tool to other instances. We rated this one in particular so highly, as we felt that it would form the important first step along the path towards team collaboration.

So far, We've already drafted a list of requirements, which you can view here:
Import/Export Requirements Draft

This document is intended to get the discussion going - We're eager to hear what you think! Please let us know if there's anything you think we've missed. Similarly, if this is a feature that resonates with you, we'd love to get you on-board - you don't have to be technical, we're as keen to find testers and documenters as we are coders.

Hi Tom,

As mentioned on the im, I think a storage for the ABC elements and a selection mechanism might be a good thing for the future.

Could be part of Asset management, but it would need then an option to setup a structure where you can "dump" the contents in a chosen way, like folders or directories.

Show parent | Reply

Thanks for that John.

I think I misinterpreted your original request - are you asking for some kind of central repository for 'snippets' of courses: say, specific component configurations you use a lot, or pre-laid-out page templates maybe.

Show parent | Reply

Yes Tom, that is the idea.

Or somehow be able to store those snippets on a Joomla/Moodle/Wordpress or any other kind of CMS you can think of and then include them. (I would prefer to have it in AT though)

Show parent | Reply

hi John,

What's the difference between a snippet and a small course? Like s single page course with a single A/B/C. Setting up a small course then using this export function gives you the same feature?

Show parent | Reply

Hi Mark,

I would call that either an Article with a Block and a specific Component, or a Block with a specific Component, or just a specific Component. Sounds like we want it all, but I have been working with systems where we were chuncking the information to that level and reuse it over multiple instances.

It does require the developers to think of reuse, minimalism, Information Mapping and translatablility. This feature would make some of this possible for our team.

Show parent | Reply

I think there's a lot of potential for this idea of course snippets, but think it's outside of the scope with this feature. I imagine an option like this being available for courses which are already in the AT (have either been created there, or imported), and sits alongside the copy/paste functionality.

A separate import/export for this feature may also be useful to share snippet libraries between instances (or possibly even using an external hosting service, so it'd only need to be stored in one place).

Show parent | Reply

As John mentioned, we've opened a Gitter chatroom for discussion of this feature, so please drop by and say hello :)

import-export on Gitter

Show parent | Reply

Hi Tom,

I've created some Mocks from your written spec, hopefully these will help with the discussion.

https://app.mockflow.com/view/c50bdce1a4e3284ed2e12dc47c3cd65f

Mark.

Show parent | Reply

Hi Mark,

Posted 2 comments on typo's. Mockup looks great, but thinking of the assets, should there be an additional selection option there in the future if the ABC items are also going to be "Assets"?

Show parent | Reply

Hi John,

I've fixed the typo's. The ABC export is outside the scope of this feature at the min

Show parent | Reply

Thanks for that Mark, they look great.

We'll also need somewhere to show the JSON validation results (any problems with specific course/config JSON). There may also be some plugin-specific information here (for things like missing schemas etc.) - these could easily go on the 'middle' screens (steps 2-7).

The only slight question I have is around the number of steps involved in the process; it could prove a bit frustrating having up to 8 screens to work through. Saying this, I'm not sure there's a usable alternative, as there's a lot of information to display...

Show parent | Reply

Hi Tom,

Good Point, I've added a complete button on the main import page that completes all the steps using defaults.

The complete still re-directs you to the summary page, just in case... where you can review the default import settings.

We will though have to decide what the defaults are

Other things to think about :

What happens if I don't export assets do I,

- Leave them blank and wipe the current aasset path

- default with a dummy placeholder image

Leaving them blank will break any preview in the builder..

What happens if I don't export a plugin (Menu/Component/Extension/Theme)

Menu/Extension/Theme, we could simply just remove them from the course, so the course will just import

Component - this is a little trickier as it goes into the notion of core/non-core components and how to preserve versions of components for export/import.

All for discussion on the call tomorrow.

Show parent | Reply

Hi all,

Just a quick message to update everyone on this.

We've implemented a developer-friendly 'export' option which is currently being tested/bug-fixed. When merged, this will allow users to get an export of their course for developing standalone/using the command line.

Note that this does not include an import option yet - the export is a one-way trip.

We're working on import functionality next, so will keep you posted!

Show parent | Reply

Thanks Tom - this sounds like a really useful update.

Just to clarify, does this mean you can develop in the authoring tool then export the "source code" and use this to continue building a course by editing the course.json, articles.json etc and then building your course using "grunt build" etc

Whilst importing too would obviously be a superb addition, this will at least serve as a good solution for creating backups with the caveat the backups can never be loaded into the authoring tool (well not until the import functionality is complete)

Show parent | Reply

Yep, that's correct Paul :)

The end goal for this import/export work is that users will be able to freely interchange how they develop their courses (we will obviously have to restrict this considerably/add rules, but that's the idea).

The only slight issue with export at the moment is that the IDs generated for the various objects (blocks, components etc. etc.) aren't human readable yet (something like 4edd40c86762e0fb12000003). This is by no means a game-breaker though.

If you're interested in getting involved, check out the gitter chat. We need as much help in the form of scoping/requirements gathering as development at this point.

Show parent | Reply

Thanks Tom

Will check out the gitter chat and offer any help I am skilled enough to help with:)

Show parent | Reply

Hi,

Any update on the Import to the Authoring Tool feature? I have a course that was developed in the Framework and I've since set up an Adapt Authoring Tool environment in AWS and would like to work on the course that was developed in the Framework by a hired developer. Is there currently any way to do this?

Show parent | Reply

Hi,

The team have been working hard on import and a good MVP has been developed. There are a number other items on the table for the official update to the authoring tool which we feel need to be released around the same time.

These last changes are in progress and the system is being tested by number of the core collaborators prior to the official release.

It shouldn’t be too long now!

Regar,

Paul

Show parent | Reply