Admin Tips: Search Quickly for Users & Courses

matthew_weather
Community Novice
19
4607

For admins who do dozens of searches per day on Canvas, here are a couple of tips that save a few clicks (and a few seconds) each time. I use these many times a day. (This post is an adaptation of the "Customer Lightning Round" 10-minute presentation I did last week at InstructureCon 2017, called "Save 1 Minute Per Day.")

The Problem:

Searching for a user or a course takes too many clicks.

The Solution: Use Google Chrome's Custom Search feature

(This is similar to  @jthoms ‌'s "Efficiency Tips" from two years ago, with screen shots added, plus some extra suggestions.)

The Chrome browser has a cool feature that lets you create custom searches, which you can use to quickly search for a user or a course on Canvas. Here are detailed instructions for using this feature:

  1. Using Chrome, log in to Canvas and do a search (as you normally would) for user Waldo
  2. From the search results page, copy the link from the address bar, which will look like something like this:
    https://canvas.biola.edu/accounts/1/users?focus=user_name&user%5Bname%5D=Waldo 
  3. Next create custom search by clicking on the three dots "Customize" link on the top-right of the browser, and choose "Settings"
    Screen shot - Google Settings
  4. Then open the "Manage Search Engines" by clicking on the little triangle to the right, then on the next page click "ADD" on the "Other Search Engines" line:
    Screen shot - manage search engines and add
  5. Fill in a name (like "Canvas Users") and a keyword (just "u" in this example), then paste the link from step #2 above, and replace Waldo with %s
    Screen shot - custom Google search
  6. Click "Save" and you're finished.

To use this new search, type this sequence of keys:
  <CTRL> L u Bob Smith <Enter> 
(or <COMMAND> L on Macs)
<CTRL> L puts your cursor in the address bar, where you can begin typing a search or URL. Next, typing u then the space bar switches to this new search. Type the name Bob Smith and then Enter, and you will be taken directly to the search results (no clicks, just keys!)

You can re-do the above steps to make another customer search for courses (or really, for any common search you do). I use one to search for a class in the current term by first searching for a course, filtering for the term, then copying / pasting that search URL.

Another Tip / Feature Idea: Make the Enrollments search result larger

Screen shot - Enrollments Window too small

This is more complicated, and I've created a Feature Idea (go vote!). See the comments in that post for a work-around using a TamperMonkey script to fix this on your own, until Canvas gets updated.

Another Tip / Feature Idea: Add More Links to Courses Search

Screen shot - add course links example

This also can be added with a TamperMonkey script. I've created a second Feature Idea (vote here too!). Again, see the comments in that post for the script that can add a "Users" link to the list of links.

#admin#admin tips#ui#improved ui

19 Comments
jthoms
Community Novice

These are great suggestions,  @matthew_weather ‌! Glad to see the the knowledge building so we all can save a little time.

awilliams
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

This has probably been one of the biggest time savers I've ever found in the community. Plus, it truly makes me look like a Canvas Ninja to all my colleagues. Thanks  @jthoms ‌ for the original post and thanks  @matthew_weather  for this remix.

244941_toy-green.jpg

Stef_retired
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

 @matthew_weather , I'm so glad you posted this! The Chrome custom search solution was running around InstructureCon's Canvas Lounge all last week (I implemented it yesterday), and I finally get to say:  @matthew_weather  Nice Work!

tdelillo
Community Champion

Whoa. I've been using the custom searches for over a year, but silly me, I didn't know the CTRL-L shortcut. That saves me even MORE mousing/clicks! Thank you!!!!!

timothy_maw
Community Champion

Thank you so much for posting this. I had never thought to do this and now it will save me a ton of time.

timothy_maw
Community Champion

I also now have created one for courses too. This is such a big time saver.

awilliams
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

You can make them term specific too. I have ones that I update each year but limit search to Spring, Summer, and Fall terms. I'd imagine that it will work for sub-accounts but I never had occasion to set that up.

hallmans
Community Contributor

This is awesome - thanks for the tip.

bogardde
Community Participant

Wow. Just. Wow. Thank you. As awilliams‌ said, this is going to make me look like some kind of wizard to my colleagues (as long as they pay no mind to the man behind the curtain...)

oz wizard

MattHanes
Community Champion

I have always found the user search tip in this blog post to be particularly useful. However, it no longer works with the new user & course search feature enabled.

If you have the new one enabled, you can simply change the search URL to this: 
https://[yourinstitution].instructure.com/accounts/1/users?search_term=%s 

You can do the same thing with course search, just leave out the users part of the URL.
https://[yourinstitution].instructure.com/accounts/1?search_term=%s 

jthoms
Community Novice

Thanks for the update,  @MattHanes ‌! Once the updated interface rolls out for everyone I will update the post.

I think it didn't work at all in the initial Beta release, so I'm super glad that it will continue to be supported. It's the one thing that other admins ask me "what did you just do" when they see me quickly get to a course or person.

rmthomas
Community Participant

Nice! Thanks.

tdelillo
Community Champion

Anyone else having issues with the Chrome custom search? I don't know if Canvas changed something or if it was the latest Chrome release, but mine broke Smiley Sad

matthew_weather
Community Novice

Tracey: Yes, the format has changed. Here's the new format:

UPDATE: The Canvas search format has changed in step 2, in the original post:

OLD: https://canvas.biola.edu/accounts/1/users?focus=user_name&user%5Bname%5D=Waldo

NEW: https://canvas.biola.edu/accounts/1/users?search_term=Waldo&role_filter_id=&page= 

tdelillo
Community Champion

Oops, should have specified that COURSE search broke. My user search is still fine.

gouldt
Community Contributor

You are awesome Mathew Weathers! I just showed this to my team, we are all excited about using the easy search feature. I feel a little slow for finding this a year later:)

matthew_weather
Community Novice

Tracey,

That search changes every semester, since there's a "term" part of the search. For example, here's what my search looks like:

https://canvas.biola.edu/accounts/1?enrollment_term_id=38&search_term=%s

Where that "38" our term number for Fall 2018 - you'll have to do a search yourself, and look in the URL for your number. Change the green part to your institution URL. You could also search by teacher:

https://canvas.biola.edu/accounts/1?enrollment_term_id=38&search_term=Waldo&search_by=teacher

tdelillo
Community Champion

I know that you need new ones every term, but all of mine broke just this week. I've updated with the new string and they're fine.

gouldt
Community Contributor

Thanks Matthew, it works great!