[Announcements] Publish and Unpublish Announcements

[dhulsey]

I love that Canvas can bring over announcements when I copy content from another Canvas course. This keeps me from copying and pasting announcements I make every semester.  To further develop this feature, it would be nice if Announcements were unpublished on import, meaning the instructor can see them but the students can't. With a "publish button on every announcement, instructors could release announcements quickly when they are needed without the tedious setting of a date and time on each announcement.

This feature would also bring announcements in line with other tools in Canvas that use publish and unpublish functionality and would help instructors who might unintentionally be releasing announcements to students from a past semester.

[jthoms]

This is an excellent suggestion! I'd add that the current "Save" button causes confusion. Except when the announcement is delayed, this action is really more of a "Send" in instructor's minds.

[ghumisto]

Control over the Announcements is a MUST!  When a previous course is imported, the Announcements are sent out even if the course is Unpublished.  This is a flaw in the Canvas design.  Again, this is a design flaw which must be corrected, rather than a tweak or preference.  Instructors should have complete control over the Announcement feature.

[snugent]

I agree with  @dhulsey ​. We have several instructors who are not aware that when they copy a course all the announcements from previous semester are visible to students. It would be nice if they came over unpublished and then the instructor can reuse and publish the announcements as needed.

[Stef_retired]

 @dhulsey ​, this would make preparing a course at the beginning of every semester so much easier. My current workaround is to import everything except announcements into my new course shell, then importing the announcements separately into a sandbox, and then copying, pasting, and editing every announcement as necessary in order to re-post it in the new course--and of course, I have to remember to do that on a regular basis. Even typing the workaround takes more time than a simple publish/unpublish feature.

[dhulsey]

Yup! I do pretty much the same thing, Stefanie. Juggling announcements is a pain right now for sure, but I have faith that the folks at Instructure and our fellow Canvas users will see the convenience of publishing and unpublishing announcements.

[zachw]

It would make curating classes easier.

[RobDitto]

Voted! Regarding  @jthoms s comment:

With Save & Publish​ now in the Canvas Beta Release Notes (2015-05-04) for the current set of Draft State-capable features, which option seems better to everyone if Announcements becomes capable of Draft State?

1. A Send button automatically Publishes the announcement.
2. Or, the immediate-send button is labeled Save & Publish​ for consistency with other Canvas features.

[dhulsey]

I think consistent nomenclature and behavior is the best way to go.

[mwinton]

This would be very helpful and avoid student confusion at the beginning of the semester.

[cms_hickss]

I would also like to see statuses or categories on the Announcement Pages. For example:

• Published / Live /Visible
• Delayed (for those announcements that have a delayed posting date sent)
• Unpublished
• Archived (for announcements copied over that you do not need but do not want to delete)