[Course Import/Export] Set all to unpublished when Importing

[acooper]

Hi,

When I import content from another course, I would like all assignments and other content to be unpublished by default. Currently, when I copy course content, I need to click through all of the content to unpublish them if they were published in the old course.

Thanks,

Adam

[epatterson2]

Right, but when you roll-over a course the new course shouldn't maintain the publish settings from the previous year/semester because this is a brand new year, right? (and if it' not a new year and you are just copying the course from someone else's course because you like the way theirs is set up,) should it publish everything exactly the same so that all the students receive (sometimes a very large number) notifications?

I think what I am requesting is a checkbox Under Options in the Import Course Content Window - that would just say Unpublish All Items either above or below the Adjust events and due dates.

[nlatimer]

Right, I agree with that. Because what happens now is you copy a course and it retains all of the published settings from the original course. Anything that was published in that course is now published in the course you copied it into. The course itself, however, is NOT published (at least, not in my case. I am talking about course copies done just prior to the beginning of the school year). So I have teachers go in and manually unpublish everything they do not want their students to see before they publish the course itself. This is what is such a pain. 

I see what you mean if it's content copied, say, after a course is already published. That is REALLY annoying!

[jennifer_lawson]

It would be extremely helpful to have the choice of importing unpublished. Thank you very much!!

[halil_yenigun]

I wonder how this problem has not been solved after so many years. Courses that are not published yet at the beginning of the semester are not a big issue as students won't see them even when they are imported as published.  But when I want to do selective import and if I decide to import one of just a few of my past exams or quizzes in the middle of the semester, it is a disaster if they get published right away. If no option will be given, the default setting of course must be "unpublished." 
While dealing with the same problem and looking for solutions myself, I have found this roundabout way to handle it. At SJSU we have a Practice Course on Canvas. I hope you all also have it. What I did was to import everything to this practice course. Then I played around with the individual items and organization of the class to create a generic blueprint for myself. My priority was my quizzes and exams so I exported them as QTI zip file. Before the export, I made sure I unpublished every single thing. With my new class, I used the import QTI zip file and all of them went right into my Assignments as well as Quizzes tab as unpublished. This also posted them into my Question Banks so I can now easily move questions around between question banks to create new Quizzes. This will also my generic course content for all my future teachings of the same course. 

It took a while to come up with this solution and I hope somebody else finds it useful as well. 

Thank you!

[cwright6]

I've come to realize that I must use Canvas much differently than how Instructure pictures it.  Defaults are often the opposite of what I want, and changes that I see as very important (and seemly not difficult to implement) sit for years and years without being addressed. 

I mean, seriously, they can implement a checkbox under 'Options' on the 'Import Content: Copy a Canvas Course' page to adjust all of the dates, but can't put in an "Unpublish All" checkbox there, too?  

[mglennon]

Yes, please.  This would be a great option when importing courses.

[mgebara-lamb]

Please put in a mute button for the announcements. Teachers have been asking for years. After transferring the course, it is a pain having to go through each announcement, click edit, delay release. We should be able to just deactivate them all, until we are ready. Please consider this soon. Thanks

[Brandon_Brown_]

+2 this request for iLearnNH and the University System of New Hampshire

[JurgenMeekel]

We experienced the following issue with our 1st-time migration from our old LMS SAKAI to the new LMS CANVAS

Before you publish a course check what is available to the students using Student View in the top right of your screen. Once you hit the publish button for the course site, ALL the resources and files that were imported from SAKAI last year are visible to students, including final exam papers (for 1st & 2nd years) as well as any marks that were posted there.

The best way to make the sensitive material from last year invisible to this year’s students enrolled on the course is to view the FILES option. You will see ALL the folders and files for the course there.  It seems you have to manually deselect EACH AND EVERY green tick next to all files you DO NOT WANT to publish along with the site.

I found that all last year’s Announcements and Assignments were also visible when the site was published and had to deselect everything unless I wanted students to see them.

I tried to bulk-unpublish holding Shift but that does not work. Any suggestions to do this more efficiently?

I would say that there should be a check box that allows all files to be unpublished. That should anyway be a default setting.

[mnall]

I am currently helping a colleague by importing my course from last semester into his course for this semester, one module at a time.  I then have to update dates and assignment categories.  I am trying to work ahead and I am not ready for this content to be published, but when the import function is finished, everything is automatically published.  Is there any way to change the setting so that imported content is UNpublished in the new course? That would be more helpful.