[Modules] Stop Canvas Modules from Auto-Publishing All Content Inside a Module When a Module is Published

[khearn1]

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

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My university is finding the fact that publishing a module auto-publishes all the content in it quite annoying.

I would like to be able to just publish a module and then choose what features of it that I wish to publish.

I know that I can set a limiter on when a student can actually see and interact with materials-but if a professor is uncertain about publishing certain content all at once, they have no options.

This has been asked about several times in the community-I snagged two of the best examples below.

Thank you all for your time and your vote!

[cuadguy]

Yeah, this is hella irritating. I also find that copying materials from previous semesters automatically publishes as well.

Does Canvas remotely have any plans to address this?

[CharlesRichter]

When Publishing a module all of the assignments and pages in that module automatically publish. I do not want everything in the module to publish when I publish the module. I would prefer to have to publish the module and then go and select everything in that module that I want published for students to see.

[dmg34]

I just found and upvoted this idea, was reading some replies, and only then realized that this idea was posted over 2 years ago. What could POSSIBLY be the upside to NOT fixing this?? As others noted, if I have an assignment/page/quiz/other content in a module marked as UNPUBLISHED, then I want it UNPUBLISHED. I publish a module and then gradually publish content in the module as I am ready for it to be visible. I can't tell you how many times I've published the module and then frantically had to click through and unpublish all of the newly-published content. It is very NOT-user-friendly.

[dbeeson]

@dmg34 I too have been posting year after year regarding the lack of this option and it is continually ignored. It is feeling like Instructure has grown too big.

[chike424]

It will be great and effective to publish only the Unit title, without it triggering publish on all of the unit elements at the same time. At the moment, when staffs hit publish on the unit title, all contents under the unit gets published. Most times staffs are not ready for all of the content to be live and then have to un-publish each of the subsequent elements individually which is time consuming. 

[KathleenWallace]

Terrible design flaw to have the publication of a module override the publish/non-publish status of items within a module.  If an instructor identified an item as "not-publish" they did so for a reason. If the modules are set up in advance on time release and the instructor assumed that the non-publish item(s) would remain non-published, one can imagine the problems that would ensue.  I had no idea this is what publishing a module would do until another instructor in my university alerted us all to the problem.  I nearly released pre-prepared feedback on an assignment that I had designated to be non-published, but turned to "published" when I published the module.  Because the instructor had warned us, I immediately went back to unpublish it.  However, now I will have to do that for all subsequent modules.  Most modules have material that I do not want published right away, or might not publish at all. I create material knowing I might need it, but might not. So I want it in the module, so it's there if/when I need it, but I don't want it published at the start of the module.

[JML-DUQ]

When a module is published, then ALL the pages and files in the module are published. This should NOT happen. Instead one ought to be able to publish the module WITHOUT also publishing all the content in the module, because then one needs to UNPUBLISH individual pages and files in the module. The module should be treated independently of the content. So a drop-down menu ought to give the user the options of publishing or unpublishing all at once.

[JML-DUQ]

Now that my comment has been merged with the earlier ones I could not find, I find it unbelievable that this has been unaddressed for so long. This is not the only flaw in Canvas, but it is a serious one that should be fixed. Blackboard's folders did not have any such flaw, and this is one that has potentially deleterious effects because content we do not yet want students to see can be seen. The only work around is to UNPUBLISH the whole site while one fixes the problem by unpublishing individual items in a module that's published, and then republish the site. Absolutely ridiculous, given that Canvas knows full well that instructors want individual items in a module to be published at a specific time. Lazy programming? An inability to listen to users? Just add the option, Canvas!!!

[casalek]

I got this really awesome car the other day, with one small flaw. When I shut it off, all systems are turned off: headlights, wipers, emergency flashers, radio, a/c. But each and every time I turn it back on after leaving it, everything starts up. It's crazy....headlights flash, blinkers are going, wipers go, fluid flies onto the windshield, the a/c AND the heater go on at the same time. So I have to turn that all off before I start to drive. Every time. Sounds like Canvas, doesn't it? I get a module all set up one semester, the semester ends (i.e. turn the car off), copy and publish the module the next semester (restart the car), and everything publishes (my car starts all the systems I had previously turned off, necessitating a frantic "turning off"). Who in the world would think this is acceptable? Can Canvas please not fix this?

[Pfisher-biscuit]

I can't understand why you, at Canvas, are not dealing with this issue. Canvas, please respond to show us you are aware that this problem exists and is overwhelmingly a change your paying users want to make.

Then either make the change or tell us why you will not.