[Rich Content Editor] Paste Images into Canvas

[blomas]

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

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I want the ability to paste images directly into Canvas from the clipboard. An example: I want to use Windows Snipping tool (or any other screenshot tool) to create an image. I then want to CTL-C to copy it and CTL-V to paste it into a quiz or assignment or content page in Canvas. Another example would be Copy-Pasting from a Word document into Canvas. This site is able to do it! I just did it below! Let's get this implemented in Canvas!

[sdjones1]

Why do we have to beg for bones?  We are the customers and should have a product that serves our need. This has been in the pipeline for 4 years.

[bogardde]

The other side of the coin...because I have an annoyingly overdeveloped sense of fairness...

To be fair, in my experience, Canvas is more responsive to users' input and needs than 90% of the software companies out there. I work with several companies and only one of the others is actively seeking ideas and input, and then acting upon at least some of them. And that other company is several magnitudes smaller in scale and scope than Canvas is.

As someone who's been very active in the Community for 5 years, I've had opportunities to converse with Canvas VP's and engineers. I have seen that ideas this popular with users are generally taken quite seriously. But at times (from what I understand because I'm not a software expert) there's something deep within Canvas' architecture that makes changing the code to accommodate the asked-for tool or process very difficult if not impossible. An example would be the Notifications tool, and the fact that it can't be set to specific courses or roles. The code for that tool apparently is not possible to be altered in that way, no matter how much people may want it. 

So I'm wondering if this is another one of those situations. If so, I think it would be helpful if Canvas were to come out and honestly say "As much as we want to, this just can't be done with our current software architecture. But as the architecture changes, we will keep this on the list of priorities."

However, if architecture is not the issue...this pinch point has been, and continues to be, impacting every user who creates content on Canvas. So it is MHO that it should not be shunted aside for another year. It made #7 on the list of priorities for Khaki 2017, which means it should have been implemented by the end of 2018. Hmmm.

[GideonWilliams]

This:

...I think it would be helpful if Canvas were to come out and honestly say "As much as we want to, this just can't be done with our current software architecture. But as the architecture changes, we will keep this on the list of priorities."

Is what so many of us would dearly like to see.

[scottdennis]

Hi Gideon and Deborah,

As far as pasting images into Canvas my advice would be to monitor the Rich Content Editor priority in the Priorities and Ideas space.  We are not quite ready to specifically commit to a list of included features but our product team is very aware that this idea would be a game changer for a lot of people.  Thanks.

Deborah, Thank you for your grace and kindness.   

[bill_borez]

@Scott Dennis.

Copy/pasting images is not a game changer, it's a bog standard required feature.

I would have called this a game changer in 2001, not 2019.

[hinrsd21]

Agreed. My school just switched to Canvas, and so far, this tops my list of annoyances. 

[scottdennis]

Hi Bill,

By "Game Changer" I meant that this would dramatically improve the workflows of many people who use Canvas, not that it is especially new functionality in software in general.  My only intent was to communicate that this would make life easier for people using Canvas.  I apologize if what I wrote came across any differently.

[erinhmcmillan]

Hi, you can drag-and-drop images in the New Rich Content Editor, which is noted in the upcoming release notes: https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-17761-canvas-release-notes-2019-10-19#jive_content_id_Rich_... 

Thanks,

Erin

[davidrcrockett]

This is definitely a step in the right direction and will at the least, save a few clicks per image added.

[stelpstra]

We need this big time! Just pasting text with images from Word or similar. Dragging and dropping images one by one is by far not sufficient enough, because you still have to extract all images, save them to disk and then draging them in with the puzzle to find where did which picture need to go. An action which could potentially take just 10 seconds max, is taking now many minutes. Replicating a Word document containing text with 20 images into Canvas pages could easily take 30 minutes, that is 180 times more time wasted just only because Canvas is lacking 2020 standard usability!

2020 people! Basic usability, just nothing more than basic! Instructure, when do you start listening to your users, your community? This idea is sitting here since 2015, that is 5 years now. Stop pampering your community with false expectations, because anyone who has been in this community for a few years has found out nothing is done with the feature ideas, just look at the sheer amount of ideas with hundreds and thousands of votes, also sitting there for years gathering comments of frustration: open ideas sorted by votes.

Canvas is awesome, right? Make it so!