Canvas and Turnitin

[dhulsey]

• Introduction
• What is "Feedback Studio"?
• Does Feedback Studio alter any functionality?
• As a local Canvas Administrator, how do I configure the Turnitin LTI?
• Can my institution enable both the API version and the LTI version as we transition to the LTI?
• What happens to API enabled assignments when the API version gets shut off?
• Do teachers and students have to sign up for an account at Turnitin.com?
• Does the LTI version of Turnitin have feature X?
• How does an instructor set up an assignment using the LTI tool?
• When creating an assignment, should I load Turnitin in a new tab?
• How do students submit to a Turnitin LTI assignment?
• How do students complete peer reviews?
• I want to set up an assignment sequence of rough draft, peer review, and final draft.
• How does the grading work?
• How do students receive their feedback?
• How can I tell if my students have viewed their feedback?
• Will Turnitin send a grade from Turnitin to the Canvas Gradebook?
• Can I use the Turnitin iPad app to grade?
• Where can I see the originality report for a paper?
• What happens when I copy a course in Canvas?
• How can I use Turnitin with an essay question on a Canvas Quiz to get an originality report?
• I want to check discussion posts for originality.
• I want to use the Turnitin LTI but need a Canvas rubric for grading / assessment
• Can Students submit to Turnitin LTI assignments from the Canvas mobile apps?
• Are there any complications with the Turnitin LTI tool?
• I have a question that is not answered here.
• I do not like something about the Turnitin LTI. Who should I make aware of my displeasure?

Introduction

Turnitin is well known for plagiarism and integrates with Canvas when an institution purchases a Trurnitin subscription. Many instructors rely on Turnitin.com services for plagiarism education, prevention, and detection. Turnitin is also a valuable tool for grading and peer reviews. Turnitin currently integrates with Canvas in two different ways, but Turnitin is phasing out the older method.

The oldest Turnitin integration with canvas is known as the API integration. Currently, Turnitin is phasing out this older integration, but still offers support to schools who are not having a good experience with the LTI.  

The newer method of using Turnitin is the LTI tool. Turnitin’s page for the LTI tool includes the official Admin, Instructor, and Student Guides

Tutorials from Instructure for using the Turnitin LTI can be found here: , How do I create a Turnitin assignment?, and How do I manage Turnitin assignments?

Canvas has also developed a more robust framework for plagiarism detection services: Spring Cleaning Is Coming: Plagiarism-Detection Improvements Headed Your Way! Turnitin has announced that they will be continuing the LTI plugin while also developing a new plugin using the framework canvas is developing. The target release for the new plugin is Fall 2017. This new plugin promises Turnitin assignment creation within Canvas's interface for those who wish to use Canvas for most operations but would like an originality report from Turnitin. Users who wish to grade in Turnitin or use Peermark will wish to use the LTI version. However, Turnitin says institutions will be able to run both the LTI and the new plugin simultaneously. 

What is "Feedback Studio"?

Feedback studio is the name for an interface overhaul for Turnitin that took place in mid 2016. You can see an interactive tour and demonstration of the interface (Note the ability to use bold, underline, italics and hotlinked text in Grademark comments).  The materials in this blog now refer to feedback Studio, but only Grademark and originality reports have been incorporated into Feedback Studio. Peermark and its interface has not changed at this time.

Does Feedback Studio alter any functionality?

Yes, but the changes only affect the grading functionality of Turnitin.  As of May 23, 2016, the ability to view the complete list of Grademark comments is missing. For students, the implementation of rubrics in Feedback Studio is clunky as I discuss in this video:

Thankfully, Turnitin is listening and refining Feedback Studio. As of early 2017, the ability to search for quick marks while grading has been restored.

As a local Canvas Administrator, how do I configure the Turnitin LTI?

There are multiple sets of instructions with varying levels of detail for local canvas Administrators on the Turnitin website. Here is the best set of instructions, and here is the current configuration of the Turnitin LTI at the account level for my school:

1. Name the configuration.

2. The consumer key is provided to your account by Turnitin.

3. The launch url is provided by Turnitin and is the same for all institutions. The launch url for Turnitin UK Users is https://submit.ac.uk/api/lti/1p0/assignment.

4. Completing the domain field with "turnitin.com" ("turnitin.uk.com" for UK users) enables Turnitin to launch from the Canvas speedgrader report icons.

5. Setting the privacy to public allows Canvas to share student names and emails with Turnitin.

6. Turnitin documentation states that the Custom Fields may be left blank. However, adding the code developed by canvas engineers adds several convenient features that sync information between canvas and Turnitin so that instructors do not need to enter information in both Canvas and Turnitin, including due dates, assignment id's, assignment titles, points possible, and availability dates. The graphic depicts all of the available codes.

Here is a short video demonstrating the syncing features added by the custom code.

Can my institution enable both the API version and the LTI version as we transition to the LTI?

Turnitin has offered varying answers on this question. The latest answer is yes. In an email sent to local Turnitin instructors on 4-11-2016, Turnitin states, "For those who are wondering, it is possible to run the legacy Canvas integration and Canvas LTI integration in parallel during the transition period."

What happens to API enabled assignments when the API version gets shut off?

In an email sent to local Turnitin instructors on 4-11-2016, Turnitin states, "When the previous Canvas integration becomes unavailable, classes and assignments originally created through the previous integration will remain accessible by logging into Turnitin directly. These older classes and assignments will not be visible in the LTI integration."  Although, I believe this access is limited to Turnitin administrators.

On the Canvas side, The API enabled assignments stay in Canvas and all Canvas functionality remains intact when the Turnitin API gets turned off. Submissions and grading in Canvas persists in Canvas once you turn off the API; only the link to Turnitin is lost, which means losing direct access to originality reports and any grading done in Turnitin. Although, with the API turned off and LTI turned on, you can currently see the icons and percent in the speedgrader for past assignments. If you try to click on the icon, you get this error message:

The text "Turnitin has been enabled for this assignment" persists in Canvas assignments when the API has been turned off but the LTI tool has not been turned on for that assignment even if the course is copied for a new term Of course, there is no way of knowing if this will change once Turnitin phases out the API altogether.

An instructor who wants to preserve grading in Turnitin from the API version for personal access, must save the grading as a .pdf one paper at a time before the API gets turned off. Originality reports can be saved one at a time, or reports can be reproduced by resubmitting the file to Turnitin and disregarding the first submission when interpreting the originality report.

When we turned on the LTI, I converted my existing assignments to use the LTI without issue.

Do teachers and students have to sign up for an account at Turnitin.com?

No one absolutely needs to create a separate Turnitin account. The tool uses the email address in the user's Canvas profile as an identifier, and log in from Canvas is seamless even for first time users. However, the instructor cannot use the Canvas test student for testing the LTI tool because the test student does not include a profile and email address. When I started using the LTI, I had a previous Turnitin account under the same email my Canvas profile uses, so the tool recognized me and put all submissions into my preexisting account.

If an instructor accessed Turnitin for the first time in the LTI and then later had a desire or need to access information in the web interface at Turnitin.com, the instructor can go through the forgotten password process at Turitin.com to set up a password and then can begin to use the webinterface. It is probably advisable for an instructor to have access to the Turnitin.com interface for using the iPad app, submitting for students at Turnitin.com, managing rubrics and saved grading comments, etc.

Does the LTI version of Turnitin have feature X?

Yes! All of the major Turnitin features are present in the LTI version, including originality reports and grading (with reusable comments, rubrics, etc.) through Feedback Studio, e-rater (automated comments), grade anything (PowerPoint Excel, etc.),  peer review (in Peermark), ios app, and cloud submit.

How does an instructor set up an assignment using the LTI tool?

Instructors add Turnitin as an external app to an assignment. This video demonstrates the process (assuming you have enabled the custom codes in your LTI configuration for Turnitin:

When creating an assignment, should I load Turnitin in a new tab?

I prefer to use a new tab, but there are pros and cons to both approaches. Probably the most important thing is to be consistent on your campus to avoid confusing students. Here is a video showing what each option looks like:

Update:  As of June 30, 2016, Instructors must no longer launch a Turnitin assignment to initiate the assignment in Turnitin. The Turnitin release notes state, "Students can now launch into an assignment and trigger its creation; this relieves instructors from being forced to have first interaction with the assignment before students are able to submit." However, the instructor must set an available from date and a due date in Canvas to allow students to initialize an assignment.

How do students submit to a Turnitin LTI assignment?

Go here for a .pdf tutorial on uploading a word processing file to a Turnitin assignment.

How do students complete peer reviews?

Here is a .pdf tutorial on using PeerMark.

I want to set up an assignment sequence of rough draft, peer review, and final draft.

You will need two assignments in Canvas / Turnitin. The first assignment will be for students to submit drafts and critique each other with Peermark. The second assignment will be for the submission of the final draft. This video tutorial demonstrates setting up an assignment and adding a Peer review component with Peermark. Note that only the grade on the paper in Grademark gets passed back to the canvas gradebook, so if you want to grade Peer reviews, you can add reviews into the paper grade (what I do), or you can set up an assignment with no submission and manually enter grades for the peer reviews:

How does the grading work?

An instructor can choose to grade using Turnitin's Grademark or Canvas's Speedgrader.

I do all of my grading in Turnitin's Grademark. I use the Quickmarks (saved comments I can reuse) with a rubric and enter the grade in Turnitin. The grade gets passed to the Gradebook in Canvas. It actually works quite a bit like the Canvas Speedgrader, and you can advance from student to student as well as quickly flip through all of a student's submissions for the term. I prefer Turnitin's Grademark because I can save and reuse remarks (with clickable url's!). Turnitin also can layer the originality report and Grademark, so the instructor can see the originality report while grading. Unlike the older API plugin, Quickmarks, rubrics, and PeerMark libraries persist across Canvas courses, so there is no need for importing or exporting Turnitin assets after the initial use.

As of the August 29, 2015 update, the student submits the paper to Turnitin, and Turnitin sends a copy of the paper to Canvas. The copy of the paper in Canvas may be graded in the Speedgrader, but if you wish to use a Canvas rubric, you must add the rubric to the assignment before configuring the assignment submission as an external tool.

How do students receive their feedback?

Here is a tutorial for receiving instructor feedback through Grademark. If the instructor chooses to grade in the Canvas speedgrader, then the process is the same as it is for any other Canvas assignment except that the student can also click on the Turnitin icon to view her originality report.

How can I tell if my students have viewed their feedback?

If you use Grademark for grading, you can access the Turnitin inbox through the link on your Canvas assignment:

In the image above of a Turnitin assignment inbox, the eye icon indicates a student who has viewed feedback. The dots are students who have not seen the feedback.

Will Turnitin send a grade from Turnitin to the Canvas Gradebook?

Yes! Grades entered in Turnitin automatically get posted to the Canvas grade book. However, this is a one way link. Grades posted in Canvas do not show up in Turnitin.  

Can I use the Turnitin iPad app to grade?

I use it all of the time! In fact, the iPad Turnitin app does something nothing else does right now: you can download papers to the iPad and grade them without an Internet connection, using a rubric and Quickmarks (saved and reusable comments). Then, when you hit wifi again, the papers sync back to Turnitin (and therefore to Canvas).

Where can I see the originality report for a paper?

Icons for the originality report show up in the Canvas speedgrader and gradebook.  The full report can be seen by clicking on the icon in the speedgrader or accessing the LTI tool from the Canvas assignment or through the Turnitin iPad app.

What happens when I copy a course in Canvas?

The assignment, settings, instructions, and dates persist in Canvas when an instructor copies a course for a new term.The LTI assignment must be visited (if you load TII inside of Canvas or the LTI tool must be launched (if you load in a new tab) to reestablish the assignment and settings on the Turnitin side. Now, a student can access the assignment from Canvas to initialize the assignment in Turnitin; However, the instructor must set an available from date and a due date in Canvas to allow students to initialize an assignment.

How can I use Turnitin with an essay question on a Canvas Quiz to get an originality report?

There are two options.

The first option is to use a file upload question in the quiz. This allows students to upload a file in response to the question, and the instructor can bulk download the files from the quiz as documented in How do I create a File Upload quiz question?.  Once the students' files are downloaded in a zip file, the instructor could upload the zip file to the Submitting via quick submit https://guides.turnitin.com/01_Manuals_and_Guides/Instructor/Instructor_User_Manual/37_Quick_Submit on Turnitin's website. This is one good reason for instructors to set up accounts through Turnitin's interface and enable the quick submit in their settings.

The second option is to use essay questions in the quiz. After the students complete the quiz, the instructor can generate an item analysis. Download the item analysis and open it. Next, locate the column with the essay responses you wish to scan, and it helps here if you can search for a key word to locate the column. I always include the word "essay" in my essay questions, which lets me locate the columns I need quickly. Next, copy the column and submit it to Turnitin via cut and paste with Submitting via quick submit 

Here is a video that demonstrates using quick submit:

I want to check discussion posts for originality.

A feature request for using Turnitin on Canvas discussions is under review: . In the meantime, you can navigate to a discussion, select the entire page (ctrl A on Windows; Command A on Mac). Next, use Submitting via quick submit  on Turnitin's website and paste in the text. Some text you may not want will be included like the discussion prompts and your discussion replies to students, but if you can live with that, you can batch scan the posts, and what you copy even includes each student's name, so you know who wrote each post:

I want to use the Turnitin LTI but need a Canvas rubric for grading / assessment

Create your assignment as a Canvas assignment without linking it to Turnitin. Save the assignment. Add your rubric to the assignment, and edit the assignment to enable Turnitin. I

Can Students submit to Turnitin LTI assignments from the Canvas mobile apps?

Not at this time. As per Canvas iOS app and External Apps(LTI), Turnitin needs to make its LTI tool fully compatible for a mobile environment. However, it is possible for students to submit essays by using the browser on their mobile device. Additionally, Turnitin's iPad app supports student use for submitting papers  and viewing feedback. For students to gain access to the iPad app, they should go through the password recovery process after accessing Turnitin at least once through the canvas integration.

Are there any complications with the Turnitin LTI tool?

There is some loss of Canvas functionality that may affect some instructors:

• Turnitin assignments will only accept one file per assignment.
• Using differentiated due dates as documented inHow do I assign an Assignment to an individual student or course section? breaks date syncing with Turnitin because Turnitin can only handle one set of dates per assignment. As a workaround, an instructor could set a date in Turnitin that corresponds with the last date in Canvas, allowing all groups to submit to the same assignment, but this only works if your school is not using the custom codes to automatically sync due dates with Turnitin.  Alternatively, an instructor could set up multiple assignments, releasing each assignment only to one subset of students.
• If an instructor wishes to alter a Canvas rubric on a Turnitin assignment, she must Turn off the LTI to alter the rubric and then reinstate the LTI when done editing the rubric. Warning: disabling the LTI after students have submitted will severe the connection between Canvas and the LTI; you should only do this if students have not submitted.
• It is not possible to use the Turnitin LTI (or any other external tool submission) with a Canvas group assignment; the option to assign to a group disappears as soon as "External Tool" is selected as the submission type.

I have a question that is not answered here.

You can comment on this blog, and I am happy to help, but I do not work for Instructure or Turnitin and have no inside information. I am an English Professor, and I use the Turnitin LTI tool in Canvas daily. 

I do not like something about the Turnitin LTI. Who should I make aware of my displeasure?

Most issues are going to be with Turnitin. File bug reports and give feedback at Turnitin - Support Wizard.  You can also contact your local Canvas admin to pass feedback to the Turnitin rep for your institution. I encourage you to do this. Let Turnitin know that Canvas users want and deserve their attention. Turnitin is a great product, but it is also an expensive one. Get the most for your money by getting your feedback to the right folks.

However, it is also true that Canvas and Turnitin are working together, and Instructure Employees have initiated discussions on the following known issues:

Turnitin + Canvas: submissions appearing on the wrong assignment

Turnitin + Canvas issue: "Resubmit to Turnitin" button occasionally results in submission getting st...

Turnitin + Canvas: Allow teachers to resubmit on behalf of students

Canvas + Turnitin: Retreive TII originality score again after due date has passed

Questions? If so, please don’t be shy!

Does Feedback Studio alter any functionality?

[themidiman]

Nice post  @dhulsey ​

We are trying to be proactive about migrating away from the legacy Turnitin Canvas plugin and moving to the LTI-API version. Reaching out to instructors to tell them that they will have to re-create every single assignment that requires plagiarism detection is going to be painful. How do you see this change affecting your institution?

[dhulsey]

Thanks, Jeffery! When I switched, I did not recreate any assignment. I did edit each existing assignment to switch from a file upload to an external tool in the assignment settings, and then I pasted in a link with a tutorial on how to submit the assignment into my assignment instructions, but the process takes about as long as setting new dates on an assignment. That part is pretty painless and only has to be done once.

Although, each term, an instructor will need to open the LTI tool on each assignment and adjust the Turnitin settings.

[themidiman]

Yes, I should have clarified that the training for each user of 'editing each assignment and adding the external tool' process is going to be the painful part. We realize that at the moment for a skilled person, it doesn't take too much time to do for one assignment, but we also have the concern about the perception that the process is very far removed from what used to be a simple checkbox to a multi-step process for each of these assignment types. That, plus the date-adjustment and the lack of grade-book integration for plagiarism reporting is going to turn off a few faculty.

[Chris_Hofer]

Thanks to  @dhulsey ​ for helping me through all this back in the old Canvas Community!  He was able to answer a lot of my questions about the LTI app!  We've announced this new way to use Turnitin to our faculty via an announcement posted to the Canvas dashboard.  I know that at least one of our faculty members will be using it in the near future!

When we announced the LTI tool, I found some other very helpful videos on YouTube that were similar to awesome videos that Dallas already put together.  I will post them here in case anyone is interested.  jmd260​ did a good job of putting these together.

And here is what it would look like from a student's point of view:

Thanks again, Dallas!  Really appreciate all the help!!!

[themidiman]

Thanks  @Chris_Hofer ​, this is very helpful for our community of plagiarism-focused instructors.

[Chris_Hofer]

You're welcome, JEFHQ12951​!

[dhulsey]

Update: The feature request at Turnitin to write submission status to the Canvas Gradebook is now visible and available for voting at Turnitin's roadmap site, which you can access by logging in at Turnitin.com. Sadly, I cannot find a permalink to the request. Please, send your faculty and staff to vote for this feature.  Thanks!

[scottdennis]

Hey  @dhulsey ​,

I knew that the information you were sharing in the old community about all things Turnitin was useful to people but it is fun to see this conversation take off here.  This appears to be the most actively viewed, commented on, etc addition to the ID group.  Thanks again.

[dhulsey]

Thanks,  @scottdennis ​ Thanks also for reapproving the post as I indulge my habit of endless revising!

[morris_admin]

We're currently using the API integration. We're hesitant to switch over because we think it's going to be very confusing for people to set their assignment settings twice: once in Canvas and once in Turnitin. We're assuming instructors will neglect to configure things on the Turnitin side and their students will experience errors.

It seems to me that the data entered in Canvas should transfer to Turnitin when a new assignment is created. We've tried contacting Turnitin with feedback out this but we have not received a response. I'm surprised that this isn't a bigger deal for more Canvas/Turnitin users. For those that are using the LTI, has this been a problem?

Thanks!

[Chris_Hofer]

We just recently turned on the LTI, and we really haven't had people using it so far.  I expect maybe a handful of people (if that) this Summer and then maybe some more (?) this Fall to utilize the LTI app.  I'm assuming that you've watched the videos that  @dhulsey ​ and I have linked to regarding the assignment settings?  I think that's "just how it is" for now.  But you're right...that would be nice to have the Turnitin assignment settings pass back into Canvas.

[dhulsey]

It has not been a problem for us, but it did feel like a lot of work and time when I started using the LTI, morris_adminAfter I set up several assignments, I got pretty quick at it, and it does feel much easier now. The assignment settings do let you save some default settings for future assignments if you want to do that.

I agree it would be nice if points available and dates synced with Canvas so that they only have to be set once, but I don't know if the LTI specification allows that interaction. I am not a programmer. I do know that LTI 2.0 is rolling out and more interactions will be possible between the external LTI tool and the LMS, so hopefully we will see increased convenience and functionality in the future.

[dwillmore]

Do you happen to know the date the Canvas API integration will no longer be available?

[Chris_Hofer]

 @dwillmore ​, I don't know a specific date.  But, you might want to check out the other conversation that is happening over here: Working with Turnitin API not LTI

[clong]

We currently have the API Turnitin in use and I would like to get the LTI Version going. Does anyone have or know of a brief walkthrough on how the Turnitin Admin & Canvas Admin configure it in the accounts so it's ready to go?

[dhulsey]

Does this help,  @clong 

LTI Administrator Guide - Guides.turnitin.com

[clong]

I think that's what I was using as a reference before, but it looks like some new information has been added. I'll give it another try. Thanks Dallas.

[themidiman]

I used 3 votes on Turnitin's website for your feature,  @dhulsey ​. I also put in a plug for a hopeful filling in the gaps created by moving away from the legacy api to the LTI-API version of the tool. These would include the tight integration with the grade book and speed grader which showed a visual representation of the plagiarism detected in a submission.

I just know that we're going to be in for a support issue as a whole when assisting faculty needing plagiarism detection via Turnitin, and having to help reconfigure all their assignments, and then for them to ask why the integration isn't as full featured as it used to be. Time will tell.

Thanks again for a well-written article and for maintaining it. We will be referring to it often as we complete the transition to this version of the Turnitin integration.

[dhulsey]

Thanks for the kind words and votes on Turnitin, JEFHQ12951​ Currently, the feature request at Turnitin has 19 votes, so we likely have a way to go before getting Turnitin's attention. :smileylaugh:

[Stef_retired]

Boy, do they make this hard to find! Tip: After logging into Turnitin.com, I tried searching on LTI, but the wheels just kept spinning forever--so I switched the view to "New Ideas" and found it on page 2. I used my three votes!

[Stef_retired]

I'm preserving in this space some of the frequently-asked questions from the old community about the Turnitin API.

Q. Can Turnitin check submissions after students have submitted on Canvas?

A. Turnitin cannot be retroactively enabled on an assignment. When a student submits his or her file it is immediately transmitted to Turnitin via the Canvas-Turnitin integration and evaluated--so if Turnitin isn't enabled, the file isn't sent. Teachers can't currently submit assignments on behalf of students, so that option isn't available to you either. The good news is that instructors can batch submit assignment files directly to Turnitin. See the instructions on "How to submit a file directly to Turnitin" at the end of this post.

Q. Can the instructor submit a student's assignment [to Turnitin] for him or her?

A. The instructor cannot currently submit the assignment through Canvas to obtain a Turnitin evaluation, but can submit it directly to Turnitin. See the instructions on "How to submit a file directly to Turnitin" at the end of this post.

Q. Can students view their Turnitin originality scores before an assignment is graded?

A. Yes, if the assignment is not muted; no, if the assignment is muted.

Q. If an instructor has not enabled an assignment for Turnitin, can a student enable Turnitin?

A. Instructors set the preferences for Turnitin as it is integrated in Canvas; students cannot enable Turnitin themselves. Some instructors maintain a separate Turnitin account that allows students to submit papers directly to Turnitin for a draft review; this would give you originality feedback, but the submission would not take place in Canvas. Ask your instructor if this option is available to you.

Q. Turnitin submission failures: why?

A. Sometimes a submission fails to generate a Turnitin report because of a backlog in processing; other times, it is because the student has uploaded an incompatible file. At this time, Turnitin lists these file types as compatible:

1. Microsoft Word® (.doc / .docx)
2. OpenOffice Text (.odt)
3. Google Docs via Google Drive
4. WordPerfect®  (.wpd)
5. PostScript (.ps/.eps)
6. Adobe® PDF***
7. Microsoft PowerPoint® (.pptx, .ppt, .ppsx, and .pps)
8. Microsoft Excel® (.xls and .xlsx)
9. HTML
10. Rich text format (.rtf)
11. Plain text (.txt)
12. Hangul Word Processor file .hwp)

Turnitin's documentation--public knowledge base - Paper Submissions - Error Uploading Paper - All --provides further details on these file types.

To quote mnagel​, "PDF's are Turnitin gold!" After I added .pdf as an acceptable file submission type on my assignments, my Turnitin errors dropped dramatically. Allowing PDFs is especially helpful for students using Macs who are creating their files using Pages, or do not have a Microsoft Word installation and are using Google Docs to create .doc and .docx files, or are resorting to the use of OpenOffice. (Tip: I limit submission file types to those that are compatible with both Turnitin and Crocodoc, so that I have Crocodoc annotations as a backup.)

Q. My school doesn't use Canvas, but does use Turnitin, and I'm using a Free for Teachers Canvas account. Can I enable Turnitin in my Canvas course?

A. (Thanks to Steven Andres for providing this information.)

tl;dr; "NO" for the free-for-teachers.

In theory, one can add the LTI information for Turnitin in the Apps. However, Turnitin provided this additional guidance:

• Your institutional account admin would have to enable the LTI feature.
• The TurnItIn salesperson has to enable the LTI feature (after checking that the school has paid for it).
• The local TurnItIn account admin has to configure the LTI feature within TurnItIn (this affects the entire school, not just the individual course).
• Once all those [probably impossible] steps are complete, then (and only then) can the instructor add TurnItIn as an LTI by completing the following steps provided by Canvas L2 Tech Support (which Steven helpfully provided as documentation for future readers):

1. Navigate to your courses settings page using the button in the bottom of the courses left side menu.
2. Click on the "Apps" tab, then click "View App Configuration" on the right.
3. Click the blue "Add New App" button to open a configuration screen popup.
4. In this popup window there is a drop-down labeled as "Configuration Type" you will need to change to "By URL"
5. Enter https://api.turnitin.com/api/lti/1p0/assignment for "URL"
6. Enter TurnItIn Account ID for "Consumer Key"
7. Enter shared key configured by TurnItIn administrator for "shared key"
8. Allow LMS to send user's email addresses.

---

How to submit a file directly to Turnitin (these instructions are accurate as of May 6, 2015):

• First, you will need to be able to log into Turnitin at this link: http://turnitin.com/en_us/login If your school has not already set up this direct access for you, contact the Turnitin admin at your school to obtain the credentials you will need to create an account. Specifically, you will need an account ID and a "join password"; once you have that, you can create your own account using your own email address and password of your choosing.
• After you've successfully logged into Turnitin, select the Quick Submit tab and then on the Submit button. You will be presented with a Customize Your Search screen, which allows you to enable various evaluation methods. After doing that, click on the Submit button again. Select your option from the dropdown at the top (single file, multiple files, cut and paste, or a .zip file), fill in the fields for the student's name and title of the file, and select your upload option (generally "Choose from this computer," although you can also upload from Dropbox or Google Drive). Finally, click on the Upload button to generate originality reports for the paper(s).
• Click on the Quick Submit tab again to view the list of originality reports, and click on the colored icon next to the submission title to access the originality report and GradeMark screen for the submission, where you can mark up the paper just as you would through the Canvas API. You can then download the annotated papers and distribute the resulting PDFs to your students individually.
• I generally attach the PDF of the annotated GradeMark view to the Comments section in the SpeedGrader.
• Tip: I export my QuickMarks from Canvas/Turnitin and upload them into a submission in Turnitin.com so I can use the same QuickMarks that I'm using in Canvas. I also export my QuickMarks at the end of every semester so I can re-use them in future courses.)

[brendaa]

I found the site on Turnitin and added 3 votes.  We're up to 31 but need a lot more.

To clarify -- you can find the New Ideas to vote on by logging into Turnitin.com and selecting RoadMap

In the "Describe your new idea" field type in LTI.

[dhulsey]

We have at least made it onto the known issues list with some of the LTI issues: public knowledge base - Known Turnitin Service Issues and Notifications . It is a start!

[dhulsey]

Additional Updates:

Submissions made to Turnitin LTI assignments now appear on an instructor's "To Do" list. Clicking on the submissions in the "To Do List" takes the instructor to the Speedgrader with a text only version of the submission that includes the following message:

Also, submissions to Turnitin through the LTI now appear as Text submissions in the grade book, so instructors can see who has submitted and who has not in addition to being able to use the "Message Students Who" feature of Canvas. Spiffy!

On the downside, I cannot seem to edit any of the dates on the settings in the LTI tool, which is a problem. :smileyconfused: I have filed a bug report with Turnitin, and we will see what happens

[Chris_Hofer]

This looks very helpful, but I just tried to submit an assignment as a "dummy" student in my own sandbox course, and when I returned to my course as an admin/instructor, I don't see any "To Do" list.    The only thing I see is at the bottom of my Dashboard under "Recent Activity" which takes me to the assignment with the LTI integration.  What am I missing?

[dhulsey]

First, Turnitin support jumped on the date editing problem, and it has been resolved. I have never seen them move that fast before.

 @Chris_Hofer ​, I am not sure. What you are doing sounds like what I do. It looks like these features went live yesterday, so they are really are hot off of the presses.

In this shot of my "To Do" list, I marked assignments that are Turnitin assignments with Peermark assignments:

In this screenshot, the grade book shows submissions to the Turnitin LTI assignments as Text submissions:

That's all I have for now, but if I figure out what is missing from your work flow, I will be back!

[dhulsey]

To follow up, Chris, it looks like the To Do list assignment account is not always totally accurate. Right now, my To Do list says I have three papers to grade, but when I open the LTI tool, there are seven papers there. My guess is that your workflow is fine, but there may be some bugs in the new features.

[jhalter]

Hi Dallas, I have an issue with Turnitin and Canvas.  I am seeing a higher similarity index score with the Speed Grader and than what Turnitin LTI interface is showing. I work  @Chris_Hofer ​ at MPTC and he suggested you as a reference.

[dhulsey]

Hi, jhalter​! I have been seeing the same thing. I plan to file a bug report with Turnitin about this. The report in the LTI tool is correct as far as I can tell. The similarity scores showing in the speedgrader and grade book are all in the red for me, which seems statistically improbable. My current theory is that Turnitin is producing a second report to display in the speedgrader and grade book and is thus showing the paper is plagiarizing itself from the first report in the LTI tool. I believe if you look at the sources for the reports in Canvas, it will show the source material is the paper itself.  I hope to get a bug report to Turnitin tomorrow, and I will reply here to let you know what I find out.

[buellj]

Hi All,

The folks at Turnitin are being very inconsistent about the messaging about the schedule and depreciation of the legacy API. Below is the response we got from the integration team regarding our ask to continue using the legacy API through summer of 2016:

Hi John,

Thank you for your email. We are retiring access to our Legacy API in Q4 of 2015 in favour of LTI, which is a supported, and generally more stable route to integration. We are working closely with Canvas at the moment to ensure that their LTI integration is a suitable replacement for their current Legacy integration. We have offered Canvas some extra functionality (this will be different to a standard LTI integration) and they are implementing this functionality in the coming months.

Canvas will be reaching out to their customers closer to the time to advise them of these changes and we will be assisting with the migration to the new integration. We will not simply turn off access to the Legacy integration until the LTI version is up to scratch, so you will not be without a suitable replacement.

Regarding an extension to the Canvas Legacy integration, I do not think this will necessarily be required. Canvas may have completed their integration by Q4 of 2015 but they will still need to migrate everyone to the new integration and this may take some time. We don't have all the details on this at present but Canvas will certainly keep you informed!

Please let me know if you have any queries in the meantime.

Kind regards,

Charlotte

ᐧ

Charlotte Hutchison

Product Owner, Integrations (Team Lead)

[dhulsey]

jhalter​ and  @Chris_Hofer ​:

The preliminary word from Turnitin tech support is that the engineer thinks having the API and LTI enabled on the same account is now causing problems. If that is true, most of what looked like recent feature changes are actually bugs from the two integrations running afoul of each other (even though we were previously told having both enabled was fine). They are continuing to look into the problem. I will keep updating here as I know more.

[Chris_Hofer]

We do have both the API and the LTI enabled.  Interesting...thanks for the info.

[dhulsey]

Sadly, Turnitin engineers have confirmed that having both the API and the LTI turned on for the same account is creating problems, including false originality reports and the appearance of features associated with the API tool, including assignments showing in the to do list and grade book as well as report icons in the speedgrader and grade book. All of these occurrences are bugs when both the API and LTI are on for the same account.  Turnitin support suggested using sub accounts to activate one or the other might work.

[Chris_Hofer]

Thanks for the information!  I saw you also updated your blog posting.  We do not currently use sub-accounts, so I'm going to have to see who else might be using the Turnitin API and if this is causing problems for them, too.  I don't suspect we have too many other faculty using Turnitin at this time, though.

CC: jhalter​

[ccalderon]

 @dhulsey ​ - thank you so much for your original post as well for staying on top of these many questions and comments. As we prepare to roll this out, I have a couple more I have not seen in the thread above...

1) Because Canvas rubrics are not available, Outcomes and Learning Mastery Gradebook would then also not be fully accurate for such courses, correct? Have you run into this issue and if so, how has it been addressed?

2) I know there is an option to "Allow submission of any file type", which makes it sound like you can specify .doc, .pdf, etc as with an Online Submission from Canvas. However, we do not see a way to actually do that....??? Any ideas?

Thank you in advance for any help you can provide (again!)

Crista

[dhulsey]

Hey,  @ccalderon ​. You raise an interesting question about how Outcomes and Learning Mastery would work with Turnitin (or other LTI integration assignments for that matter). I don't know the answer for sure because I have never had occasion to use the Learning Mastery Gradebook, but I suspect you are correct. This might be an issue to raise with  @karl ​ who commented in Will Instructure update the Turnitin Legacy integration when new Turnitin APIs become available? that his team would be working to improve the Turnitin LTI integration right about . . .now?

On the file types, Turnitin defaults to accepting any file it can produce an originality report for. When you select "allow submission of any file type," the sorts of files get broadened to literally any file of any kind. For instance, a student might submit a photograph as a .jpeg, but there is no originality report for images (sadly!). Still, Peermark and Grademark might be useful for such files. Even when Turnitin cannot render the file; the student could still submit her .mp3 file or whatever, but there would be little point in using Turnitin over Canvas for assignments requiring such files.  Lists of the files in each category and other details about submitting files may be found here: Turnitin - Submitting Paper. As far as I know, you cannot restrict file types to specific file extensions in Turnitin the way you can with a file submitted directly to a file upload assignment in Canvas.

I hope that helps!

[ccalderon]

Thanks  @dhulsey ​ - this really helps! I will follow up with Karl on the thread referenced above. Have a great Thursday!!

[Chris_Hofer]

Is there any way to determine which of our instructors are using the Turnitin API?  Thinking ahead, it would be nice to just send those using the Turnitin API a targeted message letting them know we're moving everyone to the LTI.

[snugent]

We finally have the TurnItin LTI integration setup and I am writing documentation creating and submitting assignments. I have a couple of questions about some of the settings. I just want to be sure I telling everyone correctly what each setting does. The TurnItIn documentation on the LTI is nearly non-existence on their website.

On the option, Allow submission of any file type?

The default is checked as yes. So does this mean that there is a chance that an originality report will be not get created if the file is non-supported type? If the instructor leaves this at default and the originality report doesn't get created, what message displays to the instructor?

If no is chosen what exactly does this mean? Does it mean only supported file types will be accepted like the list stefaniesanders mentioned earlier in this thread? I am assuming that if the grading and originality report are important to the instructor then no should be checked. Just want to be sure I am understanding this correctly. What kind of message displays to students if they try to submit a file type that isn't supported?

The directions on this page on the site shows this being two options to choose from for this option but that isn't what I see in the LTI tool.  It seems more clear to me so I can't figure out why they changed it.

Assignments - Guides.turnitin.com

[glparker]

HI Chris,

The Assignments API will tell you this.

An Assignment object looks like:

{

  //the ID of the assignment

  "id": 4,

  //the name of the assignment

  "name": "some assignment",

  //Boolean flag indicating whether or not Turnitin has been enabled for the

  //assignment. NOTE: This flag will not appear unless your account has the Turnitin

  //plugin available

  "turnitin_enabled": "true",

  //Settings to pass along to turnitin to control what kinds of matches should be

  //considered. originality_report_visibility can be 'immediate', 'after_grading',

  //'after_due_date', or 'never' exclude_small_matches_type can be null, 'percent',

  //'words' exclude_small_matches_value: - if type is null, this will be null also -

  //if type is 'percent', this will be a number between 0 and 100 representing match

  //size to exclude as a percentage of the document size. - if type is 'words', this

  //will be number > 0 representing how many words a match must contain for it to be

  //considered NOTE: This flag will not appear unless your account has the Turnitin

  //plugin available

  "turnitin_settings": "",

}

I suspect you'll have to query ALL assignments to get a list of the ones with Turnitin Enabled.  

[glparker]

Hi  @dhulsey ​

Given your update that the API and LTI are incompatible, does this change how you would intriduce the new LTI to your faculty?   In particular, it sounds like we should turn off the API when we turn on the LTI.   Given that, will this disable old Turnitin Assignments until they are edited to switch from file upload to External Tool?  

[Chris_Hofer]

Thanks for the reply.  I don't work with API stuff much in Canvas (I leave that to our IT folks here).  How would we query ALL assignments for a given term?

[dwillmore]

I think they meant Canvas standard Turnitin vs. the new Turnitin LTI. The Canvas tool that connects Turnitin through the assignment is actually considered the API tool as Canvas uses Turnitin APIs to communicate from Canvas to Turnitin.

Dave Willmore

636.922.8514

[Chris_Hofer]

Yup...I understand that.  I'm looking for a way to determine which of our faculty are using the Turnitin API in their courses for a given term instead of sifting through hundreds of courses and even more assignments to find ones that are using the API.  Ideally, I'd like to send just those faculty members a message letting them know we're going to move exclusively to the Turnitin LTI prior to the start of the Fall semester.

[dwillmore]

I misunderstood sorry. I am swamped right now, but I will look into the API side later and see how difficult it is to pull. I think it is pretty easy, and if so I will provide my syntax.

Dave Willmore

636.922.8514

[dhulsey]

The only way I know of would be to ask the faculty which they are using, but, other than using API, the local Turnitin administrator might be able to tell. It has been awhile since I have looked closely at the administrator interface in Turnitin, so I do not know for sure.

[dhulsey]

Hi, Susan!

Turnitin defaults to accepting any file it can produce an originality report for. When you select "allow submission of any file type," the sorts of files get broadened to literally any file of any kind. For instance, a student might submit a photograph as a .jpeg, but there is no originality report for images (sadly!). Still, Peermark and Grademark might be useful for such files. Even when Turnitin cannot render the file; the student could still submit her .mp3 file or whatever, but there would be little point in using Turnitin over Canvas for assignments requiring such files.  Lists of the files in each category and other details about submitting files may be found here: Turnitin - Submitting Paper.

I hope that helps!

[dhulsey]

Hi, Glen! I do not think the old assignments would be disabled; they should still function in Canvas, but they would be without Turnitin functionality. it is possible to switch an existing assignment to use the LTI and keep all of the existing instructions. Of course, the instructions might need to be edited to provide instructions on using the LTI tool for the students. I did this by pasting in links to tutorials.

The big change for us is in timing, and now we cannot wait until Turnitin ends support. We wouldn't switch things up on students and faculty in the middle of a term if we could help it. We plan to turn off the API after our summer term ends but before fall starts.

[Chris_Hofer]

Good idea,  @dhulsey ​!  I just checked with one of our librarians, and he was able to get me a listing of courses (via his admin role) that have been using Turnitin.  Even better was that the listing showed which courses have used the API and the LTI versions!

[snugent]

I have been digging deep into the documentation the TurnItIn website. It appears for institutions using the LTI integration instructors can use the iPad app. There is a couple of steps involved in setting up a class in it.

I am linking to the documentation for it here because it is so darn hard to find. Scroll down the page to the heading, Logging in with an access code.