A Blank Assignment Group Shows Up after Course Copy or Blueprint Sync

[erik_gustafson]

Whenever I copy a course over or do a blueprint sync into a new course, a blank assignments group is always shown at the top of the assignments page. It doesn't matter whether the source course has a group called Assignments or not. It seems to always happen. It is never overwritten, so I have to manually go in and delete said blank group. 

Has anyone else experienced this issue? Have you been able to solve it?

It is really annoying because assignment groups show up at the end of the grade book for students and instructors. 

--
Erik

[Chris_Hofer]

@erik_gustafson ...

Yes, this happened to me a couple times this morning when I was finishing a project for some of our instructors.  I had imported content (using the option to select specific content instead of copying an entire course).  The empty "Assignments" assignment group remained once the import had completed, and I needed to remove it from the course.  Not a big deal for what I needed to do since it was only 2 or 3 courses.  But, yes, that empty assignment group was there.  But, it didn't seem consistent in other courses I was importing.  Some had the empty assignment group...some did not.  🤔

[Hildi_Pardo · Accepted solution]

Hi @erik_gustafson 

The reason you see an "extra" Assignments Group is because any/every blank course will have an Assignments Group already there, by default.  (If you create a blank course and go to Assignments, an Assignments Group will be there to begin with).    Importing content never overwrites existing content in a course.  So when you import content to that course,  you will see the addition of Assignment Groups that were imported.   

There isn't a way around it, I think. 

How are you doing the blueprint sync?  Are you syncing to existing courses? (this won't remove the existing Assignment Group).   Or are you doing it via CSV files (I wonder if this would actually create an EXACT copy of the course without the "extra" Assignment Group.)

[erik_gustafson]

I know that every course must have at least one assignment group, but I wonder if Canvas can do something so the blank ones don't appear in copy or sync. It's really annoying. 

I blueprint sync manually (well, API) and not CSV import. I haven't tried that. 

I'm sure Canvas could do something about it. 

[PaulFynn]

@Hildi_Pardo  Ref ""Importing content never overwrites existing content in a course.""

In my experience I'd never say never - if I import template content to a course, then make updates in that course, then import from the same template content again, I have seen content overwritten ... and not show up on 'undelete' afterwards ...