Any possible way to automate LTI tool installation?

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zia_rehman
Community Novice
‎07-01-2020 12:47 AM

We are trying to build a seemless way to use our plugins/apps in canvas(among other LMS systems), we have successfully achieved this in Moodle, and we apparently it does not seem possible in canvas to automate this flow. The flow we want is something like:

  1. User is on our external webapp (xyz.com or anything)
  2. User want to use some of our content in his LMS system, he clicks on the option, we show him simplest possible instructions to install our plugin in his LMS system
  3. Next step, installing plugin, Ideally should be as simple as possible, in Moodle we achieved this by building its internal plugin, which when added, is able to automatically install an LTI app with keys and everything. And also that plugin generates an API key and sends it to our server for further usage as well.

We want something similar to step 3 in canvas.

I know this does not seem possible in Canvas and I can understand why, but I am posting in a hope to get as near to our goal as possible. As much reduction in user steps involved in installing an LTI plugin and generating an API key is our objective.

Any insights/help will be great. Thanks.

1 Solution

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James
Community Champion
‎07-01-2020 09:16 AM

You can create an LTI integration using an XML file (LTI 1.1) or JSON (LTI 1.3). See the External Tools Introduction in the API documentation. In particular, near the bottom:

Configuration XML contains all non-account-specific settings (except the consumer key and shared secret, which must always be entered manually)

If you need an API key for the institution, then they will need to add a developer key for you. Canvas can add your globally (they have criteria for this) so institutions would just need to turn your integration on rather than reentering.


Otherwise, you use OAuth with each user to get access.

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