Editing a published page without sending a notification

[SandyGambill]

First time poster with what is probably a simple question. I've searched and can't find exactly what I'm looking for.  

I have a published page in a live course with students.   I need to edit that page to fix something like a typo. How do I do that without triggering a notification to students that the page has been updated? If this isn't a setting I can control, if there a work around? Un-publish the page, fix it, and re-publish?

Thank you! I'm new to Canvas at a campus that is working on migrating to Blackboard.

[gcollins1]

I think it is as easy as making your page edits and then not checking this box, next to the save button at the bottom-right of the edit screen.

[SandyGambill]

Thanks for responding! I have that setting turned off but it's sending notifications anyway.  Since we're just migrating to Canvas, I'm in touch with our migration rep.  I'll report back if I figure anything out.

[slefler]

Has anyone found an answer to this? It seems that the notification has embedded links that students can use to access items such as images embedded in a page. These can be accessed even if the page is unpublished. To me, this is a major flaw in Canvas as it can allow students a backdoor to access something that was mistakenly published, even if the instructor immediately unpublishes the page. 

Also, does anyone know if such a notification is sent when unpublished pages are modified inside a live canvas course? 

[Chris_Hofer]

Good morning, @SandyGambill ...

Are all you students in the class getting notified that you've been updating content in your course?  Or just select students?  Every user in Canvas (students, instructors, Canvas admins, etc.) have their own personal notification settings that they can turn on/off at will.  This is done via the "Account" >> "Notifications" Screen in Canvas.  This screen controls all notifications for all courses that a user is enrolled in.  One of the rows on this page is for "Course Content" which includes changes to page content.  It's quite possible that some or all of your students have options turned on so that they are getting notified of the changes you make to your pages.  You cannot control the settings of your students...that is for each student to decide on his/her own.

There are also notification settings that you can further customize per course...which are similar to the settings at your user account level.  So, for example, you may want to get certain notifications in one course, but you may not want to get those same notifications in another course.

Here are a handful of Guides for you to look through:

• How do I set my Canvas notification preferences as an instructor?
• How do I manage notifications for a single course as an instructor?
• How do I set my Canvas notification preferences as a student?
• How do I manage notifications for a single course as a student?

I hope these resources will be of some help to you.  Please let Community members know if you have any other questions about this information...thanks!  Take care, stay safe, and be well.

[ccrane1]

This cheerful avoidance of the question being asked is one of my biggest complaints about Canvas.  The question is about whether the course author can control notifications and whether it makes a difference whether the course is published and/or the edited page is published; Chris Hofer's response is about the recipients' ability to control notifications.   And no one has explained what the box that shows at the bottom of an edited page actually does, if notifications are  sent when it is not checked, as the original questioner stated.  Does checking it override the recipient's preference, and send a notification sooner than the chosen preferences?

[Andreas_Hopf]

Surfing around the question is very unprofessional indeed.

If there is a checkbox one can uncheck so no notifications are sent - but then one finds out that notifications are sent anyway, what kind of shoddy programming is this?

[chriscas]

Hi @Andreas_Hopf,

I agree the scenarios here perhaps aren't as clear as they should be in the guides.  In my head, I was pretty sure I understood how things were supposed to work, but I did some testing to verify...

From what my testing revealed, it appears notifications about page changes are only send to a user if BOTH the checkbox is enabled when the page is edited AND the user has the "course content" notification enabled for the course (or their global notification preference).

If anyone else knows or finds out differently, please let us know here, but I'm pretty sure this info is accurate (and matches what my understanding was before testing it out too).

-Chris

[KathyHayes]

What we seem to have found today is that the publishing of the content triggers a notification when the student has notifications set to get notifications about content changes. IOW, if you unpublish a page and change some things then publish again they get the notification. BUT if you have a published page that you change and don't check the notify box and you never 'trigger' the publish (because it is already published) no notification is sent. Not intuitive for instructors who are thinking you have a notify box on the page settings for a reason and if you don't check that box then one would assume no notification is sent. This caused confusion for a student and faculty member who was trying to change some content in a huge lab class. I just want to know exactly what the behavior is supposed to be so I can inform them what triggers a notification when they actually can't control the students setting for their own course notifications.

[Andreas_Hopf]

1. Published Page or Assignment
2. Keep it published
3. Then I make changes
4. I do not tick "Notify users that this content has changed"
5. I click "Save" and do nothing else

Then the students get no notification?

[KathyHayes]

"

1. Published Page or Assignment
2. Keep it published
3. Then I make changes
4. I do not tick "Notify users that this content has changed"
5. I click "Save" and do nothing else

Then the students get no notification?"  Correct...at least in our case. And to clarify, only the students who have notifications set in their profile for page changes have gotten a notification.

[Andreas_Hopf]

Then you're lucky. Our students get notifications no matter what. Like any good CMS, it should be simple: Unpublish. Make changes. Republish. No notifications - unless explicitly desired.