Large Subaccount Restructures

[rtoon]

Does anybody have experience with using SIS feeds to reorganize our subaccount structures? I'm looking at some very big top-down changes in our system. From testing on beta as well as production servers with small sample sizes, I've noticed the feed displays as taking quite a long time to process. We have tens of thousands of classes easily, and practically all of them would be impacted although the changes themselves are pretty simple (consolidating subaccounts under a new parent account, etc.)

Has anyone ever experienced any kind of data loss or interruption of access during the processing of such a feed? Should I make sure to schedule it for an extended downtime period? I'm worried about things like subaccounts moving while users are working in a given class or account.

[brian_mullins · Accepted solution]

Rtoon,

I did a large reorg similar to this a few years ago to get our account structure into the structure described in this post:

https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Canvas-Admin-Blog/A-bit-about-account-structure/ba-p/545557

The reorg was very easy, but I do recall that it took quite a while for the system to ingest. 

Since the account id does not play a part in the URL to the course or its content, you should not see any issues accessing courses. 

I would, however, be very sure that any LTI's that are connected at a sub-account level, as opposed to in the root account, are set up in the new 'destination' accounts. Same with your sub-account admins, make sure they are set up in the destination sub-accounts.

Thanks,

Brian

[KeriSalyards]

Hi rtoon,

I completed a huge reorganization like this in my own instance just last year. We too had THOUSANDS of classes that needed to be reorganized into subaccounts. I did it during the summer when there were relatively few classes running, just to make sure I wasn't going to derail things during the busiest time, and I'm happy to report that it went off without a hitch. I still have to manually move new courses into their subaccounts at the beginning of every semester (a few hundred courses at a time), and the process has never adversely affected an instructor. It only takes a few seconds for the CSV to upload and the changes to process. 

[brian_mullins · Accepted solution]

Rtoon,

I did a large reorg similar to this a few years ago to get our account structure into the structure described in this post:

https://community.canvaslms.com/t5/Canvas-Admin-Blog/A-bit-about-account-structure/ba-p/545557

The reorg was very easy, but I do recall that it took quite a while for the system to ingest. 

Since the account id does not play a part in the URL to the course or its content, you should not see any issues accessing courses. 

I would, however, be very sure that any LTI's that are connected at a sub-account level, as opposed to in the root account, are set up in the new 'destination' accounts. Same with your sub-account admins, make sure they are set up in the destination sub-accounts.

Thanks,

Brian

[melodyc_lam · Accepted solution]

Chiming in with my experiences --

Definitely agree with @brian_mullins and making sure LTIs and subaccount admins are checked.

I work at a large K12 with about 184 subaccounts (and their courses) that need to move into parents based on their school's grade levels (high, middle, elementary) and had to do this after our rollover in the summer.

Two things to take note:

1) If you do have another system that impacts account structures, like a SIS -- make sure that "process as UI changes" is enabled so that your work isn't undone. (Ask me how I know. 😆)

2) Through the UI you can only do one SIS import at a time. If you use the API you can "load" other SIS imports (this is how I could do an account re-structure then blueprint courses)

I always suggest the following with SIS imports:

1) Test in your beta instance first to see if the structure is correct!

2) Do SIS imports during a downtime to minimize any impact.

Hope this helps!