creating/adding a new field of info for a user.

[MoatazKhan12]

is it possible to create a new seperate field in user info?
I want to create separate fields for department classification (in my customer's case there are departments, junior colleges, first term, and second term) and department names (addition of input items other than the existing items).

Then, those fields can be viewed in the Account settings or in the Admin page in 'people'.

[chriscas · Accepted solution]

Hi @MoatazKhan12,

To expand on what @mzimmerman said, there is no way to do what you're asking in the Canvas UI.  There is a custom user data API available, but you'd need to use that API to set the data and also use the API to pull data back out.  If you have a developer at your school, you might be able to have then create some custom javascript to display the data on the profile page, and maybe even find a easy(ish) way to enter the data somewhere too, but it's not trivial work so just know that going into such a project.

-Chris

[MoatazKhan12]

@chriscas @mzimmerman Thank you very much for the helpful insights. There isn't any developers who are free for the next 5 weeks, so I would like to give it a try it at least. How would you recommend me to go about this using the custom user data API ? 
Any good starting points or specific video or article that can be a good guide to follow? 
I would like to create a new field to add to the user info. in the profile page, but I might also want to add this field to the 'People' page under Admin as well. Do you think that would be possible? 

Thank you again for the support. 

[chriscas]

Hi @MoatazKhan12,

I have not used that particular API, nor have I done anything this ambitious myself in terms of customizations.  I don't want to discourage you from looking around and trying some things, but I think this is actually a pretty complex customization, especially if you want the users to enter the info themselves form with in Canvas.   Something else to consider is how this would work with mobile apps, as the same customizations that apply to the web version of Canvas will not generally apply to the mobile app.  Because of the uniqueness and complexity of these things, I don't think there is any real good guide to point you to.  I will move this post to the developers area where someone else might chime in.  I know @James has done a lot of what I think are called "Canvancements" in the past, but I'm not sure how much of that kind of work he still does or if he might have any pointers for you.

I wish you luck on this for sure!

-Chris

[MoatazKhan12]

@chriscas Thank you again for all the help and support. Hopefully James can point me out in the right direction.