[ARCHIVED] Import from Commons button placement?

[Jeff_F]

Hello - Canvas Commons was recently enabled on our system and we observed that an Import from Commons button is  now visible on the course Home page above the To Do list.

Would this button be better positioned under Settings, next to the other existing Import Content button? I reason teachers set up the course ahead of time and would benefit by not having such an unneeded button on the course Home page.

I suppose CSS could be used to hide the button where it isn't needed.

[shanaegalloway]

I agree with you, Jeff. Even I, when training faculty, have gone to Settings looking for the Import from Commons button only to remember that I need to go to the Home page to import content from Commons.

[Jeff_F]

Thanks for the validation.

I understand the intent may be to place the button on the Home page where it is seen and thus more likely to be used, however my Vulcan logic is telling me this placement simply does not compute.

[Jeff_F]

We've now hidden the Buttons for Commons on the course Home and Settings pages for a particular subaccount.  And we also selectively hid the Commons button on the left menu for when instructors are accessing a course within that subaccount.

And today I found additional buttons to 'Share to Commons' within Assignment, Module pages, and Quizzes.  Guess we are back to hiding more buttons tomorrow.

As this is so tightly integrated I would love to see the ability to enable/ disable this tool at the subaccount level.  I feel like we are playing whack-a-mole.

[Jeff_F]

<Grumble>  

It happened.  Though we tried to hide all the Commons links an instructor found a way to import a Commons course into all his live courses.  All of them.  And students were completing assignments unnecessarily.

</Grumble>

[kenneth_rogers]

Hi there,  @Jeff_F !

I'm running through some old questions and checking in on everyone and wondered how you were doing. It looks like it's been a bit over a year since you last gave us an update on how Commons were (or were not) working at your institution and we'd love to hear back from you.

Were you able to get things working a little smoother without having to play whack a mole? Or is this still a pain in your side?

[Jeff_F]

Hello Kenneth. We have it set up so everything to do with Commons is hidden for one of our major parent subaccounts.  However, we do not have a means to hide the button on the left menu when faculty are using the Dashboard, Calendar, etc.  To date, that has resulted in a handful of 'bad imports' requiring manual corrections.

This summarizes what we are hiding using CSS / Java - 

1. Hide "Delete This Course" button
2. Hide "Conclude this Course" button
3. Hide "Reset This Course" button
4. Hide "Course Status" switch (Show for Admins) i.e. publish course toggle
5. Hide "Choose Home Page" button (Show for Admins)
6. Hide Course Setup reminder
7. Hide "Course Setup Checklist" button (wizard overlay)
8. Hide "Commons" icon / button on Canvas left navigation menu
9. Hide "Share to Commons" button (Settings page)
10. Hide "Import from Commons" button (course home page)
11. Hide "Share to Commons" option in various dropdowns (found on Discussions, Modules, Pages, and so forth; usually the last option)

[kenneth_rogers]

Sorry to hear you are still having issues,  @Jeff_F . I did a quick search through the Community and couldn't find anyone else with the same question, but I did find where someone was attempting to hide their manually created items in a subaccount (Sub-Accounts and JavaScript). I wonder if that will help out and you could deconstruct her code (granted I don't know the code for Commons to place in there).

In the meantime, I'm also going to share this with the Canvas Developers‌ group to get some extra eyes on it and see what they say.

I do feel the need to warn you about the possibility of headaches when you use CSS/js in Canvas though. I'm sure you're aware of them, but with each release there's the possibility of things breaking or code no longer being supported (depending on exactly what you're using). Like I said, I'm sure you're aware since you've already gone down this path, and you certainly have a great use case, but I would hate for this to work one day for you and not the next.

[Jeff_F]

Sorry I wasn't clear:  our approach is working perfectly fine for the most part.  Minus not having 'control' over the left global nav menu.

[kenneth_rogers]

Well, Jeff, in your defense, I also haven't had all of my coffee yet

I'm going to go ahead and mark this as "Assumed Answered" since it's not totally answered. This won't prevent further dialogue in the event someone comes along with an amazing idea to give you control over the global nav.