Allow Admins to hide Course Menu Bar Items by Default

(17)
Many instructors get overwhelmed by the options available in the menu bars of their classes.  As administrators, we would like the ability to hide designated menu items by default, by subaccount.

 

Because many of our instructors don't use certain tools, like Attendance, Outcomes, Conferences, or Collaborations, this change would make a cleaner experience for the instructor.

 

Use case:

  • Admins could hide by default select items on the menu, by subaccount.
  • Hidden items would appear under the "Drag items here to hide them from students." area. 
  • Hidden items would not appear as "greyed" out on the menu.
  • Instructors could unhide items by going to Settings/Navigation and moving the item up to the navigation.

 

Below is a typical menu for us and an example of a nice short menu that we could cultivate.

183532_Screen Shot 2016-05-10 at 11.30.56 AM.pngScreen Shot 2016-05-10 at 11.30.56 AM.png183587_Screen Shot 2016-05-10 at 11.32.49 AM.pngScreen Shot 2016-05-10 at 11.32.49 AM.png

20 Comments
Renee_Carney
Community Team
Community Team

Thank you for submitting this feature idea!  Learn more about the feature idea process and how to champion your idea!

Your feature idea will be open for vote from Wed. March 2, 2016 - Wed. June 1, 2016! Smiley Wink

Renee_Carney
Community Team
Community Team

This idea has moved to the next stage and will be open for voting among the Canvas Community, from Wed. March 2, 2016 - Wed. June 1, 2016.

Check out this doc for additional details about how the voting process works!

japarodi
Community Novice

We are new Canvas customers and I would love to be able to set a default menu that fits our district. Sub-Account level customization would also be preffered as we would have Elementary, Middle, and High school settings differ.

Chris_Hofer
Community Coach
Community Coach

If I am understanding this Feature Request correctly...maybe a temporary work-around would be to use Canvas Commons.  (From your screen shot, it doesn't look like Commons is enabled at your school, but you could talk with your CSM to have it turned on.)  A co-worker and I have a course in Canvas we use as a template.  It has some very bare-bones content in it, and it also has a left navigation menu order that we use.  We shared this entire template course to Canvas Commons (just so people at our school can see it).  When my co-worker and I build new courses, we go to Commons and import the template into our new course shell, and the left menu is imported exactly how we wanted it.  Maybe you'd be able to do something similar at your school until your idea is developed by Instructure?  Just a thought/suggestion.

arovner
Community Contributor

This is a great feature request!  We too have a very long default menu and would love to make more of the buttons "opt in" vs the current "opt out" system.  By default, students would have a more streamlined and user-friendly experience.

Thanks for posting!

Amy

DaleDrees
Community Champion

Great idea nuroark​!!!

jcombs
Community Novice

I agree with the navigation request......and would add on that Admin and/or Teachers also need to be able to control the Menu bar in the Groups.

Our students are super confused when all of those options pop up that they've never seen before - and we don't actually support them either.

John_Lowe
Community Champion

Welcome to the 100+ club, nuroark​!! I can't wait to see how both of our ideas come out of the review process this week!  Best of luck!!

mcsmith
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

We are currently researching a bigger project that could involve cleaning up the menu bar for instructors and students. We do not have a timeline quite yet. However, it wont be in the 6 months so this idea will be archived.

Renee_Carney
Community Team
Community Team
  Idea is currently in Product Radar Learn more about this stage...
emily_renoe
Community Member

Hi there!  great suggestions. I tried this and works like a charm.... the only thing is the Course Image does not come with the import... and thoughts? 

Chris_Hofer
Community Coach
Community Coach

Hi  @emily_renoe ‌...

I'm not too sure on that one.  You may need to contact Canvas tech support to report this as a possible bug ... if you are sure that there was a course image included in the course to begin with.  I seem to recall someone saying a long time ago that the Course Image does not carry over from an import, but I could be wrong...or that may have changed since then.  I looked at How do I add an image to a course card in the Dashboard?, but I couldn't find anything to help answer the question.

Renee_Carney
Community Team
Community Team

The Radar idea stage has been removed from the Feature Idea Process.  You can read more about why in the blog post Adaptation: Feature Idea Process Changes.

 

This change will only impact the stage sort of this idea and will not change how it is voted on or how it is considered during prioritization activities.  This change will streamline the list of ideas 'open for voting', making it easier for you to see the true top voted ideas in one sort, here.

teststudent
Community Participant

I LOVE this idea and would hope that it would extend to all navigation menu items...I'd like to be able to add a link to the navigation menu defaulted to DISABLED. We often want to make items/apps/links available to teachers in the Navigation pane IF they want to use them...but at this time when I add an app/link at the account/subaccount level it automatically is added as an active navigation menu item to all classes in the whole system - this is NOT what we want!

teststudent
Community Participant

To further clarify, when you Add App, there should be an option to add it as enabled or disabled by default!

brett_g_dalton
Community Novice

For ref, this can be done by custom XML or using the API but these are not practical solutions for 95% of users.  The ability to control some low risk LTI settings would be good especially as with LTI 1.3 some of the custom XML work etc may not be possible

cesbrandt
Community Champion

I fully support this idea (I voted for it a few years back), but given all the configurable functionality I decided to make an expanded version of this idea: https://community.canvaslms.com/ideas/16740-default-course-configuration 

jbasham
Community Member

At SSCC we are now using DesignPlus with the new required course template. This allows us to streamline the navigation flow in our courses all from the home page that links directly to our modules with clear concise links on one page. Could a future enhancement allow us to hide the Module navigation tool so that students can only see the modules thru our home page DesignPlus page rather than having two separate areas? It would be like the Discussion tool. We can hide the Discussion course navigational tool and yet students are still able to access the Discussion tool by having the discussion in our modules. We would like to see that very same feature available for Modules as it is for Announcements and Discussions. Currently, we don't have to have the Discussion navigation to allow students to access discussions through the modules or the Announcement navigation tool to allow students to access announcements if we have them reflected on their home page. I would like to see that same feature added to the Modules navigational too to hide the visibility of the tool. I am a designer and instructor. 

meierj
Community Member

I agree! Many of our faculty don't use certain tools, like Attendance, Outcomes, Conferences, or Collaborations. This change would make for a much cleaner course shell! 

ProductPanda
Instructure
Instructure
Status changed to: Archived
Comments from Instructure

As part of the new Ideas & Themes process, all ideas in Idea Conversations were reviewed by the Product Team. Any Idea that was associated with an identified theme was moved to the new Idea & Themes space. Any Idea that was not part of the move is being marked as Archived. This will preserve the history of the conversations while also letting Community members know that Instructure will not explore the request at this time.