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Moodle 3 Administration, Third Edition

Moodle 3 Administration, Third Edition

By : Büchner
3.9 (9)
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Moodle 3 Administration, Third Edition

Moodle 3 Administration, Third Edition

3.9 (9)
By: Büchner

Overview of this book

Moodle is the de facto standard for open source learning platforms. However, setting up and managing a learning environment can be a complex task since it covers a wide range of technical, organizational, and pedagogical topics. This ranges from basic user and course management, to configuring plugins and design elements, all the way to system settings, performance optimization, events frameworks, and so on. This book concentrates on basic tasks such as how to set up and configure Moodle and how to perform day-to-day administration activities, and progresses on to more advanced topics that show you how to customize and extend Moodle, manage courses, cohorts, and users, and how to work with roles and capabilities. You’ll learn to configure Moodle plugins and ensure your VLE conforms to pedagogical and technical requirements in your organization. You’ll then learn how to integrate the VLE via web services and network it with other sites, including Mahara, and extend your system via plugins and LTI. By the end of this book, you will be able to set up an efficient, fully fledged, and secure Moodle system.
Table of Contents (19 chapters)
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Preface
Preface
What this book covers
What you need for this book
Who this book is for
Conventions
Reader feedback
Customer support
Free Chapter
1
1. Moodle Installation
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1. Moodle Installation
Moodle installation – an overview
Installation in a LAMP environment
Installation in a Windows environment
Installation in a Mac OS X environment
Installation via the Command Line Interface
Updating Moodle
Summary
2
2. The Moodle System
2. The Moodle System
Moodle architecture
Finding your way around in Moodle
File management
Summary
3
3. Courses, Users, and Roles
3. Courses, Users, and Roles
A high-level overview
Moodle courses
Moodle users
Moodle roles
Summary
4
4. Course Management
4. Course Management
Course categories
Creating courses
Forms of enrolment
Summary
5
5. User Management
5. User Management
User profiles
Standard user actions
Manual accounts
Cohorts
User authentication
Usernames – best practice
Summary
6
6. Managing Permissions – Roles and Capabilities
6. Managing Permissions – Roles and Capabilities
Moodle predefined roles
Contexts
Assigning roles
Capabilities
Roles management
Summary
7
7. Moodle Look and Feel
7. Moodle Look and Feel
An overview of the look and feel
Site versus Dashboard
Customizing your front page
Moodle themes
The Moodle editor
Accessibility
Summary
8
8. Moodle Plugins
8. Moodle Plugins
Plugins – an overview
Module plugins
Moodle repositories
Moodle portfolios
Miscellaneous plugins
Installing third-party plugins
Good add-ons and bad add-ons
Summary
9
9. Moodle Configuration
9. Moodle Configuration
Collaboration
Configuring and managing badges
Supporting the LTI consumers and producers
Localization
Grades and gradebook settings
Miscellaneous educational settings
Communication
Experimental settings
Summary
10
10. Moodle Logging and Reporting
10. Moodle Logging and Reporting
Moodle's logging framework
An overview of reporting
Moodle's reporting facilities
Statistics
Report generation
Data analysis
Miscellaneous reports
Summary
11
11. Moodle Security and Privacy
11. Moodle Security and Privacy
Security – an overview
Security notifications
User security
Data and content security
System security
Moodle privacy
Summary
12
12. Moodle Performance and Optimization
12. Moodle Performance and Optimization
An overview of performance and optimization
The Moodle content
Moodle Universal Cache
The Moodle system settings
Moodle performance profiling and monitoring
Summary
13
13. Backup and Restore
13. Backup and Restore
The course-level backup and restore
Site-level backups
System-level backups
Uses of backup and restore
Summary
14
14. Moodle Admin Tools
14. Moodle Admin Tools
Web-based admin tools
Command Line Interface (CLI)
Moosh – the Moodle shell
Moodle Adminer
Summary
15
15. Moodle Integration
15. Moodle Integration
Web services overview
Web services in Moodle
Enabling web services for external systems
Enabling web services for users
The Moodle mobile web service
Summary
16
16. Moodle Networking
16. Moodle Networking
Networking overview
Networking prerequisites and security
Peer-to-peer networks
Moodle hubs
Integrating Mahara or Totara Social
The Moodle Community Hub (Moodle.net)
Summary
17
A. Configuration Settings
A. Configuration Settings
Configuration reference: an overview
Configuration reference: administration settings
Configuration reference: system settings
18
Index
Index

Installation in a Windows environment

XAMPP is a free Apache distribution that contains MySQL and PHP (as well as Perl) and exists for a number of operating systems. The Moodle distribution for Windows makes full use of XAMPP and is located at https://download.moodle.org/windows. The installation works on all the latest Windows PCs and server variants.

The XAMPP-based Moodle distribution is only suitable for servers with a small number of users. For larger Windows installations, you have to install Moodle manually. This involves installing a database server (MS SQL or any other support system), a web server (Microsoft IIS or Apache), and PHP, separately. You can find details about this process at https://docs.moodle.org/en/Windows_installation.

Once downloaded, follow these ensuring steps:

  1. Copy the distribution to a folder on your PC and unzip the archive in your folder of choice.
  2. Make sure any software that uses port 80 (such as Skype) is not running, or change its settings to point it to an alternative port.
  3. Double-click on StartMoodle.exe.
  4. If you have a firewall installed, allow any shown services to be executed.

  5. The XAMPP service will run in the Windows background.
  6. Go to your web browser and enter http://localhost to your address bar.
  7. You will see the same installer being launched as the one described for the LAMP environment. All values have already been populated; all you have to do is navigate through all the screens until you see the familiar Setup administrator account. This process will take a few minutes.
  8. Enter the administrator details and select Update profile.
  9. Enter the Front Page settings for your site.
  10. Check that no warnings are displayed in the Notifications section of the Site administration area in the Settings block.

That's it! Your Moodle system is now up and running and you are now able to use Moodle locally or from a web browser on another machine as long as your IP address is accessible via the network you are on.

To stop using Moodle, double-click on StopMoodle.exe. If you have a firewall installed, you might have to allow the program to be executed.

Instead of starting and stopping Moodle manually, you can start Apache and MySQL automatically as Windows services. In the server directory of your Moodle system, you find an executable called service.exe, which you have to run with the -install parameter as administrator, as in the following example:

C:/moodle/server/service.exe -install
End of Section 4
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