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What is “In-context discussions” (v1.7)?
Milestone v1.7 primarily consists of two improvements: Discussions sidebar and New discussions topic structure.
Discussions sidebar
Users will be able to see and interact with discussions corresponding to a course Unit, along side the Unit in a collapsable side-bar, when they navigate to that course Unit.
This setup assumes a 1:1 mapping between course Units and discussion topics, something that the legacy experience does not enforce. Therefore, a new discussions topic structure is introduced (details below).
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New discussions topic structure
In legacy discussions experience, course authors can create course-wide discussion topics (details) and content-specific discussion topics (details). Content-specific discussion topics are created using discussion Xblocks (details). A 2 level hierarchy of these discussions Xblocks is created using the Category and Subcategory property of the discussion topic.
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Each course Unit has AT MOST 1 content-specific discussion topic associated with it.
Each content-specific discussion topic has EXACTLY 1 course Unit associated with it.
These discussion topics and their associations are automatically created for all units in the course upon migration.
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Course teams will have the option to skip discussion topics for graded units.
Rollout decisions
What will the rollout look like?
Rollout will be done in 2 phases:
In phase 1, all new courses will be configured to use new 1.7 by default. For all running courses, migration will automatically happen at re-run mark.
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We only plan to rollout in-context discussions for new courses and re-runs.
New courses:
All new courses will use the new discussion provider by default.
Once the course or a unit is published, “the script” will run and create discussion topics.
Course re-runs:
Re-run of a course will use the new discussion provider by default.
Once re-run has been created, “the script” will run and create discussion topics, with following rules:
For unit without a discussion xblock, a new topic will be created and linked with the course unit.
For unit having EXACTLY ONE discussion xblock, topic for that xblock will be linked with the course unit.
For unit having multiple discussion xblocks, topic for the top most xblock when viewed in studio, will be linked with the course unit. Rest of the xblocks in this unit will be ignored.
A banner will show up in studio saying something like “Hey we’ve migrated discussions over to the new topic structure. Learn more about it here.” For course re-runs having
complexity in xblock mappingignored xblocks, the banner will additionally say: “Here’s a list of discussions xblocks in the course that did not make it to the new discussions hierarchy. Learn more here.”
How do we show the list on banner? It could be a long list?
Should the banner be time bound or should it disappear upon
In phase 2, running courses will be migrated upon request from the course team.
This is kept optional because running courses will contain threads in discussion xblocks. Theoretically we can connect “topics” (cs_comment_service lingo) in existing discussions xblocks to course Units. But it becomes complex when a Unit has more than one discussions xblock or one xblock is referenced in multiple Units. A mechanism for this migration is yet to be developed.
Other questions
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What happens to Xblocks?
Courses that switch to v1.7 will no longer have the option to add new xblocks.
Existing xblocks will be visible but “collapsed” by default. “Expanding” the xblock will open discussions in the side, instead of rendering in the xblock itself.
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What would be the names of discussion topics that will be automatically created for course units in 1.7?
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Running courses:
We do not plan to migrate running courses to avoid complexities associated with discussions threads.
Once a course using new provider has been started:
If a new unit is published, a new topic will be created be automatically created and linked to that unit.
If the newly published unit contains an xblock, that xblock will be ignored.
What happens to xblocks in courses using new provider?
All xblocks will appear in collapsed state, as seen below.
For xblocks whose topic ID has been linked to course unit, “Show Discussion” button will open the topic in discussions sidebar,
For xblocks whose topic ID has NOT been linked to course unit, “Show Discussion” button will be inactive (greyed-out). There will be no way to access that discussion xblock.
What happens when an xblock is deleted, whose topic id has been linked to course unit?
Can we stop showing option to add xblocks in courses using the new provider?