[Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Wed Oct 3 15:27:40 BST 2012

Hi Simon

good point - I guess that's a real advantage in that if a teacher with
moodle course and XOT access has the relevant details they can still add an
XOT resource even if the Moodle admin hasn't set-up the specific external
tool.

Cheers

Ron

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Simon Atack
Sent: 03 October 2012 15:17
To: For Xerte technical developers
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Ron,

I have updated the documentation as suggested.  As this is a landing page to
lti then the documentation on the moodle page makes sense.

If you put the full url into the url box on the specific instance then you
would get to the correct place.  This means that if Xerte hasn't been setup
in moodle it can still be used you would just enter the information that you
entered under site administration on that specific instance.

Simon

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Ron Mitchell
Sent: 03 October 2012 14:56
To: 'For Xerte technical developers'
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Hi Simon

thanks the key difference was that tick box to 'show tool type when creating
tool instances'

With that ticked there's no need to add a url when adding an external tool
activity as long as the correct external tool is selected from the drop
down. Without it ticked it just goes to the login page. I hadn't ticked that
originally because the moodle help says:

In most cases, this option does not need to be selected. Teachers can use
this tool configuration based on the Launch URL matching the Tool base URL,
which is the preferred method. The only case in which this option should be
selected is if the tool configuration is just intended for single sign on.
For example, if all launches to the tool provider just take the user to a
landing page instead of to a specific resource.

If this is correct perhaps needs adding to the quick documentation?

Cheers

Ron

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Simon Atack
Sent: 03 October 2012 13:56
To: For Xerte technical developers
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Ron,

I think you haven't set up your moodle correctly.  You can have it so moodle
is set only once with the Xerte Object  under the LTI Administration[under
site administration] (I have included a screenshot from mine) once this is
set and the tick box below the custom parameters box is ticked then this
will show up in the usual adding a new external tool, type in an activity
Name then in the drop down box for external tool type choose the name you
gave the  object under the site administration don't enter anything into the
launch url and just click save and display.  This then means you just select
the external tool from the drop down XOT in your case, it suggest the XOT
hasn't been setup as I have said above, there is no reason to additionally
enter the url below this.

There is currently no support to create accounts in the lti additions,  All
I do is call the authentication mechanism.  For LDAP it will add users into
the logindetails table, for others  I believe you would have to add code to
the authentication mechanism so that it could add to itself etc 

Simon

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Julian Tenney
Sent: 03 October 2012 12:17
To: For Xerte technical developers
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

> In my new features slot on the 10th ok if I mention this and suggest
delegates speak to you if they have any questions?

Please do! I'll make a fresh zip, 1.81, the LTI release.

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Ron Mitchell
Sent: 03 October 2012 12:08
To: 'For Xerte technical developers'
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Hi Simon

thanks for the screenshots - very useful. All working well now! :-)

I had added the /lti/ when configuring via admin > plugins > activity
modules > external tool but I hadn't added a url or a url with /lti/ in the
end when adding an external tool activity to a course. Now that I've done
that it works great. It seems a shame that the Moodle settings can't
automatically pick up the correct url by selecting the name of the external
tool. e.g. If I select XOT as shown in the screenshot (the name I gave to
the external tool via admin) I still have to add the url with /lti/ appended
for the selection of an LO to work otherwise it just takes me to the
standard login screen. Not a problem for me but I can see it being a problem
where users just put what they know to be the installation url, or no url at
all, rather than knowing or remembering to add /lti/. I know this is more a
moodle limitation rather than any kind of limitation of what you've
developed which is great! 

I guess once users know what to do via a guide or something then they should
remember and I guess in an institution it would be worth customising the
help for the external resource activity to show what url to add.

I can see awareness of LTI growing quickly over the next couple of years
especially where Moodle is used as the VLE. Does the functionality exist in
what you have developed to automatically create accounts from the consumer
e.g. if the XOT db was used to store accounts? I'm guessing not at the
moment but I could see that being very useful for OER collaborative projects
etc.

Great stuff!

In my new features slot on the 10th ok if I mention this and suggest
delegates speak to you if they have any questions?

Cheers

Ron

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Simon Atack
Sent: 03 October 2012 11:08
To: For Xerte technical developers
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Ron,

Sorry about not mentioning to run upgrade.php I assumed (wrongly!) that
standard practice would be to run each time when upgrading code.

It should work with all the authentication methods, I had only used it
against LDAP. I have just switched to static as authentication and gone
through it and it appears to work as Id expect.  

The steps will be (I have attached screen grabs to compare to)

1st you should get a login asking for username/password ( this will only
appear once) [Xerte-lti-1.png]

2nd you should get a screen with instructions on the left and list of
projects in the right with a select button at the bottom [Xerte-lti-2.png]
an empty workspace & [Xerte-lti-3.png] for workspace with some content.

The obvious thing I can think of is you didn't put the correct url into the
Tool Base URL,  it should be the usual Xerte url with the addition of /LTI/
on the end as only this URL is configured to accept the LTI link 

Simon

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Ron Mitchell
Sent: 03 October 2012 10:10
To: 'For Xerte technical developers'
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: LTI Provider

Hi Simon

thought I'd have a go at testing this for you but may be misunderstanding
how it works. Firstly will it only work with XOT configured for LDAP or
should it also work if XOT is set to static authentication?

Results of tests so far:

1. Realised I had to run upgrade.php to create the lti table - this worked
fine.

2. Adding a key and secret via management.php also worked fine.

3. Configuring the Moodle external tool via admin > manage plugins etc also
worked fine 

4. Adding an external tool activity to a course and selecting save and
display simply launches the XOT login page and upon login shows the
workspace e.g. there isn't an option to select a specific LO for the link.
Is this because it won't work with static authentication or am I missing
something?

HTH

Ron

From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
[mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Simon Atack
Sent: 02 October 2012 17:14
To: xerte-dev at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
Subject: [Xerte-dev] LTI Provider

First thank you all for the welcome.

Yesterday I submitted to svn the LTI Provider integration function I have
been working on.  This allow you to have launch Xerte from within a VLE
giving single sign on etc (In moodle this is the External Tool activity
plugin).  

It handles the association between the LTI userid & the Xerte username (and
allows regular re-authentication) and then if staff lets you select the
project you want to associate the link with, and then displays the project
for subsequent launches of the link.  It also includes LTI Key/Secret
Management in the main Xerte management interface.

I have tested it myself on my local box with a fresh install of Xerte
(configured for LDAP authentication) and Moodle 2.2.2+.  I have tried to
keep the changes as few as possible to integrate it in (I have extended a
couple of functions to support extra parameters as well as factoring some
repeated lines into functions so there is only 1 copy doing anything).  It
would be really useful if others could download it,  test it out and give
feedback.  

There is a very brief documentation file LTI Documentation.txt included with
a brief note of what you need to do, anyone having problems/or trouble
understanding how to get it working please get it touch.

The LTI library is based off the IMS sample code for LTI in php and extended
by UoN and has been used in the Rogo OSS project.

Thanks

Simon

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