August 2022 Product Update

Frost Admin

LTI 1.1 Deep Linking

By default, LTI 1.1 Tool providers configured earlier pointed to a particular resource. With this improvement, tool providers that use LTI 1.1 to launch their resource selectors will now be supported. 

 

Course Delivery Settings for Tenant

In the Tenant Configuration page, a new section called “Course Delivery Settings” has been added. This section contains settings which can be done by the Superadmin and Tenant Admin for course delivery from Frost.

 

Kaltura Media Gallery Configuration

In Designer settings, there is a section called “Libraries” under which the user will find the “Kaltura Media Gallery” option. Turning the slider “On” will now display an input area to add the Kaltura Media Gallery URL. If any value is provided in this space and saved, all courses in Designer will show “Kaltura Media Gallery” as an option in the outline menu.

 

Improved Export Configuration for Tenant

The Tenant admin can choose the export type to be shown to the user under “Course Delivery Settings”in edit mode. If nothing is selected, the Export button will not show up at a course level. 

A new setting “Canvas LTI Export as native pages” introduced in Tenant Configuration under Designer will control the display of an additional checkbox in Designer when Canvas LTI export is chosen.

 

Tenant Configuration for Course Duplicate 

Duplicating Global Resources introduced in Tenant Configuration under settings is now available for superadmins as well as tenant admins to configure at a tenant level. It contains 3 choices:

  • Retain Global Resource: If this option is selected, the system generates the exact duplicate of the source course and keeps the LOR, QuAD, Vimeo, Kaltura references central. 
  • Convert to Local Resource: Global resources get converted to local resources. It is no longer reusable or able to receive updates. If this option is selected, the system removes the reference links connected to LOR, except for the reference links connected to objects from external applications like QuAD, Vimeo, and Kaltura. 
  • Ask me Everytime: Displays a pop-up to select between Retain Global Resources or Convert to Local Resources before duplicating the course. By default, the “Ask me Everytime”is selected for existing or new tenants. 

 

Frost Designer

 

Export Canvas LTI as Native Canvas Pages

Users can now choose to export all the content pages from Frost Designer as native Canvas pages with the new export type configuration for Canvas LTI exports. Based on configuration done in Admin, a checkbox will be displayed when the user chooses Canvas LTI exports.

If checked, in the Canvas LTI export, all the content pages will export as native Canvas pages ie. they will have their own edit buttons in Canvas.

Support of Point and Point Range Rubrics

Point and Point Range rubrics are now supported for authoring in Designer. The user can now associate these two types of rubrics to assignments. Point and Point Range rubric support is available in Canvas LTI Export and Deep Publish.

Deep Publish Enhancements

The URL of any course which is deep published in Canvas will be shown to the user in the Publish log. Additional settings have been added in deep publish, enabling users to render content pages, assessment descriptions, assignment descriptions, forum descriptions and questions inside assessments. The user can additionally choose to deep publish the package as an LTI 1.1 or an LTI 1.3 package.

 

New Authoring Experience

The New Editor is integrated into Frost Designer with the goal of assisting users in making better use of the Editor. It offers several feature enhancements, simpler navigation, and an improved user experience. The following are some of the noteworthy authoring experiences that have been incorporated into the New Editor:

 

Add Root Folder

By selecting the “Add Folder” icon from the top menu in Outline view, users can add a root folder directly. The folder is inserted just before the glossary node.

 

Easy Switch Between Different Views 

Users can easily switch between Outline, Author, and Preview mode. Outline mode is for users who want to just focus on building the Outline. Author mode will display  the Editor with the Outline. This is for users who want to focus on authoring content. Preview mode displays the Preview of authored content along with the Outline.

 

One Preview Mode 

This new feature smartly switches between showing saved as well as draft content. If the system finds that there are unsaved changes, it will show a “Save” button. The user is prompted to save the changes if they move away from the active node in authoring or preview modes.

 

Left Panel for Widgets & Outline in Authoring 

The left panel in Authoring is enabled with 2 tabs – Outline and Widgets & Patterns. Using the icons, the author can easily switch between authoring content by using the widgets & patterns, or managing the outline.

 

Easy Access to Create Outline From Author Mode

Author mode offers access to the same actions that are available from the Outline. To add new nodes or update existing ones, authors do not need to return to the outline. Add Node, Edit Node, Add Metadata, Delete Node, Lock or Unlock Node, Comment, and Node Status are the actions that are accessible based on user permission from the author mode. 

Collapsible Left Panel

In the Author & Preview mode, the left panel can be collapsed to make more room for the Editor and content preview for a better authoring experience.

 

Assessments, Assignments and Forums Authoring Improvements

The Editor can be used to directly update existing Assignments, Assessments, and Forum in the Author mode.

 

Centralized Commenting Component 

The UIX for commenting is available in the Author and Preview mode for all node types. Authors can now tag content in case of content pages and for other node types. Comments are saved as node level comments. For users without access to the Author mode, Preview mode will act as Review mode where they can review content authored in Outline and add comments.

 

Improved Widget Authoring

Widget authoring now has a better UIX. The UI is improved with adjustments like:

  • Label icon is moved together with the Label.
  • Select Asset does not have a big placeholder till an asset is actually added.
  • Character limit counter is introduced  for Label & Alt Text fields.

 

New Widget : Content Fragment

Content Fragments are a new object type in LOR. These are typically patterns which can be embedded in content, with the exception that these can be updated globally at all places where it is reused (Designer or LMS)  by updating it in LOR. To embed a created content fragment from LOR, a new widget called “Content Fragment” is enabled in Designer. It’s like embedding a content page within a content page.

 

New Widget : External Tool 

A new widget called External Tool has been added. This lets authors embed an external tool in content pages. 

New Pattern : Youtube Video

Just like Vimeo and Kaltura, the user has an option to add Youtube video while authoring content in Designer. The user can reuse a youtube video from LOR or add the Video link directly in Designer.

Preview Component for Widgets 

Widgets now load in a component instead of iframe causing them to load faster and steer clear of scrolls in case of lengthy content.

Add Documents Inside Gadgets

PDF documents can now be embedded inside Gadgets. The PDFs can be picked up from LOR or the local repository.

 

Frost LOR (Learning Object Repository)

 

New Object : Content Fragment

Content Fragments can be created and authored  in LOR. It is now part of the content screen, which the user can reuse across multiple pages or multiple courses. Contents fragments can only be edited in the LOR. A user will be able to create, edit, delete or download a content fragment in LOR subject to permissions. 

Alt Text Support In Import

A new column to add Alt text for images is now available on the sample spreadsheet for Bulk Import & Bulk Import from S3. If Alt text is added for an image in the column  “Img Alt text” of this spreadsheet, the same will be imported / updated for the image in the LOR.

 

Frost Align

 

Optimized Taxonomy Processing

The taxonomy details page has been optimized for faster processing and user interactions on taxonomies having up to 30K nodes. Nodes of the larger structures will be loaded in batches of 100 at a time. Users can now load the next batch of Nodes manually by clicking the ‘Show more’ link displayed at the bottom of the previous 100 Nodes batch (link will be displayed only if the respective level has more than 100 nodes).

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