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Processes

This page covers the most common processes, from creating a course in Courses, through any changes, to its deletion.

Creating a New Course

The ICT Department creates a course page based on a request submitted via the ServiceDesk system. In the request, specify whether to use the template sample course for the new course or to use one of the existing courses as a template.

Creating a variant of an existing course

In this case, the existing course page is not changed by default. The new variant is merged (or redirected) into the existing one.[1]

It is sufficient to simply state this fact in the request for changes to the Signpost settings. If a completely new course page needs to be created for the new course variant, proceed to the Creating a New Course section.

End of Semester

Users can view the page’s appearance across semesters. Archiving by semester occurs automatically.[2] The state as of the last day of the semester is considered the final version.[3]

The URL of a course page in a specific semester includes the suffix @<semester code>.[4] For example, https://courses.fit.cvut.cz/BI-ZMA/@B181/

For general information on branches and Courses, see Branches.

Redirecting to Moodle

Create a request to change the Signpost settings.

Transition between Courses and Moodle

  1. On the selected platform (Courses/Moodle), create a new course page.
  2. Perform the data migration.[5]
  3. Once the course is ready, create a request to change the Signpost settings so that it links to the selected platform.

External course pages

Caution:

Required courses that make up the thematic areas for the final state examination must have materials on Courses or Moodle (to ensure guaranteed archiving)!

If you do not wish to use Courses or Moodle, you can operate your own website outside of FIT for your elective course – this approach is strongly discouraged, but it does occur in rare cases.

Instead of simply posting a link to an external website on Courses or Moodle, please report its address via request to change the Signpost settings. The head of department should also be informed of this.

If you wish to operate your own course website, it must comply with several basic rules:

  • HTTPS – the site must be accessible via the HTTPS protocol and use a trusted certificate.
  • Privacy – the site must not violate users’ privacy.
  • Long-term availability – the site should remain accessible for several years after the course ends, at a minimum to students who took the course, all teachers, and the head of department (unless specified otherwise).
  • Archiving by semester – students should be able to review course materials as they existed during the semester in which they took the course. This also applies to attached slides and other attachments.

Course Discontinuation

Teachers do not need to take any action.

Caution:

Do not delete the source repository containing the course.

Pages for discontinued courses are not deleted by default; instead, they are archived. From the students’ perspective, there will be no changes, and the course page will remain accessible as usual.

Questionnaire for the upcoming semester

Teachers are contacted before the start of each semester to indicate any changes regarding their course in the questionnaire:

  • Preferred platform for publishing course materials (Courses or Moodle).
  • Preferred platform for grading (Grades, Progtest, or Moodle).
  • Whether to merge all course variants into a single course page.

This information[6] will be used to configure Signpost.

Teachers can also report changes throughout the semester by creating a request to change the Signpost settings.

  1. The form of the course page prior to reaccreditation is preserved via automatic backups at the end of the semester. ↩
  2. This process can also be done manually by simply creating the desired branch. The branch must be in the format of the semester code, e.g., B201. ↩
  3. Archiving is performed by creating a new branch from the commit closest to the last day of the semester. Semester branches are then displayed in the user interface in the tab for switching semesters. ↩
  4. The name of any branch can be substituted for the semester code in the same way. ↩
  5. Currently, there is no tool for automatically migrating data between Courses and Moodle. The user must handle this process using their own resources. ↩
  6. For more on configuration, see https://gitlab.fit.cvut.cz/course-pages/signpost-data/ ↩