To find out more about these features select Site administration > Feature overview.
| Setting | Description | Notes |
|---|---|---|
Outcomes | Outcomes are specific descriptions of what a learner has demonstrated and understood at the completion of an activity or course. Each outcome is rated by some sort of scale. Other terms for outcomes are Competencies and Goals. In simple terms outcomes are similar to sub components of a grade. A grade is an assessment of overall performance that may include tests, participation, attendance, and projects. Outcomes assess specific levels of knowledge through a series of statements, that may be coded with numbers or letters. Thus an overall grade can be given for a course, along with statements about specific competencies in the form of outcomes. | - |
Comments | A comments block can be added to any page in Totara, enabling users to easily add comments. A similar interface enables comments to be added to glossary, database activity and blog entries. The comments interface uses AJAX so that comments are added instantly without needing a page refresh. | - |
Tags | Tags allow learners and trainers to describe their interests in a way that is easy for people with similar interests to find them. The user's profile has a place to enter interests, which will create or add the user to an existing tag. Tag pages can be viewed and blog posts can be tagged. | - |
Notes | The Notes feature is a way to attach information about a user by another user. For example, a trainer might attach a note to a specific learner about the hobbies and interests that seems to engage that learner. Users must have the permissions to View notes and Manage notes in order to use this feature in any context. Thus learners might be allowed to view or even manage notes within a course. | - |
Portfolios | Portfolios in Totara Learn make it easy for a learner to export their work to an external portfolio. For example, learner work might include forum posts or assignment submissions that they believe demonstrates their knowledge. | - |
Web Services | Web services enable other systems to login to Totara Learn and perform operations. | - |
Messaging | 'Messaging' refers both to automatic alerts from Totara Learn about new forum posts, assignment submission notifications etc, and also to conversations using the instant messaging feature. There is also an options for message notifications when a message is read, deleted or forwarded to an email address. | - |
Statistics | If statistics are enabled for the site, graphs and tables of user activity may be generated. | - |
RSS Feeds | RSS (really simple syndication) feeds in Totara Learn enable people to stay up to date with forum posts, glossary entries, and other events within Totara. | - |
Blogs | Blogs in Totara Learn are user based, each user has their own blog. Users can also register their external blogs, such as Blogger or Wordpress, so that entries are automatically included in their Totara Learn blog. | - |
Networking | The Totara Learn network feature allows a Totara Learn administrator to establish a link with another Totara, Moodle or a Mahara site and to share some resources with the users of that Totara. | - |
Completion Tracking | Completion tracking is a process that assists Course completion and Activity completion features. It must be enabled in Advanced settings before it can be used anywhere in the site. Select the roles that tracking are required (usually learner) under Site Administration > Grades > General settings > Graded roles. | - |
Conditional Activities | Conditional activities enable trainers to restrict the availability of any activity according to certain conditions such as dates, grade obtained, or activity completion. When it is enabled by the administrator, a 'Restrict access' setting appears in the settings of activities or resources. | - |
Enable RPL | When enabled, a course can be marked as completed by assigning the user a Record of Prior Learning. It is also possible to enable RPL for course page modules. | - |
Plagiarism prevention | Plagiarism is when a learner submits content they have copied and the real author was not given credit for the words. Plagiarism prevention detects when this form of cheating or academic dishonesty has happened. | - |
Badges | Open Badges allows the awarding of badges for meeting specified course and site level criteria. Enabling this allows the creation and award of badges on the site. | - |
Report Caching | Report caching is used to increase the performance of selected reports. | - |
Audience Based Visibility | The visibility of each individual course, program or certification can be set to; Visible to all users, Visible to enrolled users, or Visible to enrolled users and members of the selected audiences. | Enabling this setting will change the visibility of courses, programs, and certifications across the whole site, meaning the existing visibility settings and the viewhiddencourses capability will no longer apply, so courses, programs, and certifications that are currently hidden may become visible. |
Totara Connect Server | Totara Connect is a single-sign-on and user identity solution for multiple Totara servers. | - |
Enhanced Catalog | The enhanced catalog supports the search by course activity and other criteria including custom fields across categories. When disabled, the standard catalog will appear. | - |
Dynamic Appraisals | This setting allows you to specify whether appraisals lock on activation and no longer update assignments and roles or continue to update after activation. | - |
Display Hierarchy Shortnames | Hierarchy shortnames are able to be displayed in addition to the fullname in hierarchy forms. | - |
Program Extension Request | When enabled extension requests can be turned on for individual programs. This allows the program assignee to request an extension to the due date for a program. This extension can then be accepted or denied by the assignee's manager. | - |
Goals | Personal and organisation Goals are able to be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
Competencies | Competencies are skills that are not course related. These can be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
Appraisals | Staff Appraisals are forms that can be created that are required to be answered at specified times by the staff, manager, manager's manager, or appraiser. These can be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
360 Feedback | 360 Feedbacks are forms that can be created that can be answered by specified people. These can be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
Learning Plans | Learning Plans are used to specify the training required by staff and are able to be reviewed by managers. These can be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
Programs | Programs allows you to create learning paths for learners where you can define dependencies and control the order and flow of the competencies and courses your learners complete. These can be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
Certifications | Certifications allows you to create learning paths for learners that need to be repeated after a specified time. You can define dependencies and control the order and flow of the competencies and courses your learners complete. These can be Hidden or Disabled across the site. | - |
Totara Dashboard | Dashboards allow administrators to design multiple interface options for a user to access upon logging into Totara. | - |
Report builder graphs | This allows data from Report builder reports to be aggregated and displayed as a graph. | - |
Record of Learning | This displays all of the learners completed and current learning. | - |
Positions | These allow the assigning of users to managers, organisation, and position hierarchies. | - |
My Team | This allows managers to see information regarding their staff learning and items that require manager approval. | - |
