Known Issues - Moodle
- Jon-Luc Holmes (Unlicensed)
- Tom Walters
- Eliot Hoving
Ongoing - Moodle 24-25
Lecturecast embeds - Embedded Lecturecast recordings in Moodle showing an error message
Staff and students have reported seeing an error message for embedded Lecturecast recordings in Moodle.
There is a workaround for this issue which involves changing the embed link.
The original embed links are in the format:
href="https://moodle.ucl.ac.uk/filter/echo360/lti_launch.php?url=etc-etc"
In order to make these work, you need to add the word tiny (without making it bold), so you get:
href="https://moodle.ucl.ac.uk/filter/echo360tiny/lti_launch.php?url=etc-etc"
There is no html view on the TinyMCE text editor, so you need to select Tools > Source code:
The Digital Learning Environment team is investigating this issue to see if the workaround can be applied across Moodle systematically. In the meantime, if this workaround does not solve your issue please fill out this MyServices form.
Moodle Gradebook - error when editing grade item
Staff have reported encountering a 'gradesneedregrading' error when editing or viewing certain grade items in the Moodle gradebook.
This issue is usually caused by a category which has been set up with a manual calculation for its grade. When a course is rolled-overed and updated any references to grade items in a manual calculation need to be updated to ensure the calculation can occur.
To resolve, check that your course grade total and any other categories have the correct formulas.
Logs - Downloaded logs not showing User full name in Excel
When going to Report > Logs in Moodle you can see the Full Name, but when downloading the logs into Excel the "User full name" column is empty. The Affected user column is unaffected.
Moodle has found a fix for this which will be deployed in our next release.
Turnitin - Error when revealing individual identities
When revealing individual identities within a Turnitin assignment you will see the following error, however the process does work and after refreshing the web browser page you will notice that the identity is revealed.
Turnitin are currently investigating this issue.
Mobile - forum pages freeze when scrolling
When browsing Moodle on a mobile device or with the UCL Go app, users may find that when viewing a forum digest, the screen freezes and they are unable to scroll further down the page.
This is caused by Moodle's text editor. Moodle and consequently UCL is moving to a new text editor in future, which will resolve the issue.
As a workaround, you can use the Home or My courses buttons to exit out of the forum digest page. To view forum digest pages, it is recommended that you view Moodle on a desktop device.
Gradebook - menu options appear behind last row of Gradebook table
Drop menus in the Gradebook can appear behind the last row of the Gradebook table.
For example, the menu below should show "user report" under the option "single view for this user" however this option appears behind the last row (in grey) and so cannot be sceen.
The issue has been logged with Moodle to resolve.
MyFeedback report errors
A number of features have degraded in the MyFeedback tool.
It is not possible to add self-reflective notes.
The option to paste general feedback from Turnitin does not work.
The Digital Learning Environment team is investigating these issues and will resolve them as soon as possible.
Flexible format is not optimised for Moodle 4.2 and users may encounter issues.
The flexible format is not a format maintained by UCL, it is a third-party plugin, which is out of support and will be retired in summer 2024.
Currently, flexible format is not optimised for Moodle 4.2 which is UCL's current version of Moodle. The UCL's Digital Learning Environment team encourages users to use the Topics format instead where possible.
If flexible format is used, users may encounter the following issues:
The new Moodle bulk edit feature is not available for this course format.
Users are unable to drag and drop content using the course index menu (the left hand menu). However they should still be able to move content by:
- opening the relevant course,
- turning editing on
- opening the relevant section of content, and then
- using the cross-hair icons to drag and move content.
When deleting a section, error messages may occur:
The Digital Learning Environment team is investigating the potential for a UCL bespoke format
Tabs course format - no bulk edit feature
The Tabs format is not a format maintained by UCL, it is a third-party plugin. Currently, the tabs format is not optimised for Moodle 4.2 which is UCL's current version of Moodle. The UCL's Digital Learning Environment team encourages users to use the Topics format instead where possible.
If the tabs format is used, users may encounter the following issues:
The new Moodle bulk edit feature is not available for this course format.
The Digital Learning Environment team is investigating improvements to the tabs format as well as the potential for a UCL bespoke format.
Duplicate submission deadline for Turnitin assignments on timeline and calendar after editing a part name.
This issue has been identified as a bug by Turnitin who are investigating.
Currently, when an assignment part is renamed in the assignment inbox, it may appear as if it has been re-created, and displays in the timeline and calendar as a duplicate. Please report to digi-ed@ucl.ac.uk if you experience this bug.
Resolved
Moodle Workshop - error when launching
We are working to resolve an issue whereby course admins receive the following error when accessing a Moodle Workshop.
Students may also receive the following error when attempting to access Moodle Workshops.
Grid course format display issues
Update: The grid format display issue is resolved, however we have received reported incidents of the section totals being reduced to 1, with the appearance of orphaned sections.
We are investigating this as a matter of urgency. In the meantime, changing the number of sections back to the original amount via the course settings may provide a temporary fix.
You can change the number of sections via the course ‘Settings’ at the top of the course page.
Staff have reported issues with the Grid format display in Moodle, such as the example below.
The links to course content still work, but until the format is fixed the only way to fix the display is by changing the course format to a suitable alternative such as Custom. If you would like to keep the covering images for different sections, changing format risks losing them so we would advise you to download and save them until the course can be changed back to Grid format.
The Digital Learning Environment team is investigating this issue and will resolve it as soon as possible.
MyFeedback report errors
A number of features have degraded in the MyFeedback tool.
The Print and Export to Excel do not currently work.
Some staff may encounter errors when viewing certain student reports.
The Digital Learning Environment team is investigating these issues and will resolve them as soon as possible.
Course access - error when accessing a course or logging in
Some staff and students have reported an error message "An internal error occurred in the completion system. (System administrators can enable debugging information to see more detail.)" when accessing certain courses or logging into Moodle.
The DLE team are currently investigating the root cause of this issue. In the meantime the workaround is turn Completion tracking off and on again. You can do this by going to the course's Settings > Completion tracking > Change "Enable completion tracking" to No > Save and display > Go back to the same setting and change it back to Yes > Save and display.
This workaround will not erase any completion data you may have for the course. If the error still occurs after this workaround, please complete a Staff Query Form or Student Query Form on MyServices with the relevant details.
Editing an individual Moodle section
When viewing a single Moodle section, Tutors and Course Administrators are currently unable to edit that section.
This issue appears related to an analytics plugin. As a workaround the plugin has been temporarily disabled, and staff should find that editing in Single Section View now works.
This issue has now been resolved, and the plugin has been re-enabled.
IPAC LTI - Updating VLE with IPAC results error
When trying to update VLE with results (marks, feedback) the process fails with the following error: “Unable to send all results for this form to the VLE (x sent with x errors); please try again.”
The Digital Learning Environment team is aware of this problem. We are currently investigating it and will resolve them as soon as possible.
Until this is fixed, users will need to manually upload grades using manual grade items
Moodle 19/04/24 - footer displays incorrectly on assignment pages
When viewing a Moodle assignment page, the Moodle footer may display incorrectly with text going down the page rather than taking up space horizontally in three separate columns.
The Digital Learning Environments (DLE) team is investigating this issue currently.
Moodle: 19/04/24 - arrow menu icons incorrectly display
On certain pages such as when creating Moodle groups, the arrow menu icons do not display correctly. Additional HTML is shown as per the image below.
The Digital Learning Environments (DLE) team has implemented a fix for the issue that should be available shortly.
Moodle: 19/04/24 - Students cannot see activities restricted by group when the group has "Group membership visibility" set to "Hidden".
This issue has been reported to Moodle HQ who are investigating.
Currently, there is no way to create a "hidden" group. If you use a group to restrict access or filter an assignment, you should name it generically and avoid naming it in any way that might indicate sensitive personal information.
Download Selected Grademark Files - files not downloading
Users have been unable to use the "Download Selected Grademark Files" function in Turnitin Assignments, as the pop-up window stays stuck on "Please wait while your download is being prepared" after clicking Download.
This issue has now been fixed by Turnitin. These bulk files are now available to download by either leaving the pop-up window open and waiting for the zip file to be compiled there to download, or by downloading the zip file from the 'Messages' tab. However, there does seem to be a caching issue when it comes to the download showing in the 'Messages' tab, if the download does not show there then you will need to log out and back in again for it to show. Turnitin have a ticket in place to address this at the earliest opportunity.
Group submission errors - incorrect number of query parameters
Users have received the following error when trying to submit to group assignments
This error is caused when a group with visibility set to "Hidden" or "visible only to members" is created in a course, it can prevent group submissions from being possible on the course. The error occurs whether or not the group is actually associated with the group submission.
Moodle have fixed this issue(MDL-79635), and UCL now has this fix.
As an immediate workaround, users should delete any groups with "hidden" or "visible only to members" visibility. Instead user overrides may be more appropriate to manage extensions.
Moodle: 31/08/23 - Updating grade in the gradebook shows error: "Exception - Call to a member function get_decimals() on null"
If you search or filter a course Gradebook, and try to update a grade, you will receive the error message: "Exception - Call to a member function get_decimals() on null".
This occurs when the list of students have been filtered using the search input box and the student appears on page 2 or higher on the unfiltered list.
This is a known issue with Moodle.
Workaround: Navigate to the student using the pagination options at the bottom of the Gradebook. Do not use search or any filters. You will be able to update the grade as normal.
Moodle: 18/08/23 - Question Bank Statistics disabled
Some users reported that Question Banks, particularly those with large amounts of questions, were experience slow load times.
Our developers are investigating this issue. As a workaround, we have disabled Question Bank statistics to improve the load time of Question Banks. This means you will no longer be able to see statistics on question performance e.g.
Moodle:18/08/2023 - Boards activity - error
Users encounter the error message "Invalidrecord".
Our developers have resolved this issue.
Moodle: 18/08/23 Blocks appear in calendar drawer
When moving blocks on a course, it is possible to accidently move or drag a block into the calendar drawer. If you notice a block you moved no longer displays, and cannot be re-added, check the calendar drawer.
- Turn on editing mode.
- Click the calendar drawer icon in the navigation bar. You should see the calendar block and any other blocks open up in the drawer.
- Click the crosshair icon to move your block back to the main block region.
Our developers have resolved this issue.
Moodle: 18/08/23 Course search error
Some users are reporting that when searching for a course, they receive the following error message:
Our developers have resolved the issue.
Moodle: 10/08/23 - Course rollover
Depending on the course being rolled over, the Moodle course rollover process may suggest an invalid course module.
Our developers are working to improve the validation of the auto-suggest feature.
If you encounter issues rolling over your course, please contact IT services.
fixed on 18/08/2023
Moodle: 10/08/23 - Grid course format - rollover of a course removes images
Where a course in the grid format is rolled over, the images on each section card are deleted in the new version of the course.
Our developers are currently investigating this issue.
The immediate workaround is to re-added images to the new course after the rollover.
Moodle: 27/07/23 - URL icon doesn't always display correctly
Where a URL is created to an online PDF, the icon will not display clearly.
Moodle: 10/08/23 - Homepage error
Some users have reported an error message when logging into Moodle.
Our developers are investigating this issue. It only impacts the dashboard page of Moodle. For an immediate workaround, please go to https://moodle.ucl.ac.uk/my/courses.php to access your courses, and do not use the Home button, top left of screen.
This issue is now resolved.
Moodle: 27/07/23 - Sharing Cart Plugin - Block Displays incorrectly
The sharing cart plugin displays incorrectly outside of the block limits.
Moodle: 27/07/23 - Reading List Icon does not display
The Icon for reading lists does not display
This issue was fixed on 27/07/2023. incorrect link within code
Moodle: 27/07/23 - Course Rollover Action Returns - Error Reading Database
Upon selecting the Course Rollover Action from the Course/More Dropdown - you are presented with a error reading database.
Product team are aware and are working to resolve this, in the short term the function has been disabled to enable to team to work on the issue.
Update Issue resolved at 13:30pm
Moodle: December 2022 Issue creating Zoom activities
Update 12/12/2022 - Issue Resolved. We shall continue to monitor this. Please report further issues to digi-ed@ucl.ac.uk
Due to an authentication issue, some staff are currently unable to create new Zoom activities from within Moodle. Staff and students should be able to join existing meetings as normal.
Our technical teams are investigating as a matter of urgency, and will provide updates as soon as they know more. In the interim, if you urgently need to create a new Zoom meeting in the next few days, please contact:
from your UCL email account account with the Moodle course title / url.
This information is provided by Digital Education
( https://www.ucl.ac.uk/isd/digital-education-team-information ) and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License