Moodle

I agree with D'Arcy on this one. I have just been asked to export a course as a scorm package so one of our clients can run and test the course in their own system. They don't use Moodle. Just a little frustrating that this can't be done. The arguement 'why leave Moodle' really doesn't cut it here imo. I'm a bit surprised this feature hasn't been added, at the apparent resistance to such a feature and am also equally surprised at the lack of voting on this.

I would also like to see this added very soon. I know many of us in the corporate world already have a SCORM compliant LMS. For us, this LMS is our corporate repository. Moodle will act as our Learning Environment. We need a way for the data in the Learning Environment to go into the LMS. While Moodle can act as an LMS on it's own, you can't ask a company who has invested large amounts of money to change this functionality. I honestly believe that if you can add this functionality, you will attract more corporate users to Moodle.

I have the same perspective as raised above. There are people that use the fact that moodle is "scorm compliant" as one of its many virtues. Now I'm realizing that it is NOT scorm compliant – moodle can import courses but not export them in scorm.

This is a big priority for any software that wants to call itself a viable competitor in this field... thanks.

Must concur - it just occurred to me that there is no way to export content as either IMS nor SCORM out of Moodle, which I find somewhat surprising. We moved all our courses INTO Moodle from WebCT, ONLY because WebCT provided a means of export that could be consumed. (Ok, they were mainly providing it so that one could upgrade from CE 4 to Vista 6...)

At any rate, I recently took a colleagues creative commons licensed content and created a Moodle course, and wanted to share it with colleagues who use Angel, but suddenly realized: I can IMPORT IMS content packages from other systems, but not EXPORT them out of Moodle. Surprising considering many of the others (Angel included) offer to export courses as IMS packages.

Just to note that, while it might very likely be better than nothing, any such export would be a partial one because the IMS formats cannot represent many features of Moodle courses. So simple content (such as the basic resource types) could mainly be transferred across, but complex content might not be possible.

This really is a very important issue. when reading about moodle : it says moodle is a CMS or LMS & is SCORM complient. that means the courses & other facilites developed using moodle are scorm complient. & if they are then there should compolsury be a functionality to export to scorm. else it's a double effert to build a framework in some other application, converting it to scorm & then incorporating to moodle. because you can't be sure of the LMS that your clients may have.

We are a not for profit organisation vying for repeat funding, one of the requirements of our sponsors is that our LMS is SCORM compliant. Only having briefly looked into this and seeing that Moodle 1.9.3 and above was 'SCORM compliant' when we started out 18 months ago we thought we would be OK. Now that having looked into it more and realising that it's only a one way trip (ie import SCORM only) we are now on shaky ground! This is a really important issue as I'm sure there are others like us that are expected to produce multiple-platform content, even if Moodle is our main tool. I'm a bit dismayed that no one's been able to address this and there's not even anyone looking at it for Moodle 2.0. I wish I was a programmer and could look at this functionality myself, but unfortunately I'm not. Is there any further thoughts on this or is it that a few (and getting more) of us are going to continue to be disappointed?

Moodle 1.9 and HEAD can now export in IMS Common Cartridge format. This is probably a better choice for a whole course format than SCORM, which is a format for learning objects.

I would add SCORM export to core if someone wrote the code. Unfortunately moodle.com is flat out on higher priorities at the moment but I'm watching the votes on this bug.

Just like to add another vote to this issue. We are working with an NHS client who are new to Moodle but further up the chain they have an online learning environment that is based on Oracle and only imports SCORM content. Like a post above, the specification of it being SCROM compliant should be errated with "import only", IMHO.

I was hoping there might be a SQL query to run against the dB to extract all the course content, but our coders don't have the time to do it.

I have to admit I'm surprised to see the number of votes on this.... Are you sure SCORM is what you're looking for?

As Martin mentions above - Moodle can now export in IMS Common Cartridge format which is really a better format - (Most SCORM players will play a full IMS package too)

The SCORM standard is really limited - it's only really designed for 2 things.
Displaying static content.
embedding quizzes within that content.

Moodle has a massive featureset of modules/plugins that could never be included in a SCORM package export

Also - some of the products on this page:
http://docs.moodle.org/20/en/Creating_SCORM_Content will import quiz data directly from Moodle backup files and others support one of the other export methods that the quiz module already exports.

I'm really tempted to close this bug as "won't fix" but the number of votes on this bug seems to reflect that I might be missing something here.... for those of you who have voted can you please provide information on why you think SCORM export is needed and why you can't use one of the other methods that Moodle currently provides?

If you have previously voted (28 people as of now)but think you no longer need a SCORM export from Moodle - perhaps you could remove your vote?

also, reading the above comments it looks like there's some confusion over the compliance stuff...

SCORM compliance certification doesn't apply to authoring or creating a SCORM package..

there are 2 "certification" types
for the LMS - this certifies an LMS(Moodle) can play SCORM packages - Moodle 1.9.5 is "Certified" for 1.2 - this means we paid someone to test and "certify" that Moodle meets the SCORM 1.2 spec. all other Moodle versions are tested by us using the ADL test Harness here: http://docs.moodle.org/dev/SCORM_1.2_compliance_test_instructions

The other certification type is for content - not for authoring tools... - this allows you to have an individual SCORM package certified as SCORM compliant (I don't know of anyone who has actually done this!)

I don't know of any compliance or certification programs around SCORM authoring tools (generating a SCORM) - this is probably why the quality of SCORM packages varies a lot and we are needing to constantly improve the SCORM module to deal with buggy SCORM packages (not just the actual spec)

If you're interested in the certification process check out this site:
http://www.academiccolab.org/certification/scorm/index.html

I agree completely that exporting as SCORM makes little sense. IMS CC is a better choice. (Just a correction to that old comment: we do not actually export in IMS CC format at the moment, but we will in a future version)

Please remember that none of the "standard" formats support all of Moodle's features, so a lot of information will be lost during any export from Moodle. Moodle backups are the the only format that can capture everything.

If you really need interoperable content, then create it in the first place in a lowest-common-denominator format like SCORM or PDF and then you can use it anywhere.

I'm closing this as won't fix - no one has responded to my comments above (except MD) - If someone can "convince" me that this really is a good idea - or if someone wants to fund the work to create a SCORM plugin for the new backup/restore stuff in Moodle 2.0 to export partial courses as SCORM then I'm happy to re-open this again.

Hi Dan and fellow developers

I have asked you (Indirectly) and the group of developers on the last 22/11/11 online Moodle developer meeting about the future of SCORM and got back an email from you, explaining why SCORM export will not be part of the future Moodle feature list or plan.

It all seems logic to me as a developer BUT...
The Israeli Ministry of Education is doing a hugggggeee shift in agenda by setting LMS and Digital Content Creation and Exchange standards for all the LMS providers and content creators in Israel. The IME choose, after a long and intensive research, to use SCORM (with some minor variations) as the standard for exchanging content between digital content creators and LMS providers. One of the LMS' compliance requests is "LMS support for SCORM export". other wise, it will not get certified for as a standard LMS.
Currently, none of the current LMS software in Israel support SCORM export. and all eyes are at Moodle due to its wide distribution and continued adoption rate in K12 to Academic institutes.

I understand, from you Dan, that it is a dying standard but i did not find any evidence to it or read any one expressing in similar words, when i read through major educational internet magazines and blogs. please see if you can attach references to backup that statement. so i can forward it to the right discussion make stuff. ( It is very important to us , LMS users, to know: what are the future trends of content creation and safe standard exchange between systems )

Can you please provide more info about IMS CC export and future feature plan of Moodle HQ for that standard?

Do you know of 3rd party modules that might be considering or developing a SCORM export tool?

What are the future plans of Moodle 2.x regarding SCORM import support. and current statues (I watch the related tracker issues, but i'd like a "one line" authoritative statement from Moodle HQ, if possible)

Thank you very much for all the info and support
Nadav

Hi Nadav,
The tracker is probably the wrong place to discuss this and it's probably useful for more people so I've moved it to the SCORM forum here:
http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=190948

Great. Thanks