Improvements to Consistency in BOLT

With our October update at the end of this week, there will be numerous changes to BOLT in the language and workflows controlling visibility of items.

Here are the key changes:

1. Language used to denote an activity is not visible to a learner will be “Hidden” and noted with a consistent visibility icon. 
2. Differing visibility controls will change to a checkbox. 
3. Visibility controls will appear on the Restrictions tab. (This is a big change in Discussions!) 
4. Consistent ordering of activity and tool specific icons on activity list pages. 
5. Visibility icon switch in Content. 
6. TOC flyout will no longer allow changes to visibility. 
7. TOC completion method icon switch in Content. 
8. New activities will have Save, not Publish buttons (and will include the “hide from users” checkbox consistent with the other tools. 
9. Visibility controls in context menus (drop down menus) of modules and topics. 

For more information, please read on.

Coming to BOLT: Visibility States for Assignments

Beginning August 18th, instructors will be able to set the visibility state for assignment submission folders in Content and Assignments. When items are in a draft state, they are not visible to learners in BOLT.


IMPORTANT: When instructors create new assignment submission folders, they will default to the draft state- just like in Quizzes, Surveys, and Discussions. To make them available to learners, instructors will need to modify the visibility status on the Restrictions tab. If you have copied your course and want the folders available, check the status of the folders after August 18th and modify them as needed.

When instructors set the visibility to "draft", a hidden icon appears beside the assignment submission folder in the instructor's view of the Assignments tool

For more information on this, read on.