Update Feed

Moodle LMS 4.4

13 May 2024

Moodle LMS version 4.4 is now available (major release).

Upgrading to Moodle LMS 4.4

Moodle LMS 4.4 can be upgraded to (or installed) using any of Installatron's products. Use Installatron's optional Automatic Update feature to automatically apply Moodle LMS updates as new versions are released, or use Installatron's Clone feature to duplicate an existing Moodle LMS install to test the 4.4 upgrade prior to applying it live. Get started managing your Moodle LMS installations with Installatron

What's New in Moodle LMS 4.4

BREAKING CHANGES

This major update from Moodle 4.3 to 4.4 requires that you manually update any custom mods (./mods/) and themes (./themes/) to Moodle-4.4-compatible versions before updating the application to 4.4.

Security

MDL-78511 - Add SMS as a factor in multi-factor authentication

Course hierarchy improvements

MDL-80923 - Remove the Custom checkbox from the Settings page for all course formats
MDL-80621 - Update activity separators with "+" buttons styling
MDL-80622 - Improve the shadow element when dragging activity cards
MDL-80620 - Improve the collapse/expand chevrons styling
MDL-80219 - Improve activity and section cards
MDL-80460 - Create section with "New section" name and stop using the auto-renaming for the topics course format
MDL-80418 - Homogenise Adding / Updating activity titles, regardless the section where it belongs
MDL-80541 - Homogenise the section form title
MDL-80248 - In course/section.php, display the General section instead of displaying all the course sections
MDL-80249 - In course/section.php, hide secondary navigation and add breadcrumb
MDL-80557 - Change the default order for the course formats
MDL-79986 - Create a new course section page
MDL-80461 - Eliminate erroneous references to topic and weeks from the UI
MDL-80186 - Add delegate section fields to the course_section table
MDL-80203 - Delegate editing options for delegated sections
MDL-80220 - Update the section visibility badge to use status dropdown like the activities
MDL-79987 - Improving the course layout one section per page

Messaging phase 2 - Expand Matrix integration & Communication API

MDL-78551 - Implement initial group support in Communication providers
MDL-77444 - Add initial Mobile App support to the communication API

Notification improvements phase 1

MDL-4188 - Send course welcome message for manual and self enrolments
MDL-46886 - Send users a notification message before they are unenrolled due to inactivity
MDL-79131 - Send administrators a notification when tasks reach their max fail delay
MDL-79714 - Web and email notification default on for new installs

BigBlueButton

MDL-79239 - Require Registration for BigBlueButton Plugin Server Credentials
MDL-77660 - Completion extension using Subplugins
MDL-79750 - Make SHA256 the default algorithm for BigBlueButton requests
MDL-79537 - Remove 'bbb-meeting-size-hint' as a meta parameter on create

Quiz and questions

MDL-79863 - Integration of the ordering question type into Moodle core including improved accessibility and configuration process
MDL-74610 - Let a quiz have multiple total grades (e.g. for each section)
MDL-67259 - Quiz autosave should reassure users that it is working
MDL-80900 - Review quiz attempt summary improvements
MDL-80099 - Migrate quiz statistics callbacks to Hooks API

Report builder

MDL-79510 - Allow Config changes report to filter on Plugin
MDL-80342 - Allow to filter users in the custom reports by their cohorts
MDL-77805 - Improve report builder filters dropdown UI
MDL-77804 - Improve report builder inline filter forms UI
MDL-79270 - Improve "Browse users" page using Report builder functionality
MDL-80245 - Support custom reports tagging
MDL-80722 - Course report source - add time created and time modified
MDL-80619 - Add capability to view any report in report builder
MDL-81126 - Add relative date filter option to select dates after given period
MDL-78427 - New theme usage report
MDL-80325 - Make "delete" actions in report builder reports red
MDL-81073 - Add version and expiry date to manage badges page filters
MDL-79200 - Improve how custom reports filter file types by type
MDL-79216 - Improve how custom reports filter files by size
MDL-80843 - Add authentication method column to user entity
MDL-79646 - Add animation to indicate completion of drag/drop when editing report
MDL-79629 - Enhance report editor filter/condition selection to use autocomplete
MDL-80063 - Custom report on assigned roles across the site
MDL-79788 - Convert tag collection report to a report builder system report
MDL-80560 - New report for "Browse user list" follow up - picture, download, identity fields
MDL-79346 - Add filter/condition on cohort visibility field
MDL-80329 - Report builder filters should trim the spaces
MDL-79552 - Add cohort data (columns/filters) to user-focused reports
MDL-79532 - Add blog "title with link" column for custom reporting
MDL-80052 - Convert remaining reports inside Badges to report builder

TinyMCE 6

MDL-77325 - Make TinyMCE the default editor for existing installs
MDL-79709 - Create Capability for TinyMCE Premium plugins
MDL-78096 - TinyMCE - Improve image adding

Content bank and H5P

MDL-79543 - H5P activity number of attempts no longer displayed
MDL-80028 - Grant non-editing teacher mod/h5pactivity:reviewattempts
MDL-80754 - H5P activity reports page: Add the total attempts to the table column
MDL-80055 - Restyle and re-position the 'Edit H5P content' link within the H5P activity page.

Accessibility improvements

MDL-78994 - Guest policy link should be early in the page's tab order for keyboard navigation users
MDL-80431 - Do not use <fieldset> tag for form elements group that does not have a label
MDL-81066 - Validate form fields on submit or change, not just tab

Usability improvements

MDL-77980 - Grade item column headings in the grader report should link to activities
MDL-69541 - Add option to "Post to all groups" in the quick discussion creation
MDL-78850 - Clicking on Calendar date through Course page should select course in dropdown and show course events on Calendar event page
MDL-79769 - Login Page - Add ability to show password in plain text
MDL-78335 - Normalise the date completion criteria date string
MDL-79912 - Improve the backup/restore workflow: Create index page
MDL-79915 - Improve the backup/restore workflow: Improve UI for Restore
MDL-81337 - Course page plus icon should have a tooltip to inform you what happens if you click it
MDL-80235 - SCORM should not allow 0 as minimum score required
MDL-79920 - Authentication: MFA - Improve user factor setup
MDL-78425 - Theme Selector: Improve UI
MDL-81172 - Async Backup on by default from Install

Functional changes

MDL-78285 - Reintroduce activity mime file type icons (meaning each file has its extension icon)
MDL-78284 - Implement the new activity icons design
MDL-43820 - tool_uploadcourse supports multiple enrolment instances of the same type
MDL-80871 - Add option to user tours to make them always show
MDL-79044 - Improve gradebook export formats order
MDL-73626 - Can no longer release individual grades when assignment is anonymous
MDL-71744 - Configurable defaults for Announcement forums
MDL-73852 - Allow using meta enrolment when uploading course via CSV
MDL-80856 - Improve the sticky footer maximum width to dynamically adapt to the page content width
MDL-79959 - Add custom field picker for SSO identification in repository_equella
MDL-80828 - Activity action menu should not have a submenu panel when only two choices are available
MDL-70384 - Allow dialogues for adding database fields to use Bootstrap so they look consistent with other pages
MDL-80949 - Database field - Remove autolink setting for short text field type

For administrators

MDL-43056 - Add the capability tool/uploadcourse:use for tool_uploadcourse
MDL-80914 - Reintroduce the LTI external tool option to set custom params at the instance level
MDL-79128 - Tasks: Implement no-retry flag for ad-hoc tasks and clean up records of historical failed tasks
MDL-79130 - Tasks: Ad-hoc tasks shouldn't retry after max fail delay
MDL-80866 - Disabled by default Chat and Survey activity for new installations
MDL-67898 - Have an admin_setting which exposes a check
MDL-80548 - Add bulk actions to the"Browse list of users" page
MDL-80554 - Show debugging calls in tasks logs regardless of debugdisplay
MDL-79563 - Add cmid option for backup and course option for restore for CLI script
MDL-79564 - Implement import CLI script
MDL-80267 - Asynchronous restore keeps deleting course/student content - Using no-retry flag
MDL-80328 - Use a confirmation modal when deleting a user
MDL-78426 - Theme Selector: Settings UI

Performance

MDL-63128 - Redis Cache & Session: implement cluster support
MDL-74676 - Speed up limittoenrolled option in course search
MDL-65403 - messaging_cleanup_task should use an indexed DB field for improved performance
MDL-66546 - Add support to unix:// connections to redis caching/sessions.
MDL-79337 - Unnecessary call to set_user_preference when loading a page with an already open drawer in Boost theme
MDL-73703 - LDAP user sync: update users in chunks

For developers

MDL-78334 - Provide a mechanism to deprecate and detect deprecated CSS
MDL-73483 - Add hooks (instead of callbacks) to extend course edit form
MDL-80838 - Add support for PSR-20 (Clock) to allow better time management
MDL-80005 - Add PARAM_ definition class
MDL-79151 - Backup of custom fields for courses should include images
MDL-80082 - In tables and reports, when there is no entry, give out the "Nothing to display" string as notification instead of header
MDL-81011 - Allow hooks to use attributes instead of described_hook interface
MDL-79974 - Improve developer experience for exceptions when developing and make it easier to open in editor
MDL-80850 - Create JavaScript core/dropzone module to handle dropzone
MDL-79520 - Replace custom Clever SSO implementation with OIDC implementation
MDL-80207 - Replace use of Horde with Roundcube
MDL-80736 - Move AWS helper code to core namespace
MDL-80566 - Convert callback 'bulk_user_actions' to hook
MDL-80096 - Add a tool to execute behat generators in the current instance
MDL-79985 - Create a dropdown form field for advanced options

Upgrade Boost theme to use Bootstrap 5.x

MDL-80397 - Refactor some .card-* helpers dropped in Boostrap 5
MDL-80395 - Refactor dropped mixins in Bootstrap 5
MDL-80396 - Refactor .media component dropped in Bootstrap 5
MDL-75673 - Add PopperJS v2 library
MDL-80244 - Refactor Navbars preparing them for Boostrap 5
MDL-80259 - Refactor .badge-[warning|info|...] and .badge-pill classes dropped in Bootstrap 5
MDL-80238 - Refactor .jumbotron dropped in Bootstrap 5
MDL-75670 - Refactor Bootstrap form layouts preparing them for Boostrap 5

Web service additions and updates

MDL-81065 - Create a new Web Service to be able to retrieve filter configuration and specific overrides per context
MDL-65978 - New web services for managing blog entries
MDL-78088 - New web services for the user data privacy section (Privacy and policies)
MDL-80300 - New web service for creating quiz overrides

Deprecations

MDL-75794 - Deprecate i_add_a_field_to_database_and_i_fill_the_form_with() and i_add_an_entry_to_database_with() behat steps
MDL-77038 - Deprecate stateactions::section_move method
MDL-67667 - Deprecate is_blocking() for adhoc and scheduled tasks in Task API
MDL-81326 - Deprecate book_get_nav_classes
MDL-72656 - Deprecate old course renderer methods
MDL-74238 - Final deprecation of get_available_completion_tabs() and navigation()
MDL-73975 - Final deprecation management_heading/course_search_form
MDL-73545 - Final deprecation lesson_add_header_buttons
MDL-73426 - Final deprecation print_badge_tabs
MDL-72376 - Final deprecation of book_get_nav_types
MDL-73117 - Final deprecation of three-month calendar pseudo block items
MDL-70483 - Final deprecation of get_forum_discussions_paginated web service
MDL-80703 - Final deprecation of block_calendar_upcoming::get_upcoming_content()
MDL-71950 - Final deprecation display_help_icon() and print_help_icon()
MDL-80409 - Final deprecation of download_as_dataformat method
MDL-71732 - Final deprecation of functions in lib/deprecatedlib.php initially deprecated in 4.0
MDL-72438 - Final deprecations in core_question initially deprecated in 4.0
MDL-71734 - Final deprecation of strings initially deprecated in 4.0

Component API updates

admin/tool/dataprivacy/upgrade.txt
admin/tool/mfa/upgrade.txt
admin/tool/usertours/upgrade.txt
admin/upgrade.txt
auth/email/upgrade.txt
auth/upgrade.txt
backup/upgrade.txt
badges/upgrade.txt
blocks/calendar_upcoming/upgrade.txt
blocks/recentlyaccesseditems/upgrade.txt
blog/upgrade.txt
calendar/upgrade.txt
completion/upgrade.txt
course/format/upgrade.txt
course/upgrade.txt
customfield/upgrade.txt
enrol/upgrade.txt
grade/report/upgrade.txt
grade/upgrade.txt
h5p/upgrade.txt
lib/form/upgrade.txt
lib/upgrade.txt
mod/book/upgrade.txt
mod/data/upgrade.txt
mod/forum/upgrade.txt
mod/lesson/upgrade.txt
mod/quiz/report/upgrade.txt
mod/quiz/upgrade.txt
mod/upgrade.txt
mod/url/upgrade.txt
question/bank/upgrade.txt
question/engine/upgrade.txt
question/type/calculatedmulti/upgrade.txt
question/upgrade.txt
reportbuilder/upgrade.txt
tag/upgrade.txt
theme/boost/upgrade.txt
theme/upgrade.txt
user/upgrade.txt