Moodle 2.3.2 Enhances Grading, Simplifies Roles and Permissions
Moodle HQ has released updates to the Moodle open source learning management system. The new Moodle 2.3.2 and 2.2.5, available now, incorporate several minor fixes and enhancements and resolve a number of security-related issues.
Moodle is a free and open source learning management system designed for a wide range of organizations of varying sizes. It includes course management tools, tools for collaborative work, online assessments, integration with plagiarism detection software, integration with repositories and electronic portfolio software, and other features common to learning management systems. As of this writing, it's used by about 1.3 million teachers and more than 60 million users via 68,000 registered sites worldwide. Those users participate in some 6.6 million current courses. (Updated statistics can be found on the Moodle Stats portal at Moodle HQ.)
Version 2.3.2's new features are primarily in the category of minor enhancements and fixes. Included in the latest release are:
- New grading features, including new support for Oracle in the new assignments module and the new ability to retain feedback on assignments when re-grading;
- Support for importing questions from Blackboard 6 and above;
- Simplified roles and permissions checking;
- Enhanced restore;
- New tools for dealing with missing files;
- The ability to set course layouts in course defaults; and
- Enhanced control over blog entry associations.
Moodle's developers noted that the new version has resolved "a number" of security issues but have not released details of those security issues. The organization reported that it will do so in about a week in order to "allow system administrators to safely update to the latest version."
In the 2.2.x branch, the new version 2.2.5 has gained a handful of similar new features, along with the security fixes, including Blackboard question import, new handling of missing files, and simplified role and permission checking.
The 2.1.x branch is no longer being updated for features, but version 2.1.8 does include fixes to security issues.
There were no updates to the 1.9 branch (also no longer being updated for features) "as there have been no serious security issues in this branch," according to a blog post on Moodle.org.
Moodle 2.3.2, 2.2.5, and 2.1.8 are available now. Complete details are available at tracker.moodle.org. Downloads are available at download.moodle.org.