Rules

Rules

Overview

The platform has a robust rules engine that allows you to customize the user experience and automate a variety of actions. Used wisely, rules can make a course more engaging and flexible. 

Examples of rules you can create include:
  1. Sending custom messages to learners when they enroll in a course. 
  2. Awarding badges to users when they complete a specific module.
  3. Enrolling learners in an intermediate level course after they complete a beginner level course. 
  4. Adding users to an "alumni" group when they complete a learning path. 
  5. Awarding certificates to learners when they complete a self-paced course.

Rules can also be used with course games to define rules that award points and badges to learners. You can add rules to courses, modules, sections, assessments, and accounts.

A few things to keep in mind regarding rules:
  1. By default, rules and rule actions do not apply retroactively.
    1. For example, if you add a rule to an assessment it will not be triggered for users who submitted the assessment before you added the rule automatically. If you want the rule to apply retroactively, select the Apply retroactively? checkbox when creating the rule.  
  2. If you set a rule scheduled at a time that has already passed, the rule will not be executed. 
  3. Rule actions do not apply to archived learners. 
  4. If you remove rules or actions they are not un-applied.
    1. For example, if you awarded a learner a certificate for submitting an assessment and later you delete the action, the learner's certificate will not be deleted.

Rules for courses and classes

Rules are compromised of specific events that trigger actions. There are many events throughout the platform that allow you to add actions. For example, within courses and classes you can add actions to the following events:

  1. Course Completion.
  2. Course Enrollment.
  3. Course Unenrollment.
  4. Course Re-enrollment.
  5. User Inactivity in a course.
  6. User Deactivation in a course.
  7. Compliance course expiration.
  8. Start/Finish of a course.
  9. Level achieved in a course game.
  10. Posting or replying in a course forum.
This section will review how to add a rule to each type of course and class event.
Info
Please note the business platform uses the term course, and the academia platform uses the term class. The terms 'course' and 'class' are interchangeable throughout this article. 

Completion actions

Self-paced courses automatically check for course completion. If you would like Instructor-led and Blended courses to automatically check for course completion: 
  1. Access the Instructor-led or Blended course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Completion from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click Enable in the Completion section.

To add an action that occurs when users complete a course or class: 

  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Completion from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click + Add in the Completion actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, Send custom notification, and Send canned message.
Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Add action pop-up, Access tab

Enrollment rules

To add an action that occurs when a user is enrolled in a course or class:

  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Enrollment from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click + Add in the Enrollment actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, Send custom notification, and Send canned message.
Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.
Add action pop-up, Awards tab

Please note that if the course is set as a course goal in a learning path, the enroll in course automation action of the path completely takes over what message on the course is sent. The canned message in the target course is always ignored when a learner is added via automation. This allows the learning path to control the learner experience. For example, it allows the path to silently enroll someone into a specific course regardless of how that course is set up for regular enrollment.

Unenrollment rules

To add an action that occurs when a learner is unenrolled from a course or class:

  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Enrollment from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click + Add in the Unenrollment actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, Send custom notification, and Send canned message.
Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Reenrollment actions

To add an action that occurs when a learner is unenrolled from a course or class:

  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Enrollment from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click + Add in the Reenrollment actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, Send custom notification, and Send canned message.
Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Inactivity rules

To add an Inactivity rule, you must first specify what qualifies a learner as inactive. To set the number of days a learner does not visit a course that qualifies them as inactive:
  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Enrollment from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click the Edit Edit icon icon for the 'Number of days of not visiting the course before learners is considered inactive' setting in the Inactivity section.
Course, Admin, Enrollment tab with the Edit icon highlighted in the Inactivity section
The Inactivity pop-up displays.
  1. Select a number of days to consider a learner inactive.
  2. Click Save. 
Inactivity pop-up with a number of days selected as an example

You can then add inactivity rules that are triggered when a learner becomes inactive in the course. The actions are triggered after the number of days specified earlier have passed. To add a rule:

  1. Click + Add in the 'Inactivity actions' section of the Enrollment page.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Deactivation actions

To add a Deactivation rule, you must first specify what qualifies a learner to be deactivated. To set the number of days a learner does not visit a course that qualifies them as inactive:
  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Deactivation from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click the Edit Edit icon icon for the 'Max days before learner is deactivated' setting.
Course, Admin, Deactivation tab with the Edit icon highlighted in the Max days before learner is deactivated section

The Deactivation pop-up displays.
  1. Select a number of days to deactivate a learner.
  2. Click Save. 
Deactivation pop-up with a max days before learner is deactivated number selected as an example

You can then add deactivation rules that are triggered when a learner is deactivated from the course. The rules are triggered after the number of days specified earlier have passed. To add a deactivation action:

  1. Click + Add in the 'Deactivation actions' section of the Deactivation page.
Course, Admin, Deactivation tab with the Add button highlighted in the Deactivation actions section

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, Send custom notification, and Send canned message.

Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

You can also add 'Deactivation countdown' rules that can trigger a variety of actions, the specified number of days before the student is deactivated. To learn more, review the Deactivation countdown section of the Configure courses and classes article. 

Compliance rules

If Compliance is enabled for a course or class, you can add 'Expiration countdown' rules that can trigger a variety of actions as the expiration day approaches.

To learn more, review the 'Expiration countdown' section in the Compliance article. 

Start/Finish rules

You can use rules to perform actions at the start and/or finish of an instructor-led or blended course. This is a useful feature if you want to remind learners that a course is about to start.

To add start and/or finish actions:

  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click Schedule from the fly-out menu.
  4. Click + Add rule in the Start actions or Finish actions section.
Course, Admin, Schedule tab with the Add rule buttons highlighted in the Start actions and Finish actions sections

The Class start rule or Class finish rule pop-up displays.

  1. Select if the rule will occur Before, On, or After the class starts or finishes.
Course start rule pop-up with On selected

If you select the Before or After options, you can determine the days and hours when the rule will be triggered before or after the start/finish of the course. 

  1. Please note the start/finish of a course is a date rather than a date/time, so a course is schedule to start/finish on the date at 00:00.
InfoNote: The time you select for a start or finish rule is the time the notification becomes available to be processed. Notifications are then delivered as part of a scheduled batch job, so they may be sent up to 90 minutes after the selected time, depending on processing schedules and message volume. Please take this into consideration when selecting a time for a start or finish rule.
Course start rule pop-up with Before selected and an example of days selected

After the start or finish rule is added, it will display on the Schedule page.

  1. Click Edit to edit the rule.
  2. Click Delete to delete the rule.
  3. Click + Add action to add an action to the rule.
Course, Admin, Schedule tab with the Add action, Edit, and Delete buttons highlighted in the 3 days before class starts rule section

If you click Add action, the Add action pop-up displays. Actions are available in the following tabs:

  1. Access: Lock course, Unlock course.
  2. Other: Archive course, Deactivate, Send custom notification, Unpublish course.

Additional details about each action is covered in the Adding actions section of this article.


Course game rules

If your course or class has a game, you can add a variety of rules that are triggered when a particular game level is achieved. When learners reach a game level, you can add rules that award badges, certificates, custom messages and more. To learn more about adding rules to course game levels, visit the Course games article. 

Course forum rules

The platform also supports rules that trigger actions when users post and/or reply in course forums. For example, you can award a user five points in the course game for posting to a forum and two points for replying to a posting.

To add rules to course forums:
  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Forums on the course navigation menu.
  3. Click a forum.
  4. Click Configure. 
Course, Forums page with the Configure button highlighted

The Configure screen displays.

  1. Post actions: Click + Add in the Post actions section to add an action that is triggered when users post to the forum.
  2. Reply actions: Click + Add in the Reply actions section to add an action that is triggered when users reply to a post on the forum.

The Add action pop-up displays. Actions are available for forums in the following tabs:

  1. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  2. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  3. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  4. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

Rules for modules, sections and assessments

Rules for modules and lessons

Info
Please note that the business platform uses the term modules, and the academia platform uses the term lessons. The terms 'modules' and 'lessons' are interchangeable in this article.

Actions can be added directly to modules and lessons, where you can specify what actions occur when a learner completes them.

To add a rule to a module or lesson:
  1. Access a course or class.
  2. Select a module.
  3. Click the Completion tab.
  4. Click + Add under Completion actions.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Rules for sections

To create even more granular rules, you can add rules to sections. 

To add a rule to a section:
  1. Access a course or class.
  2. Select a module/lesson.
  3. Click a section page.
  4. Click the Completion tab.
  5. Click + Add in the Completion actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Completion rules for assessments

Completion rules can also be added to assessments. To add a rule to an assessment:

  1. Access a course or class.
  2. Click Assessments on the course navigation menu.
  3. Click an assessment.
  4. Click the Completion tab.
  5. Click + Add in the Completion actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

Additional details about each action is covered in the 'Adding actions' section of this article.

Score rules for assessments

You can create rules that trigger actions when a learner earns a particular score for an assessment. To create a score rule for an assessment:

  1. Access a course or class.
  2. Click Assessments on the course navigation menu.
  3. Click an assessment.
  4. Click the Score rules tab.
  5. Click + Add rule.

The Assessment score threshold rule pop-up displays.
  1. Set the score parameters that will trigger the action.
    1. Each rule can define a lower and optional upper range for the assessment score.
  2. Click Save.

You can add multiple rules to an assessment. After the rules are added, you can modify them:

  1. Click Edit to edit the rule.
  2. Click Delete to delete the rule.
  3. Click + Add action to add an action to the rule.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

You can also add multiple actions for each score rule.

  1. Click the  icon to edit an action.
  2. Click theicon to remove an action. 
Course, Assessment, Assessment page, Score rules tab with the Edit and Remove icons highlighted for two score rule actions

Info
Note that in the case of multiple assessment submissions, the initial rule and action triggered by the first submission are replaced by the rule and action for the second submission.  For example, in the scenario below, if a learner submits an assessment, scores 60% and is awarded 10 points, then submits another assessment and scores 80%, the previous 10 points are removed, and the learner receives 20 points.

Course, Assessment, Assessment page, Score rules tab with two separate score rules

Rules for groups 

You can create rules that trigger actions when members are added or removed from groups. To create rules when members are added to or removed from groups:

  1. Access the group.
  2. Click Admin from the group navigation menu.
  3. Click Membership from the fly-out menu. 
  4. Click + Add in the Added actions or Removed actions section.

The Add action pop-up displays. Actions are available in the following tabs:

  1. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  2. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  3. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  4. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Remove tag, Send custom notification, and Send canned message.

Mastery rules

The platform allows you to add rules that trigger specific actions when learners drop below the threshold for a specific skill for a defined period of time.

To create Mastery rule rules:
  1. Access a course or class.
  2. Click Mastery from the course/class navigation menu.
  3. Click the Rules tab.
  4. Click + Add Rule. 

The Mastery threshold rule pop-up displays.

  1. Select the competency/skill from the drop-down that will trigger the rule.
  2. Set the rating threshold.
    1. Use the operators to define the parameters. For example, you can trigger a rule when a learner has a rating below a specific percentage, above a percentage, or within a range of percentages. 
  3. Select a duration (in days).
  4. Click Save.

The Skill rule is created. To add an action:

  1. Click + Add action below the skill rule.
    1. Note - you can add multiple actions to a rule.

The Add action pop-up displays. Depending on the set-up of your platform, the following actions are available across multiple tabs:

  1. Access: Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Lock module, Show assessment, Show module, Show section, and Unlock module.
  2. Awards: Award badge, Award certificate, Award coupon, Award points.
  3. Integrations: Webhook, xAPI
    1. Additional integration options vary based on the set-up of your platform.
  4. Membership: Add to group, Enroll in course, Remove from group.
  5. Other: Add tag, Add to-do item, Archive, Deactivate, Remove tag, and Send custom notification.

Adaptive learning

Adaptive learning provides additional actions that allow you to dynamically personalize a course based on the previous actions of a learner. Dynamic personalization allows you to use rules and actions that personalize which modules, assessments, and path goals are shown/hidden from specific learners.  

Adaptive learning adds visibility settings to modules and assessments, as well as the following access actions:

  1. Hide assessment.
  2. Hide module.
  3. Hide section.
  4. Show assessment.
  5. Show module.
  6. Show section. 

Add action pop-up, Access tab with the Hide assessment, Hide module, Hide section, Show assessment, Show module, and Show section buttons highlighted
The Adaptive learning app must be install by administrators from the App center. To learn more about Adaptive learning click here. 

Adding actions

Rules are compromised of specific events that trigger actions. To learn about the individual actions themselves, visit the Rule actions article. 

Site-wide automation

The platform supports site-wide automation, which allows administrators to define rules and actions that apply to courses, modules, section, assessments, groups, resources, and forums on the whole platform. To learn more about site-wide automation, visit the Automation article and work with your site administrator.

Automation tab

Courses

The Automation tab in courses allows you to quickly view all rules that have been set up for a course and its modules.

To enable the Automation tab for a course:
  1. Access the course or class.
  2. Click Admin from the course navigation menu.
  3. Click Features from the fly-out menu.
  4. Select the Automation checkbox. 
Course, Admin, Features tab with the Automation checkbox selected and highlighted

The Automation feature is now enabled for the course. To see the rules for the course: 

  1. Click Automation on the course navigation menu.

All of the enrollment, reenrollment, unenrollment, inactivity, deactivation, and completion rules for the course display.

  1. Click the Modules tab to view all rules for modules in the course.
  2. Click Edit to modify or add actions directly from the Automation page. 
Course, Automation, Course tab with the Edit button highlighted

After clicking Edit, new options display:

  1. Click the Edit Edit icon icon to edit an existing action.
  2. Click the Remove Remove icon icon to remove an existing action.
  3. Click + Add below a triggering event section to add an action.

To hide the editing tools on the Automation page:

  1. Click the Read-only button. 
Course, Automation, Course tab with the Read-only button highlighted as well as the Edit and Remove buttons highlighted in the Enrollment actions section

Groups

The Automation tab in groups allows group administrators to quickly view all rules that have been set up for a group.

To enable the Automation tab for a group:
  1. Access the group.
  2. Click Admin from the group navigation menu.
  3. Click Features from the fly-out menu.
  4. Select the Automation checkbox. 
Group, Admin, Features tab with the Automation checkbox selected and highlighted

The Automation feature is now enabled for the group. To see the rules for the group. 

  1. Click Automation on the course navigation menu.

All of the actions for the group display.

  1. Click Edit to modify or add actions directly from the Automation page.
Group, Automation page with the Edit button highlighted

After clicking Edit, you can add actions that are triggered when members are added or removed from the group. To add an action:

  1. Click + Add in the triggering event section.

You can also modify existing rules:

  1. Click the Edit Edit icon icon to edit an existing action.
  2. Click the Remove Remove icon icon to remove an existing action.

To hide the editing tools on the Automation page:

  1. Click the Read-only button. 


Using filters with rules

You can add one or more optional filters to any rule action to further refine which users the action will apply to. To add a filter to an action:

  1. Click + Add action in a triggering event section.
  2. Click the + icon in the from the Filters section.

The Filters fields display.

  1. Select a field from the first drop-down list.
  2. Select a condition from the second drop-down list such as 'contains', 'equals', and 'in'.
  3. Type a filtering term.
  4. To add another filter, click the + button.
    1. The + button adds an "and" statement, meaning the user must meet all criteria for the action to take effect.
  5. To cancel a filter click the X button.
  6. Click the Save icon save icon to save your filters for future use.
Add action pop-up, Filters section with a First name and Last name filter example and the Save icon highlighted

Saving filters allows you to reuse it with other actions. 

Add action pop-up, Filters section with the predefined filters drop-down menu active and three saved filters listed

To delete a filter:

  1. Click the Delete Delete icon icon.
Add action pop-up, Filters section with a filter listed and the delete icon highlighted

When filters are in place, the action only applies to users that satisfy the requirements of the filter. 

Group, Automation page with an action highlighted that includes a filter