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2024 Post 2 - Summer Update

2024 Post 1 - Update for Eclipse Day

2023 Final Update.

2023 End Of Year Report

On The Road To Somewhere

Gonna Find Out

moving forward

Sometimes It Happens to the Best of Us

Summer Surges

And The Beat Goes On

What It Takes

Winter Words

Autumn Updates

Jewel Eye

Gone is April, Come what May

Spring Is Springing

Happy New Year

Still Here And Moving Along

Changing the World - Tag, You're It!

Gimme Shelter-(in-place)

We may all be working from home, but we’re still working hard. Since March, we have pushed a number of updates, improving usability, updating code, and fixing bugs. We also have pressed forward with our efforts to refactor the objectives system to allow for the tagging of objectives with vocabulary terms, the expansion of the offerings manager to include better tools, including the ability to attach individual learners and site management, and much more. Our accessibility score has been improved to a notable 98.7%, and we look forward to continuing these improvements through the rest of the year.

COVID-19 Days

New Year New News

Happy Holidays

November Delights

“After a good dinner one can forgive anybody, even one’s own relations.” ― Oscar Wilde

October Surprises

Search Has Landed

So...Where're We At?

Glad you asked!

Independently Yours

With the latest release, v3.67.0, we have taken the “experimental” flag off the new search API. While it isn’t yet exposed, it will soon be available to hosted Ilios schools. If you are running ilios locally, please contact us before looking to implement, as there are some significant additional tools and systems required.

Sneak Peek

Thank You, Ilios Man

It's May

“It’s May, it’s May, the lusty month of May…”

Sharing is Caring

STATUS:

• current version: 3.64.2
• API Updates: deprecation of program and program year publish attributes
• Notable new features and improvements: improved learning material search/filtering; improved competency/program objective linkage display; improved naming conventions and labeling; improved offerings editor form.
• next scheduled release: 4/18/2019

At Last Lots Links

Welcome to the New Way

STATUS:

• current version: 3.60.0
• next scheduled release: 2/13/2019

Happy Holidays - updated

Keep Calm

Velocity

STATUS:

• current version: 3.55.0
• next scheduled release: 10/05/2018

Summer Speed and Super Leaps

STATUS:

• current version: 3.53.1
• next scheduled release: 8/30/2018

Keeping Up

STATUS:

• current version: 3.51.0
• next scheduled release: 8/10/2018

Independence Day Is On The Way

STATUS:

• current version: 3.50.0
• next scheduled release: 7/13/2018

Sum Sum Summertime

STATUS:

• current version: 3.49.0
• next scheduled release: 6/21/2018

New Permissions

STATUS:

• current version: 3.48.0
• next scheduled release: 5/11/2018

4 18 1906, 5:12am, or just 4 20

STATUS:

• current version: 3.47.0
• next scheduled release: 4/27/2018

It's all in the delivery

STATUS:

• current version: 3.45.3
• next scheduled release: 3/16/2018

Happy New Year, From Team ilios!

The Ilios team welcomes you to the new year, and the first release of 2018, v3.42.0, which adds further permissions improvements, enhanced data for your downloaded reports, a calendar view for learner groups, and bunch of other improvements to start the year off right.

Filter This, Mr. CoffeeMan!

Latest updates!

Ilios v3.40.0 has just been released, with a ton of bugfixes, performance enhancements, and improvements to the mobile experience. We’re still keeping a low profile in order to focus on the new permissions work, and do housekeeping as we move into the holiday season. Also, please check out the latest weekly update for information regarding our new policy around PHP version support.

Hush, Keep it down now - Clones are scary!

Did you know you can copy / clone any learner group, along with all of its members? Well, you can!

v3.38.0 Now Available (for a limited time only!)

We are pleased to announce the immediate release of Ilios v3.38.0. This release provides two key new features:

v3.37.0 Now Available (on VHS CD & Betamax)

We are pleased to announce the immediate release of Ilios v3.37.0. This minor point release provides a number of bugfixes and enhancements. In addition, this will be the final Ilios release which actively supports MS Internet Explorer 11. Ilios continues to support the most current version of all major browsers – including Microsoft Edge – with this and future releases.

v3.36.1 Released

We are pleased to announce the immediate release of Ilios v3.36.1. This minor point release provides a number of bugfixes and enhancements, notably the addition of the ability to view PDF materials either inline or as a download, and the inclusion of user calendars on every profile page.

Tips & Tricks

Did you know you can…

• Customize the header, colors, and logos for your Ilios installation?
• Copy teaching sessions from one course to another?
• View another user’s calendar? (if you have admin privileges)
• See the weighted value of course objectives by time spent?

Buttons

We are pleased to announce the launch of v3.34.0, which includes a nice revamp of our dashboard calendar tools look&feel, along with a number of other enhancements. We also are thrilled to announce the launch of our new LTI component, allowing the ilios dashboard calendar, week at a glance, and activities/materials agendas to be plugged in directly to your LMS pages. To get the LTI, please contact us for instructions and a key to securely authenticate your systems at support@iliosproject.org.

UPDATE: please note that this is the final PHP 5.x compatible release of Ilios. Beginning in July 2017, all new releases of Ilios will require a minimum of PHP 7.x, as PHP 5 has reached end of life.

Questions? Comments? Good Jokes? Let us know what you think at: support@iliosproject.org!

Summertime

We’ve been a little quiet the last couple weeks, so I thought it would be good to let you all know that while quiet, we aren’t on vacation on some warm tropical beach in a hammock sipping drinks served in coconuts (as pleasant as that sounds!) We released Ilios v3.33.0 recently, which is available for immediate download and deployment. And we’ve been working away on a number of exciting developments, including some new exposure to the backend CI mapping tools, and an LTI component for Moodle, Canvas, and other LMS systems.

We will be officially launching and announcing all these great updates in our next cycle, but right now it’s the slow summer season, and we continue to focus on our work from the undisclosed secure location of the Ilios bunker.

In the meantime, enjoy the new Session Type Management tools and the other latest greatest updates, and look out for more good stuff soon!

Let us know what you think at: support@iliosproject.org!

In Colors Everywhere

We are extremely pleased to announce the release of Ilios v3.32.0, available for immediate download and deployment.

Along with a number of data improvements and bugfixes, this release includes the new ability to manage session types and their associated calendar colors directly in the UI, via the school administration page; and the first pilot introduction of native Ilios Course Data Visualizations – this one showing the weighted instructional time value of a course’s objectives.

Let us know what you think at: support@iliosproject.org!

What Have You Done For Me Lately?

We are extremely pleased to announce today’s update to v3.31.0.

This update includes a bunch of improvements, including updates to the Week at a Glance feature, additions to the My Materials view, a ton of minor adjustments, cleanups, and enhancements that will make the Ilios experience for all users that much better.

Let us know what you think at: support@iliosproject.org!

At a Glance

We are extremely pleased to announce today’s update to v3.30.0.

Along with some critical code updates, significant bugfixes, and some nice feature adds, we have introduced our new “Week at a Glance” view for the dashboard. This provides a week-by-week consolidated view of activities for each learner, along with the Activities, Materials, and Calendar views previously available.

More information is available here: http://eepurl.com/cKiL1r

We think you will like it.

Let us know at: support@iliosproject.org!

A New Re-Order

It’s St. Patrick’s Day, and in honor of this auspiciously green day, we provide the following Q&A:

• Re-ordering of Learning Materials? –> Sure Thing!

• Re-ordering of Objectives? –> In the backend now, coming to your frontend next week!

• Brand New API Docs? –> Yeah, baby!

• New session attributes and the ability to configure which get used/displayed? –> Yes indeedy!

It’s all in today’s update to v3.29.0.

Let us know what you think: support@iliosproject.org!

I Need Answers!

Wondering what’s possible with Ilios? Have questions whether you can do what you want with your course information? A good place to start looking for answers is in our FAQs page of the wiki (https://github.com/ilios/ilios/wiki/FAQS). The FAQs – and the whole wiki – contain tons of information about what is possible, what is available, and simply what things mean in Ilios. We encourage you to take a look, and if you have questions, don’t hesitate to drop us a line at suppor@iliosproject.org and let us know!

What's Up

So, where are we with progress on Ilios, you might ask? Well, let me tell you! Things are going great. Today we’ve released the update v3.28.0, with the ability to sort the display order of learning materials, improved upstream code libraries, and much more.

Terms of Reporting

Today we’ve updated to v3.26.0, which implements reports for all vocabulary terms in the MyReports tool. To find out what reports are available, please visit our reports grid.

Mo Betta' - No Beta!

The world may seem a cold place right now, but warm your hearts with the news that our latest update, v3.25.0, is now available for download.

New Year Updates

Happy 2017!

End of Year Updates

Winter Is Coming. Oh, and v3.23.0.

What's New?

Q: Can I Access All My Learning Materials?:

How Do I Get The Latest Greatest?

Q: How Do I Update My Ilios Frontend?:

Turn off your babycam, turn on your Ilios v3.21

Like much of the country we were severely impacted by the massive DDoS attack on Dyn and the DNS upstream controls of the internet on Friday the 21st. This left us unable to complete our regular code release that day (or get out our newsletter, or update this site!). However, with the babycam and toaster cyber-army in abeyance for the moment, we are pleased to announce the release today of Ilios v3.21. This is update reflects a number of significant improvements and enhancements to the system and the API, including:

Version 3.20.0 is here. Hello, October!

This week we are pleased to announce the release of v3.20.0. This release includes a number of great updates and enhancements to both front and backend, including:

This Week In Ilios

This week there is no version upgrade to the Ilios code / API, but if you are on the latest release (v3.19.0) we have added some nice updates to the frontend.

v3.18.2 now available - Security Update

This week we are releasing an update to address a number of backend security issues and vulnerabilities. The items address in this release, v3.18.1, are listed below.

“Curriculum Inventory Tools are Here!”

We are very happy to announce the latest update to Ilios, v3.17.0, and a host of great updates to the interface. Among the newly introduced features:

v3.16.0 is now available

We are very happy to announce the latest updates to Ilios, which include an update to v3.16.0, and a host of great updates to the interface. Among the newly introduced features:

Monthly Status

We are happy to report that we have now released version 3.15, and brought numerous improvements and feature updates to the frontend and API. This update drops support for PHP 5.5, which has reached end of life and is no longer supported, and moves us to a new baseline requirement of PHP 5.6, as noted below. Before updating to this version, please make sure that your server systems are running PHP 5.6 or greater.

Talk To Us

Interested in chatting with the Ilios team and users? Have a question that needs answering? Now you can chime in directly in our Slack channel! You can join by going here to sign in to our channel: https://ilios-slack.herokuapp.com/

We look forward to seeing you there!

Updates! Updates! Get yer fresh hot updates here!

Ilios v3.13 is now launched and available in the wild. Lots of housecleaning and feature improvement in this point update, as well as the (non-breaking) move to API v1.5, to prepare the way for next month’s curriculum inventory report tools release.

As always, please feel free to contact us at support@iliosproject.org if you have any questions about this or any other release. You can see the full details of this release in the latest release announcement here.

You Want Sticky Filters? You Got Sticky Filters!

You want streamlined Learner Group management? You got streamlined learner group management. Better course sorting? You betcha. And an updated API and API documentation? Oh yeah. It’s Ilios v3.12!

As always, please feel free to contact us at support@iliosproject.org if you have any questions about this or any other release. You can see the full details of this release in the latest release announcement here.

May Updates and v3.11

Hi all! We are pleased to announce the release of version 3.11. This update includes API performance improvements and upgrades, and a number of frontend improvements and cleanups. Please feel free to contact us at support@iliosproject.org if you have any questions about this or any other release. You can see the full details of this release in the latest release announcement here.

Just as an aside, as I write this update, we are busy in our monthly Ilios Codejam at a top-secret, undisclosed offsite location (a.k.a. any spot nearby with decent wireless, somewhere the group can work together, and proximity to food). But if you’d ever like to be a part of our codejams, just let us know, and we will link you in, either in person or virtually: the more contributors we have, the better the system becomes!

Version 3.9 is live

This week, we are pleased to announce the release of version 3.9. This update includes some minor modifications and additions to the API, as well as a raft of important additions and updates to the associated frontend code.

There will be an additional bunch of great frontend followup updates next week as well (but no backend updates). If you have questions about the current code deployment model of backend vs frontend, or any questions regarding deployment, please give us a shout at support@iliosproject.org and we’ll be happy to get you sorted out!

we have added a number of filters and refinements to the API endpoints and backend code, allowing faster and more effective retrieval of data. In the associated frontend code release, we now have a major expansion of user management tools, for addition and editing of users, as well as management tools for the new tagging vocabularies.

We also, along the way:

• corrected a bunch of bugs

• added some UI enhancements

  For more information, and download links, check out the latest release announcement here

Version 3.8 is now available

We are pleased to announce the release of version 3.8. This release launches our new expanded tagging vocabularies, which allow for custom topics and related tags to be created. These tags can be structured in categories with internal hierarchies of parent and child tags, to allow for very rich data mapping.

What is also available via the vocabularies is the Medbiquitous list of instructional resources, for addition to courses and sessions as desired. These are input as a single vocabulary set via script, and will be mapped to the Curriculum Inventory tools in time for upload this year if desired.

We’ve also provided a bunch of UI improvements, bug fixes, and under the hood improvements. If you have questions, let us know!

The newly released code, as well as the complete changelog, is available here: https://github.com/ilios/ilios/releases/tag/v3.8.0:

A General Update

No release this week, but while we are waiting for a few final fixes to push out the next bundle of updates, I wanted to give you a sense of where we are at with development:

As noted previously, our current sprint will allow us to launch v1.2 of the Ilios API, which will make it possible to expose our new tagging vocabulary model. Other items in the works include improvements to learner groups – we have put back in the ability to auto-generate sub groups – as well as further advancement of our user and school management tools. These include at long last the ability to manage some of your basic lookup data at the school level via the Ilios interface, rather than resorting to directly managing that data in the database. The first of these is our competency manager, which along with the vocabulary manager will allow the editing and management of competencies, topics, the new AAMC/Medbiquitous list of instructional resources, and any additional tagging vocabularies that your school may add or customize.

We will be releasing a ton of new features in the coming weeks as well — user management for LDAP directory connections, course cloning and rollover from the UI, and our new improved Curriculum Inventory tools among them, as well as an improved MeSH parsing tool to let you more easily update your MeSH information to the most current data NLM offers — so keep an eye open and an ear to the ground, and if you have a chance, let us know what you think!

Our Latest Release

As most of you know, we released the latest update to Ilios the other day, version 3.7.0. What’s new?

• Tons of bug fixes!
• Faster performance!
• Ability to create recurring events!
• Calendar icons for recent updates!
• improved print view!

• Automatic delivery of frontend updates! 

  …And lots more as well. Check it out!

Our next sprint will allow us to launch v1.2 of the Ilios API, which will make it possible to expose our new tagging vocabulary model, along with a number of other improvements. Keep an eye out later this month for the next release.

On Students, Ilios, and Digital Literacy

One of the most challenging things in using a tool like Ilios actually has nothing to do with the tool at all. It is a problem with communication and digital literacy, not just among our faculty and educational staff, but (and most significantly) among our students as well.

Let’s face it: Ilios as a tool and a platform is pretty wickedly complex. Lots of moving parts. Thousands (if not millions) of lines of code. Dozens of dependencies….pretty much like any other contemporary application being used as a solution. Even so, most of the complications, user issues, and challenges we have seen coming to the core Ilios team aren’t really about that.

Since the start of the year, the overwhelming majority of issues that have been reported to us around student use of Ilios have revolved around issues of general digital literacy and communication. In some cases, schools and programs have vastly overestimated our students’ native understanding of the tools they use regularly – their mobile phones, laptop computers, and wi-fi networks, for instance – and made assumptions on top of that misunderstanding about how much guidance and orientation they may need to access networks and information here on campus. In other cases, schools and departments have neglected to provide them with even the barest outline of a process by which they can discover the sort of information they need to move ahead: where to go for technical assistance, what to do when they encounter problems accessing information on the web, in their online learning environments, in forums, or getting to a download or streaming presentation.

This is disheartening. But what can we do about it?

Step #1: Better Communication

Even before we starting handing tools to students to help them in their study, we need to be sure that we are telling them clearly not just how to use the tools, but what those tools even are, and how they fit into the landscape of technology and services they need to add to their experience to be successful. That information should start at day one, and must be both consistent in content and over time. The technology ecosystem we work in is complex; with the rapid proliferation of new tools and processes, along with continuing changes in social media use and asynchronous learning models, it is only getting more complicated and dense. It is incumbent on us, as educational technologists, to effectively communicate this complexity to our communities. This is easy to say: it is hard to do. Nevertheless, without effective communications about the things that makes our stuff work – the underpinnings of our systems, rather than the tools themselves – any challenges faced by our users will wind up being both misdirected and ultimately dissatisfied with the solutions they are offered.

Step #2: Know Your Students

It is now pretty well documented that the assumptions made about millennial “native knowledge” around technology and the internet have been wildly off base. Instead of being digital natives, who have an intuitive knowledge of how to use the proliferation of tools they are handed, they are more likely to be digital pilgrims: traveling along the road of technology use, collecting whatever seems to fit but often lacking in the linguistic skills to claim true ownership or mastery. The landscape of technology is shifting under our feet every day (hey - off the top of your head can you describe the difference on how to subscribe to a calendar feed on an iPhone 4s vs iPhone 6 vs iPad mini II vs. HTC One? I know I can’t.) We need to provide easy, single points of access for this type of information for our students. But even more: we need to let the students know that such information even exists, and that they need to know it, and know where to apply it. this means better outreach from educational tech support teams, better orientation for technology use with incoming students, better coordination among support staff in the messaging used to communicate, and better tracking of interactions. Which takes us back to item #1.

Step #3: Don’t Stop

One of the keys to digital literacy is the reinforcement of information and behavior, by both activity as well as passive reinforcement through documentation and training, both formal and informal. What does this mean? At its essence, this means that saying something once, showing something once, training on a system or a tool or a process once, is insufficient. If we correctly understand the level of knowledge and literacy (or lack thereof) on the part of our community, we need to provide ongoing training, continuous reinforcement of knowledge, and the providing documentation.

Is this easy? Of course not. But the systems we are building and integrating are really, really complicated. The multiplicity of applications, data transport systems, proliferating points of failure, not to mention the basic behavioral and usability patterns that need to be absorbed in order to be effective in using systems like Ilios. As much as we all seek the holy grail of usability for educational systems, that will give students, faculty and staff utterly simple, intuitive, and foolproof ways of interacting with data and systems, so far — despite the truly remarkable innovations we have seen in the last decade in digital tools development — so far that grail not only remains elusive, but still appears potentially unachievable without radical simplifications in our pedagogies. And rest assured, that isn’t a trend any of us are seeing.

All of this certainly applies to my core team here, developing and supporting Ilios. But it is my opinion and suspicion that it is more broadly applicable to many, if not most of our technology initiatives which touch the lives and activities of our learners and those of us who facilitate and support their progress.

The Latest Greatest

Another week, another Ilios build, another chance to move ahead…

The past week saw our launch of v3.5, and in light of the rapid changes we have been implementing, I want to share a quote from one of my favorite authors and social commentators, Douglas Adams:

DON'T PANIC!

While we are – with every release – making it more and more fiendishly simple to update your codebase, if you miss a release, there is no need to worry. Catching up is easy, and while we are introducing new features and better tools every week, the vast majority of bugs affecting usage of the system have been cleared out. Six weeks out from the launch of Ilios 3, we are pretty darned pleased to be able to say that the application is stable, solid, and being quite well behaved.

Some of the items we’ve been able to plug in of late: “recently updated” and “draft” icons for the calendar; pagination for session management; collapsing sections for course and session objectives listings; we have also improved processing behavior, cleaned up reams of code, and generally tightened up the application.

Some of the things to look forward to in the coming weeks are memory management improvements, course rollover tools, new tagging management tools, repeat events creation tools, and expanded user administration.

If you have questions about the code or the process, or want advice on how best to keep up with the releases, please let us know and we will be happy to work with you.

The latest code can always be found at https://github.com/ilios/ilios/releases/latest, along with the changelog.

About Our Release Cycle

Just a few words on our current rapid release cycle:

Since ilios v3 was launched back in December, we have been on a highly accelerated release schedule (3.2 and counting!), tagging a new codebase with updates and fixes pretty much every week. Our intention is to continue on this cycle until we reach a plateau of stability and feature-parity with our rather lofty goals; at that point I expect we will slow down (slightly). Our intention though is to maintain a much more rapid (though not breakneck) pace for release, in order to continue to provide more and better tools, features, and support for a 21st century curriculum.

We are learning quite a bit about juggling a system with multiple repositories, not to mention the challenge of keeping our naming conventions and semantic versioning in line.

If you have questions about the code or the process, or want advice on how best to keep up with the releases, please let us know and we will be happy to work with you.

The latest code can always be found at https://github.com/ilios/ilios/releases/latest, along with the changelog.

3.1.0 Now Available

We are please to announce the first update release to Ilios 3: version 3.1.0.

This release includes a number of fixes, corrections, enhancements and updates to the 3.0 release; the full change list and code download is available here: https://github.com/ilios/ilios/releases/tag/v3.1.0:

Please let us know if you have any questions or feedback, and we look forward to providing you with more fixes and enhancements over the coming months!

Happy New Year

Happy New Year! The Ilios team is busy smoothing out the wrinkles in the newborn version 3.0, and are excited to be starting off 2016 with a ton of great initiatives to make Ilios better.

We’ve also been doing some housecleaning in our communications – this new website, the online user guides, and a new system for getting out your updates and alerts – which I hope will improve our ability to communicate and share information among the community quickly and seamlessly. Please let us know if you have further suggestions or feedback!

New User Guide

In order to make your life easier, we have published the first draft of our 3.0 user guide as an online interactive book. You can now click thru and navigate more easily from section to section, search for just what you need, and of course download it to peruse at your leisure as you have always been able to do. More importantly, this format allows us to rapidly update the document as needed in order to respond to changes and updates, and to provide you with pretty much instant access to those updates.

So What's Next?

With the public launch of the Ilios 3 codebase, API, and frontend, you may be asking yourself “Dang! What will they be up to next?”

Official Release: We Made It!

We are very pleased to announce that Ilios version 3.0.0 is now available for download.

Ilios 3 is here!

The latest prerelease of the Ilios 3 code is now available for download and testing. Please use this download link to see the current release and notes for the core code and API.

Ilios 3 is coming!

We have encountered some delays, but the much-anticipated next generation of Ilios is on its way. While we still have some significant development tasks ahead, the core of the course management and mapping system is complete and in the final stages of testing. We expect more news in just a matter of weeks. Stay tuned!

AAMC Medical Education Meeting in Chicago

For those of you attending the AAMC Medical Education Meeting in Chicago this week, November 6-7 : I will be available for one-on-one meetings, general catching up, Q&A, drop-in times, and any issues or discussions Ilios-related. If you’d like to schedule some time, please don’t hesitate to let me know at sascha.cohen@ucsf.edu, or via info@iliosproject.org. And of course, you can always just give us a shout if you want to talk about anything or have any questions. We really do like to hear from you!

Version 2.4.8 Released

We are pleased to announce the release of version 2.4.8, available now for download and installation.

Version 2.4.7 Released

We are pleased to announce the release of the latest upgrade to Ilios, version 2.4.7.

User Tutorials Available

Interested in some great user tutorials? Check out our collection of articulate videos here: https://moodle.ucsf.edu/course/view.php?id=3370