How to keep versions of your courses

Once your course(s) have been created in Nimble Author you may want to make changes to the original version - for example:

• Amend statistics (if applicable)
• Change imagery
• Amend any typos and/or update information (i.e. legislation) 
• Add/delete pages etc.

But you might have learners who are currently part way through the course(s), or you may want to make changes to a course in the background, without effecting those learners who are currently enrolled - this can be achieved by creating multiple versions of your course(s).

We would also suggest adding version numbers to your course(s) i.e. to course titles, course overviews and course information areas, so that it is easy to keep track of the latest version, to ensure you are enrolling learners onto the most up to date version of that course(s).

In addition to this, creating a version control register will also help you to keep track of the versions of your course(s), as well as provide the dates these courses were released/amended/updated. Should you need to refer to this information at a later date, you will have a record that is easily accessible (and will also be handy should you need it for auditing purposes).

Creating multiple versions of your course

You can easily create multiple versions of your course by using the 'duplicate this course' feature via course settings - this is also covered in the following article: How to duplicate a Nimble Author course.

How to duplicate your course and add version numbers

To access the course settings page:

1. From the Nimble LMS home screen, click the Courses button.

2. Locate the course you’d like to access the settings for and click the button.

      3. Click the Duplicate this course button.

      4. Enter the same name as the course that currently exists, i.e. Company Induction, but this time add              'V2' or similar to the course title, to distinguish that it is another version of that course(s).

     5. At this point you can also add a course overview that contains the version number and release                 date of the course (optional).

    6. Click the confirm button.

Within a few moments your course should be duplicated, with a "Successfully duplicated course!" message.  You should find your duplicate in the same folder as the original course.

NOTE: You will need to publish your duplicated course before your learners can access it.

Adding the version number to the course information

You can also add the version number and date released to be visible within the course(s) itself by adding it to the course information section of the course(s) - this is also covered in the following article:
How to add course information.

To add your course information:

1. From the bar that runs down the left of the side menu, click the Learner resources button.
2. From the side menu, click Course information.

3. Select the text area and type your text or copy and paste it from another programme, such as Microsoft Word and include the current version number or update the existing version number.

You can format your title text using the toolbar that appears above the text area.

To apply formatting to your text:

4. Select the text you’d like to format.
5. Select the format you’d like to apply from the toolbar.

The formatting options, from left to right, are:

	Bold
	Italic
	Underline
	Numbered list
	Bulleted list
	External link

6. Click the in the top-right to return to return to your course. 

How your learners interact with it

To access the course information, your learners:

7. Click the course menu.
8. Click Course information.

Creating a version control register

It is a good idea to keep a 'version control register' listing all of your course names and their versions. So that you have a record that can be looked back on - you know which version of the course is the latest for your learners (especially important if your course contains statistics as these can become out of date).

This register can easily be created in Microsoft Excel (or Word) and just needs to contain a few details; such as: Course name, year of creation and the version number, previous and current, along with the date of release, see below for an example:

You can also add 'notes' to these cells to contain additional information such as; Course released, version and date. 

on the next version of the course, what was then changed i.e. refreshed content, updated imagery etc., the course version, and date of change.

To see these notes hover over any cell that contains them to display. 

To add these notes, right click on the relevant cell and click 'insert notes' option, this will bring up an empty text box to enter your notes. You can also then edit and delete these notes.

To edit, click on the cell that contains the note, this will display the text box and type to replace and overwrite an existing text or add new.

To delete, click on the cell that contains the note, right click and select 'Delete note'.

Archiving your old versions of courses

You can archive the older versions of your course(s) by using folders, and adding a new folder to your account called 'Archived' - this is also covered in the following article: How to add a new folder.

To add a new folder:

1. From the Nimble LMS home screen, select the Courses button.

2. Select .

3. Complete the required fields:

• Name – So here you would enter 'Archived' or 'ARCHIVED'.
• Weight – By default, your folders are sorted in alphabetical order, we would suggest putting your archived folder to the bottom - to do this you can assign your folders a weight. Instead of using this, we’d recommend that you just drag and drop the folder to the right place once you’ve saved it.
• Visibility – By default, your folders are visible to learners, if you want to set this folder as hidden, you can. Click here for an explanation of how visibility works.

1. Select the button. Smashing – you’ve added the Archived folder.

Disabling a course

You can also disable your course via the course settings page to make versions of your course(s) unavailable for learners to access, (this will only remove it from their course list and they will no longer be  accessible to them, but learners results will still be visible on the account).
Please note: learners will still be enrolled onto the course(s) until either:

• Learners are unenrolled
• Learners are deleted
• Course is deleted or,
• Course is re-enabled.

This is also covered in the following article: How to disable or re-enable a course.

You may wish to also unenrol learners from this version of the course, and/or archive their results. See the following articles: How to unenrol learners from a course and How to archive learners existing results via unenrol or reset on a course.

To access the course settings page:

1. From the Nimble LMS home screen, click the Courses button.

2. Locate the course you’d like to access the settings for and click the  button.

3. From the Course status field, select:

• Offline – Your course will be inaccessible to any learners enrolled onto it.

4. Save your changes by clicking the button at the bottom of the page. 

Please note: To allow your learners to see this version of the course(s) again if required, you will need to re-enable the course by setting 'course status' back to 'Live' in step 3' above and saving these changes.