The tl;dr: What course mode can I use to endable certificates but not require my students to go through the “Photo Verification” process?
I’m running OpenEDX locally using Tutor 15.1. I followed the instructions to activate certificates in a course I am currently creating, but I have no idea what each of the “Course Modes” means, and neither the docs nor Google seem able to explain any of this to me. Maybe you can help.
In the LMS admin, I added the “Course Mode” called “no-id-professional.” I originally did it with just “professional”, but that triggered the photo validation screen upon enrollment - a feature I absolutely can not require for this specific course. Even after switching it to “no-id-professional” I’m prompted to provide photo validation upon enrollment.
First - how do I turn photo validation off? Is it a switch or config value? Or is it tied to specific course modes? Google seems to indicate “Honor” mode won;t trigger the validation, but I don;t even know what the consequences of selecting “Honor Mode” are.
Which leads to my second question - what are these course modes and what do they mean? I could not find any list anywhere that explained any aspect of this. Can you point me in the right direction?
Welcome to the community, it’s great to have you join us!
You’re at no fault here, because certificates are one of the most tricky topics. There are so many use cases for certificates, so many modes, and an ever-changing (evolving/updated) Open edX® platform!
I believe you should be using Honor mode. Is that an option for you?
Honor mode is definitely one of the available options, and that seemed to get rid of the validation step - thank you!
But, the question remains - what are all of these modes intended for and what are the consequences associated with each? Right now the course is free, but I do intend to charge for a different course in the future. Still not sure I want to require a valid ID or diver’s license even then - that seems excessive for my needs.
It’s my pleasure to help @rzazueta. Remember to double-check your learners are all in the correct mode, because when you chop and change modes in /admin, that does not mean your learners mode changes along with it.
To your question about all the different modes. Most of those are implemented/designed/maintained and used by www.edx.org or other advanced Open edX® platforms. There is often no documentation for it. If you use e-commerce, I believe no-id-professional will the one for you.
Most of those are implemented/designed/maintained and used by www.edx.org or other advanced Open edX® platforms. There is often no documentation for it.
That seems… unwise, especially considering those choices impact the learner and educator experience. This is one of those things that I would gladly want to jump into and rectify - the point of open source, after all, is to contribute back tot he community where you can. However, the person asking for the information is most definitely not the person best suited to provide it - that needs to sit with the experts who came up with these modes and programmed their consequences into the edX platform.
Is it documented in the code somewhere perhaps? Maybe someone who knows all about this and was involved in the design can put together a blog post explaining the modes, their purpose, their uses, etc.? Relying on tribal knowledge for this turns it into a gatekeeping device, which I’m guessing is something the folks beyond a platform called “Open edX” would not want to support.
