How to block 'trash mouths' and bullies, from Moodle IM!
Written by Ken Task
It is in MHO, that turning off things like IM for a class or the entire site is punishing all students for the actions of a few. Thus had embarked on a quest to find a way, to allow the students who CAN behave in IM to continue to use it, and BLOCK students who have demonstrated they cannot behave in that environment. 2 cases: 'trash mouths' and bullies.
So here's the fix (basic outline):
1. duplicate the authenticated users role renaming the duplicate student_noim
2. edit the student_noim role taking away ANY and ALL abilities to see:
profile or blocks related to IM (participants, messages, online users).
3. set the permissions on the various blocks in the course that lead to IM in such a fashion, where the role student_noim cannot view (override).
Tricky part ... add the offending students to the student_noim role (that's a system wide role). Then remove students from the students role in the courses where they need restriction. Doing it this way means the students are NEVER removed from the course - which might also loose their grades!!!!
At this point I had mistakenly thought all was well. The only way such students could re-gain access to IM was conditional and the site just so happen to have those conditions just right … running my moodle.
When running My Moodle, students are presented with a page that list only their courses. But they are also presented with a button for 'Edit this page' and through editing their own my moodle page, they could turn on those blocks which related to IM: participants, messages.users online.
THE FIX!
This involves hacking some of the core code - not much - and as such, it is highly recommend backing up the moodle instance first before applying the fix.
The only way to stop NO_IM students from the 'Edit this page' button was to comment out some code in my/pagelib.php
On line 59, the original line:
print_header($title, $header,$navigation,'','',true, $button, $loggedinas.$langmenu);
Edited to the following:
print_header($title, $header,$navigation,'','',true);
//, $button, $loggedinas.$langmenu);
Now when NO IM students login, they no longer see the 'Edit' button. Note: this also removes the button for all students, but the other students CAN see the blocks in the course so it's a minor one-more-click to get to the IM.
Original resource:
http://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=128333
NOTE: this has been implemented in a functioning/working Moodle for High School with no issues (cept the NO IM students complaining!).
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