2019 D2L Connection: Dublin Edition 4th annual European D2L Connection; a professional learning opportunity for educators, corporate training professionals, and D2L employees. Wednesday-Thursday, October 9-10, 2019 at O’Reilly Hall, University College Dublin (UCD) Track 1: Integrations & Extensibility in Brightspace: Creating your ed-tech ecosystem, Louise Plunkett, Senior Solutions Engineer, D2L

1. Connection
DUBLIN

2. Integrations & Extensibility in Brightspace:
Creating your ed-tech ecosystem
Louise Plunkett
Senior Solutions Engineer, D2L EMEA
Connection | Dublin

3. D2L Standard CSV

4. ‘Near’ real-time
processing of formatted
CSV batch files
Creation of courses,
users, and enrollments.1
D2L STANDARD CSV
What is it?
• D2L Standard CSV is a replacement to the legacy Standard CSV approach for SIS, HRIS integrations for
managing courses, users & enrolments
Why have we changed the service?
• To keep inline with our All-In AWS strategy
• To upgrade our Communication, Logging, and Processing methods
How is it improved for you?
• Allows live monitoring of the processing queues using SaaS technology
• Extends the legacy IPSIS processing by removing limitations (i.e. only 2 roles can be supported, legacy)
• Near-real time batch processing

5. D2L Standard CSV: Batch File Transfer
Use batch files (CSV) to send instructions from your SIS into
Brightspace as a scheduled process.
You work with your SIS to assemble the data files
The users, courses, and enrollment actions are done in Brightspace
You (or the SIS) load the
files into the SFTP site
You upload the files directly into
the Brightspace interface
Brightspace retrieves and processes the data files
approximately 10 minutes after upload

6. Connection | Dublin
What New Features are Available with D2L Standard CSV?
• Drag & Drop Dashboard
• Enhanced Batch Completion Email Notifications
• Unlimited Roles provisioning & mapping
• Enhanced Special Character support
• Brightspace for Parents Support
• Manager Dashboard – User Attributes support

7. Connection | Dublin
New! Drag & Drop Dashboard
• Zip your CSV files and drop
directly into the dashboard for
real-time triggering
• Increased frequency for Files sent
to SFTP for processing: we
monitor the SFTP in 10 minute
intervals
• Summary/Status/Batch Errors
highlighted in Dashboard & can
be sent to administrators via
email

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New! Enhanced Batch Summary Emails
Processed Successfully Processed with Errors

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New! IPSIS Configuration Updates
• Roles Provisioning - unlimited• Manage your SFTP Password from the Configuration page

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Auto-Copy from Master Course
• Auto-copy course from master (using implicit business logic)
• Relies on the Brightspace copy course APIs

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New! Update Unique ID in Dashboard
• Can now manually update a unique ID/User Source ID

12. LTI v1.3 & LTI Advantage

13. Connection | Dublin
What is LTI and What can it do for your VLE?
LTI (Learning Tools Interoperability) allows Brightspace to easily and securely connect with third parties and
eliminates the need to manage multiple sets of login credentials for different websites/tools.
A launch can include context-passing from Brightspace to the tool so that the user experience is based on the role of
that user and the course where they launched the tool from.
LTI is pluggable, no additional integration is required besides the initial configuration.

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LTI v1.3 & LTI Advantage – Where We Are!
• LTI v1.3 is the Core LTI certification level
• Learning Tools can be LTI v1.3 certified
• LMS can only be LTI Advantage Complete (LTI v1.3 core
launch + 3 additional services)
• As of September 2019, D2L are LTI Advantage Complete
certified!

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What Do LTI v1.3 & LTI Advantage Offer?
Modernized security model (OAuth2 and JSON Web Tokens).
IMS moved the security framework into a separate model, so
that current and future specifications can be updated
independently. This way as security mechanisms evolve,
specifications will not need to change and vice versa.
Recognize similar functionality to legacy specifications, but the
extension names have changed to better describe their
functionality.
Extensions can be layered on top of LTI launch, allowing them
to be enabled or disabled independently

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LTI v1.3 Security/Authorisation Changes
• LTI 1.3 uses asymmetric JSON Web Token (JWT) keys & JSON Web Key Set
(JWKS) instead of key and secret
Brightspace
Public key (jwks_uri)
Tool

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LTI & OpenID Authorisation

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LTI Advantage - Extensions
Assignment and
Grade Service
Deeplinking
Names & Roles
Provisioning
AGS – Assignment and Grade
Service provides the tool a
sandboxed Grade Item
Management experience.
Tools can seamlessly add,
edit & delete asscoiations for
grade items maintained via
integration
Deep Linking provides the
course builder a selector to
pick, search, or create
content and add to
Brightspace.
The tool returns the content
type (link, file, pdf, etc.) and
the display criteria (iframe,
window, embed).
Securely share course class
list information with the
requesting tool to provide
administrators a basis for
who has used the tool and
importantly, who has not.

19. Connection | Dublin
LTI Advantage: Assignment & Grade Service
The Assignment and Grade Service supports
decoupled grade items. This allows tools to
create grade items not associated with a
specific LTI link.

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LTI Advantage: Assignment & Grade Service
AGS allows to post scores, post comments and get scores
Tool

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LTI Advantage: Deeplinking
Deep Linking provides the course builder a selector to pick, search, or create content and add to
Brightspace.
The tool returns the content type (link, file, pdf, etc.) and the display criteria (iframe, window,
embed).

22. Connection | Dublin
LTI Advantage: Deeplinking
•Tools can add grades items for activities that are expected
to receive grades.
•
• "https://purl.imsglobal.org/spec/lti/claim/message_type": "LTIDeepLinkingResponse",
• "https://purl.imsglobal.org/spec/lti-dl/claim/data": “1.3.0",
• "https://purl.imsglobal.org/spec/lti-dl/claim/content_items": [{
• …
• "lineItem": {
• "scoreMaximum": 87,
• "resourceId": "xyzpdq1234",
• "tag": "originality"
• },
• …
Declarative creation of line item (gradebook column)
Tool

23. Connection | Dublin
LTI Advantage: Names & Roles Provisioning
• Securely share course class list information with the requesting tool to
provide administrators a basis for who has used the tool and importantly,
who has not.
GET read-only
ToolBrightspace

24. Connection | Dublin
LTI Workflow: Brightspace Updates
What are we doing?
Phased roll out
July 2019 – LTI 1.3 launch + Assignment and Grades
Sept. 2019 – Deep Linking
Oct. 2019 - Names and Roles Provisioning
Oct. 2019 - New Link type: widget
Next – Copy Course Update (best practices)
Dec. 2019 - API support
Under investigation – Auto-migrate existing LTI links to 1.3 registered tools, Data Hub reporting
LTI Advantage Complete!
What are tools doing?
Adoption over time
~21 tools certified
Tools in development now or planned work on
roadmap
Small tools may be deemed unsafe and be
deprecated

25. Connection | Dublin
LTI Workflow: Brightspace Updates
Roles and Permissions:
2 additional permissions → External Learning Tools

26. LTI Workflow: Brightspace Updates
LTI Advantage separates the Registration and Deployment of a tool.
Registration
Each tool must be registered. The registration is where the OIDC, scopes (ie. extensions) and
JWKS are exchanged between Brightspace and the tool.

27. LTI Workflow: Brightspace Updates
Deployment
Each tool can have many deployments. Extensions, data to be sent and available
org units are defined here.

28. LTI Workflow: Brightspace Updates
Links
Each deployment can have many links, created at the ORG and shared down, or
created at the course level.

29. LTI Workflow: Brightspace Updates
Ad Hoc Links
Links can be created from Course Admin → External Learning Tools or on the fly from Content →
External Tool Activity
Links are bound to an existing 1.1 or 1.3 tool

30. Helpful Updates & Articles
Brightspace Community Links:
https://community.brightspace.com/s/article/Upcoming-changes-to-D2L-
Standard-CSV
https://community.brightspace.com/s/article/Intro-to-LTI-Advantage
https://community.brightspace.com/s/article/LTI-1-3-Launch-and-
Authentication
IMS Global:
https://www.imsglobal.org/activity/learning-tools-interoperability