The Latitude Learning Team announces the latest release of the Latitude Learning LMS. This release (version 2.5.1.62618) was promoted to production on Monday, June 18th and included the following updates and enhancements...

LMS ENHANCEMENTS

Messages - Message Administration Add-On - This powerful new add-on capability provides portal administrators with a set of administrative tools that can be used to further customize and manage the set of default LMS messages. With this add-on in place, administrators can access the new 'Customize Messages' area under Site Management, allowing them to:

• View the Message Event information (e.g. Course Enrollment - Student Waitlisted)
• View the Message Description (Purpose of this message event in the LMS)
• View the Default Message content and settings
• View and manage the Message Type (e-Mail and/or On-Page Message Center)
• View and manage the Message Status (Active or Inactive)
• Customize key elements of the selected message, including: Current Translation, Subject and Body Content, 'From' and 'Reply To' information, as well as roles and email addresses that should be included as a carbon copy (cc) or blind carbon copy (bcc) every time this message is generated
• Restore the message to its default settings and content

...And editing messages is easy.  Similar to the customizable content areas of your LMS, this set of enhancements includes a built-in HTML editor, providing a powerful, easy-to-use set of tools for modifying message content. Incorporate rich text and embed URL links, as well as targeted graphics as needed. Finally, this toolset provides a 'Send Test Message to Self' option, allowing an authorized administrator to send him/herself a related test message generated by the LMS. This functionality is initially being released with limited availability; additional information will follow upon general availability.

Courses - Extended 'Link to Classroom' Action Button Availability 'Enhancement – As noted during our last release, functionality was enhanced providing a new ‘Link to Classroom' (webinar) option was promoted for limited release. This is used to help administrators configure course offerings with links to external webinar products. Once configured, instructors and students can link to webinars/webinar sites via a “Link to Classroom” button provide on the Offering details page. Previously, this button would become hidden once the offering roster was processed and the offering was closed. However with this release, functionality has been updated to extend availability/visibility of the 'Link to Classroom' action button for users viewing offering details for a closed offering. This allows administrators to publish an updated URL that can provide link-out access to post-session materials and/or playback of a recorded event.

Courses - Days Due and Reminder Days Enhancements - This set of updates enhances automated course management and messaging functionality by providing portal administrators with two new definable fields when adding or editing courses in the LMS:

• Days for Student to Complete (Due Date) Field - The first allows the administrator to define a number of 'Days for Student to Complete (Due Date)' for a given course. Here the authorized portal administrator can leave blank, or choose to enter a numeric value that the LMS will use to help determine a 'due date' once a user has enrolled in a given course (any delivery type). Each night the LMS will evaluate active user transcripts and in the event the user has reached the due date, the LMS will automatically notify the enrolled student, as well as his/her immediate supervisor(s) based on superior position assignment and portal administrator(s) affiliated with that LMS. Although the LMS generates messaging based on the days due, it leaves the user enrollment otherwise intact.
• Days Before Due Date to Remind Student Field - This second field works in conjunction with the days due field mentioned above, allowing portal administrators to define a set of reminder days. This functionality works very much like the Offering reminder days, allowing the administrator to enter a single numeric value, or a set of comma-separated numeric values that will be used by the LMS to auto-generate reminders to the enrolled student that his/her due date is approaching. Currently, these messages only target the enrolled student-user; messaging to supervisor and administrator is only escalated on the due date mentioned earlier.

Help - Link to FAQ/instructions on viewing/updating file extensions in Explorer - The Latitude team has updated the standard instructional help content located via the (?) help icon from any course SCORM tab. This enhances the existing set of instructions by providing a link to additional information on how to enable, view and modify file extensions in Internet Explorer (for use in preparing SCORM content files for upload and deployment to the LMS).

Courses - Add User Group as Search Filter for Enroll Others - This update enhances the existing set of course enrollment tools and options available when (batch) enrolling users in a given course. Now, the authorized instructor or administrator can choose from the dropdown list of available User Groups that have been defined in that LMS to provide a target set of user records that can be further selected for enrollment in a given course. This enhancement is available to all LMS portals under the 'Other Filters' from the Enroll Others search page.

Reports - New Training Status Reports: The following new reports were released with limited availability as part of this production post...

• Evidence of Competency Reports: These two new reports (Course and Certification/Curriculum versions) allow administrators to select a target course (or Certification/Curriculum) and display all active users at a location along with current status information. This includes users who have not yet enrolled in a given course (or certification/curriculum), which can be extremely useful in compliance-related tracking and reporting activities. Outputs include Location, Student Name and UserID, as well as Status and last Status Date recorded. In addition, this report can be run at the Division level to provide a location-by-location breakout of results.
• Training Program Status Reports - These two new reports (Course and Curriculum/Certification versions) provide authorized administrators with summary information tied to the set of target locations. Outputs include Location, Number of Active Students, Number of Active Students Who Have Completed, and % of Active Students Who Have Completed (the given course or certification/curriculum track).
  These reports are being promoted to production with limited availability; additional information will be provided upon general availability.

RESOLVED ISSUES

User Password - Auto-generation not functioning as expected - This update addresses an issue reported by portal administrators that the auto-generate password option was not automatically notifying the user when resetting the password from his/her My Details page in the LMS. With this update, the authorized administrator can once again choose a new password or allow the system to auto-generate a password as before.

History – Completion Certificate Update - This update addresses an internally reported issue that noted the course completion certificate link was appearing for certain statuses other than an actual completion (‘Attend’) in the LMS.

Thank you again for your valuable feedback and input into ongoing enhancements to the LMS. For additional information regarding these and other capabilities, please contact the Latitude Learning Support Team at Support@LatitudeLearning.com  .