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EchoVideo: Configuring Brightspace LMS - Integration Overview

Echo360
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EchoVideo has developed multiple interoperability modes with the Brightspace LMS.

The steps below outline a high-level workflow for integrating EchoVideo with Brightspace and link to more specific articles with detailed procedures as needed. The procedures in the linked articles are provided as guidelines to the Brightspace setup process. Refer to the Brightspace documentation for additional details, or contact Brightspace product support for further assistance.

BEFORE YOU BEGIN: You will want to determine if your EchoVideo Courses and Sections will be created separately in EchoVideo and then linked to through the LMS, or if you want to enable the simplified One-Click Provisioning feature for your institution. The One-Click course provisioning automatically creates the course and section in EchoVideo from the LMS link, using the same course code and name as in the LMS. This is designed to accommodate institutions that want to limit administrative involvement in EchoVideo management and use EchoVideo primarily as a content management solution for instructor class materials. You can still create capture schedules for the sections, to record and publish lectures, or allow instructors to generate ad hoc captures for their sections, if lecture capture is part of your institution's workflow. Beyond the one-click course provisioning feature, all other LMS integration steps remain essentially the same and are described below.

Step 1: Add a Brightspace LMS Configuration in EchoVideo

This step sets up an authentication mechanism that allows your Brightspace instance to communicate with your EchoVideo instance. 

To add a Brightspace LMS configuration to EchoVideo

  1. As an EchoVideo Admin, click the Settings icon (it looks like a gear). 
  2. Select Configurations.
    The LMS Configurations page appears by default. 
  3. On the right side of the LMS configurations page, click Configurations, as shown below. 
  4. Click Add Configuration, then select Desire2Learn from the drop-down list, and click Save.
    While the selection option shows Desire2Learn, once the configuration is in place, you can edit the LMS name in the text box, then click SAVE if you prefer it to read Brightspace.

A Brightspace / D2L LMS Configuration appears on the page, as shown in the figure below. The Key, Secret, and URL fields are the values you will copy and paste into Brightspace / D2L for all of your EchoVideo tool configurations.

LMS configurations page with Add Configuration button identified and a Desire2Learn LMS Configuration block showing
 

Step 2: Create an EchoVideo External Learning Tool Provider in Brightspace

Brightspace uses External Learning Tools to integrate with external systems. EchoVideo strongly recommends that the EchoVideo Tool you add to Brightspace be set at the Account level and applied to all descendants within the desired organizations / departments. Adding tool providers at the Account / Organization level (rather than at the individual course level) makes those tools and their functionality available to all courses in the organization(s).  

As a Brightspace admin, navigate to the Account and select the Settings icon from the top right corner. Then select External Learning Tools from the options shown.

Brightspace Admin settings options with External tool link identified as described
 

Complete the fields in the External Tool form using the URL, Key, and Secret values from the EchoVideo LMS Configuration created in Step 1 above.

BE SURE to configure the Security Settings and the Link availability settings properly. At a minimum, EchoVideo requires the user name, user email address, and role. Other selections may aid LTI communication required for future integration, so unless you have a specific reason not to, checking all options is recommended.  You should make the link available to all descendants under the account / organizational unit. See Adding EchoVideo as an External Tool in Brightspace for additional details.

Brightspace LTI tool provider Security settings section of configuration page with options as described
 

Step 3: Enable Content Item Messaging

To enable d2l.Tools.Lti.ContentItemMessaging system configuration variable, click on the admin gear and select Config Variable Browser.
Brightspace Admin options with Config Variable Browser option shown

Then navigate to Tools > Lti ContentItemMessaging and enable it.
Config Variable Browser tools option showing ContentItemMessaging variable for editing as described

Step 4: Create a Remote Plugin for EchoVideo for Embedding Videos

While this step is optional, if you want to allow users to embed EchoVideo videos directly from their EchoVideo content library into Brightspace content windows, you need to create a Remote Plugin that, like the External LTI Tool configured in Step 2, points to your EchoVideo instance using the LMS Configuration field values. The Remote Plugin will provide an EchoVideo option in the Insert Stuff button selections in content windows in Brightspace.

As a Brightspace admin, navigate to the Account and select the Settings icon from the top right corner. Then select Remote Plugins from the options shown.

Brightspace Admin settings options with Remote Plugins link identified as described
 

Complete the fields in the External Tool form using the URL, Key, and Secret values from the EchoVideo LMS Configuration created in Step 1 above.

Create a new Remote Plugin dialog box with fields to complete as described

See Adding an EchoVideo Remote Plugin for Embedding EchoVideo Videos for more specific instructions on creating the plugin and enabling the d2l.Tools.Lti.ContentItemMessaging system configuration variable is not already enabled.

Step 5: Link Brightspace Courses to EchoVideo Sections / Classes

This is potentially the most complicated set of steps in the process, because there are several different ways to go about it, depending on whether it is the Admin or the Instructor who executes it, whether the instructor is exporting EchoVideo analytic data into their Brightspace course gradebook, whether the EchoVideo sections already exist for linking or if one-click course provisioning is turned on, and whether or not additional links beyond just a link to the main EchoVideo section are needed (such as to individual classes).

See Adding an EchoVideo Link to Brightspace courses for information beyond the basic steps provided below.

The basic steps are as follows:

  1. Navigate to a Brightspace course and add a Module to the course content. 
  2. Add an Existing Activity to the module, selecting External Learning Tools, then select the EchoVideo External LTI Tool created in Step 2 above.  
    Brightspace course with new module and adding Existing Activity menu open with External Learning Tools option identified as described
     
  3. Click the external tool link you just created and use the screen that appears to select a Term, Course, and Section in EchoVideo to link this Brightspace course to. See Linking LMS Courses to EchoVideo Sections for additional details. 
    If an Admin performs this step, that user is then enrolled in the EchoVideo section as an Instructor; you may wish to unenroll yourself from these sections later.Echo360 link in Brightspace Course with term, course, and section selections shown as described
     
  4. Alternatively, if One-Click Course Provisioning is turned on, the initial click-through of this link will automatically create the course and section in EchoVideo, and you will be taken directly to the main section page. It will be empty (no classes) until an instructor creates one or more classes, launches an ad hoc capture, or an administrator configures a lecture capture schedule for the section.
  5. After selecting and linking the EchoVideo section, scroll to the bottom of the frame where the EchoVideo section appears and add an Assessment entry for the EchoVideo link. This adds a column in the Gradebook to receive exported EchoVideo student engagement analytics. 
    Assessment field for External Tool link to provide column for Echo360 gradebook exports as described
     
  6. We also recommend that you edit the activity tool link to EchoVideo and check the Open as External Resource checkbox. This allows EchoVideo to open in a new tab, providing more viewing space for classes and the media. 

Once the initial Brightspace-to-EchoVideo linking is complete, instructors may choose to create multiple module / links and link to individual classes within an EchoVideo section. 

When a student clicks the link from Brightspace to EchoVideo, they are automatically enrolled in the section. If the student is not yet an EchoVideo user, their EchoVideo account is automatically created when they pass into EchoVideo.

Brightspace course instructors are automatically enrolled in the EchoVideo section as Instructors if they are not already enrolled. Instructors may also have their EchoVideo account created if it does not already exist when they pass into EchoVideo from Brightspace. See also Disabling Automatic Instructor Creation (for LMS users) if this is not appropriate for your institution.

Brightspace Admins who pass into an EchoVideo section this way are also enrolled as Instructors in the EchoVideo course. See LMS to EchoVideo User Role Mappings for additional details.

Step 6: Provide Articles to Instructors and Students as necessary

As noted in Step 3, some or all of those procedures can be done by Instructors or Admins. Once the functionality has been added to Brightspace, let instructors and students know how to use it.

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