TinCan Mode enables you to send your learner data to a Learning Record Store (LRS). You might choose to do this if you want to examine the data holistically with other sources of learning or use your existing data analysis tools. TinCan mode uses the xAPI standard to do this.
It also means your learners don’t need to log into a Learning Management System (LMS), depending on the release type you use.
Contents:
1. What information do I need before setting up TinCan Mode?
2. How do I configure my project to use TinCan mode?
3. How do I complete the xAPI/TinCan 1.0 settings?
4. What should I set the Learner access control setting to?
5. Which release types should I use with xAPI/TinCan?
6. How do I use xAPI/TinCan with a SCORM release?
7. How do I use SCORM Cloud as my LRS?
What information do I need before setting up TinCan Mode?
Before you set up TinCan Mode, you need to collect details from your LRS. If you don’t have an LRS, it’s possible to use SCORM Cloud as an LRS.
The details you’ll need from your LRS are:
- The LRS endpoint URL - This is where your course will send learner information.
- The LRS username - If your LRS requires credentials to connect, then this is the username provided by the LRS.
- The LRS password - If your LRS requires credentials to connect, then this is the password that corresponds to the username provided by your LRS, referenced above.
You may be able to get this information yourself if you are responsible for the LRS. If you aren’t, you will need to speak to whoever manages your LRS to obtain these details.
Once you have these, you are ready to set up your project to send your learner information to your LRS.
How do I configure my project to use TinCan mode?
1. Open your project.
2. Select the Configure tab:
3. Select Learner tracking:
4. Select xAPI/TinCan 1.0 from the Tracking mode dropdown:
How do I complete the xAPI/TinCan 1.0 settings?
1. Type or copy/paste the LRS endpoint URL you collected earlier in the LRS Endpoint URL.
2. Type or copy/paste the LRS username you collected earlier into the LRS Username.
3. Type or copy/paste the LRS password you collected earlier into the LRS Password.
It is best to copy and paste these details as they can be quite complex, and pasting them in avoids any typing errors.
What should I set the Learner access control setting to?
Using xAPI/TinCan mode requires this to be set to ‘Identify’. This means an email address will need to be provided by the learner on accessing the course, so that they can then be identified in your LRS.
The Identify setting presents some additional options:
The Edit log-in page button allows you to change the look of the login page presented to a user when providing their email address.
The Invitation email subject and Invitation email content fields allow you to personalise the content of any invitation emails sent for this course. If left blank, the defaults will be used (shown on the screenshot).
The Only allow Learners from the following domain field is an important one. The domain name you enter here limits access so that only learners who have that domain as part of their email address will be permitted to enter the course.
For example, entering '@elucidat.com' in this field would mean that only people who provided an email address ending in '@elucidat.com' would be permitted to enter the course.
Once you are happy everything is set up as it should be, click the Save changes button.
You will then see a confirmation message at the top of the settings. You may need to scroll up the page to check this.
Which release types should I use with xAPI/TinCan?
Elucidat’s xAPI tracking is primarily intended to be used with an Online Link release type, so that users without an LMS can gather additional analytics data via an LRS.
When using an LMS, it is recommended to use the SCORM for LMS release type.
However, the xAPI feature will work with all release types, including SCORM. A SCORM release which also uses xAPI tracking is intended to send SCORM data to the LMS, and send xAPI to your separate LRS.
How do I use xAPI/TinCan with a SCORM release?
1. Set up the xAPI/TinCan tracking mode as described above, and save changes.
2. Change the Tracking Mode selection back to the preferred SCORM tracking type, and click Save changes.
| Note: While some LMS also have an LRS function, they will not always accept xAPI statements from a SCORM release. We recommend that you check with your LMS provider for their guidelines around tracking data. |
How do I use SCORM Cloud as my LRS?
If you don’t have an LRS already, SCORM Cloud is a great place to get started. SCORM Cloud is a training delivery platform which can host elearning content and allow you to deliver it to learners, although it doesn’t offer many of the more complex features that an LMS can provide.
1. Firstly create a SCORM Cloud account at https://cloud.scorm.com.
2. Log in to SCORM Cloud.
3. Select the LRS tab on the left of the screen.
4. In the box that says LRS endpoints you will see 4 URLs. Copy the first one.
5. Open your course in Elucidat.
6. Select Configure.
7. Select Learner tracking.
8. From the Tracking mode dropdown select xAPI/TinCan 1.0.
9. In the LRS Endpoint URL field, paste the URL that you copied from SCORM Cloud, and add the word ‘statements’ to the end.
10. Your URL should look similar to this:
https://cloud.scorm.com/lrs/76GF6HM3T/statements
11. Return to SCORM Cloud.
12. Select Activity Providers, and then Add Activity Provider:
13. Copy the code displayed next to Key:
14. Return to Elucidat and add this into the LRS User field.
15. Return to SCORM Cloud.
16. Copy the code displayed next to Secret.
17. Return to Elucidat. You don’t need to copy anything else from SCORM Cloud.
18. Paste the text you just copied into the LRS password box and then press Save changes.