Publishing the content you create in Echo is a partly manual process that occurs with the help of OLI. This is because the published material is structured to collect data about student learning, and editing your live course can endanger the ability to collect meaningful data from it. For that reason, we separate the authoring environment from the delivery environment.


Stages of development are described below. The 2-week Best Practices timeline unfolds this way: 

  • Initial development is complete and the developer notifies OLI within Echo
  • On the next Tuesday, OLI moves the project to the QA environment
  • Developer performs Quality Assurance (QA) tests and makes necessary updates in Echo; one week is allotted
  • Round #1 of QA is complete and the developer notifies OLI within Echo
  • On the next Tuesday, OLI moves the edited project to the QA environment
  • Round #2 of QA is complete and the developer notifies OLI within Echo
  • OLI moves the finished course package to the OLI server so it can be configured and used with your students


Stages of development

The stages of development and their pertinent action buttons are located on the Workflow tab of your project's Overview page. Use this key to understand your project’s stages of development, and click on the next stage when you’re ready to proceed to it.


In development

This version of the course package is under active development and has not been sent to the QA environment or published for students. To preview your organization(s), use the page preview and Preview Course functions until all development is complete. There are no restrictions on activity — you may add, remove, or edit any components, such as organizations, pages, or assessments.

Move to QA environment (click to request)

Development is complete, and the developer is ready to undertake thorough quality assurance. Because Echo’s Preview environment may host experimental course-delivery technology, OLI keeps a separate QA environment that mirrors the live OLI production site. All development is restricted while the project is migrating.

OLI turnaround time: within one business day.

QA

The developer is performing quality assurance on https://qa-01.oli.cmu.edu. Developer and teammates will need accounts on the QA server. If the developer determines that changes must be made to the project, there are no restrictions on the kinds of edits the developer can make in Echo.

Best practice: allot one week of QA to copy edit, proofread, and to ensure thorough testing of all scoring, feedback, links, etc.

Move again to QA environment (click to request)

When edits or further development follow the initial QA check, a second round of QA must be performed by the developer. Target the edited or new content. All development is restricted while the updated project is migrating to the QA environment.

OLI turnaround time: within one business day.

NOTE: if further major edits are needed, another round of QA must be performed.

Ready for publication

The quality assurance process is finished and the developer is ready to publish the course on the live OLI production site, for use with students.

OLI turnaround time: up to one business day.

Published

This project has been published to the live OLI website, and used to set up a course for students. A published, live course can be updated with changes made in Echo, but the permitted types of changes are restricted to:

  • Anything inside existing pages, such as adding or changing sentences and paragraphs; typo fixes; changing titles; adding images; fixing links; etc.
    Exception: Do not add or remove Learning Objectives from pages in order to update a live course. Do not add formative or summative assessments to pages in a published course. Instead use an upversioned project (OLI will move you from v1.0 to v1.1, for example).
  • Assessment content in existing assessments, such as text of questions and feedback; the correctness designation of answers; typo fixes; changing titles; adding images; fixing links; etc.
    Exception: Do not add or remove skill tags in order to update a live course.
  • The text of existing Learning Objectives or Skills. Do not create new Learning Objectives or skills in the project of a published course.


To upversion your project for "forward development" (new development for the next publication, not edits to the live course), contact OLI Help or your primary OLI point of contact.