/blackboard_upload

Primary LanguagePython

Blackboard Collaborate Uploader

This is a small utilty to upload a list of classes to Blackboard Collaborate.

Usage Reference

usage: blackboard_upload.py [-h] [-d] classes_csv token

Upload classes to Blackboard Collaborate

positional arguments:
  classes_csv  csv file containing classes
  token        Your auth token for BB Collaborate.

optional arguments:
  -h, --help   show this help message and exit
  -d, --debug  Turn on debug logging

Where classes_csv is a path to a CSV in the requisite format (see examples/classes.csv), and token is the Bearer token given to you by Blackboard Collaborate.

This script requires pandas and requests.

Classes CSV

The classes CSV contains the list of classes you want to upload, with the following columns:

  • name (string) - the name of the class
  • start (datestamp) - the start date/time of the first class, in LOCAL_TIMEZONE (as defined by the global variable in blackboard_upload.py, currently "Australia/Sydney" )
  • end (datestamp) - the end date/time of the first class, in LOCAL_TIMEZONE (this should be on the same day as start).
  • recurr (int) - the number of times the class will occur

Instructions

  1. Copy the file examples/session.csv somewhere, and edit it to contain the relevant detialas
  2. Login to BB Collaborate (via Moodle)
  3. Open your developer tools (usually, right click on the page, choose "Inspect Element")
  4. Go to the "Console" tab of your developer tools
  5. Find the message "LaunchParams loaded parameters:", and copy the value of "tokens" (this will be a long base64 string, with some dots in the middle. Copy everything inside the quotes.)
  6. Run the script provided in this repo, with the command ./blackboard_upload.py <your_session_csv>.csv <the_token_you_copied>

TODO

  • Get the tool to automatically remove flexibility week.
  • More precise control over weeks, for things like public holidays.