Link courses as editions
An edition is one Moodle course occupying one position in a certification's renewal sequence. There are three ways to link a course, and one certification can use more than one of them.
The Chaining method column shows how each row got there, and Parameter shows the pattern it matched.
By hand
Pick the course yourself and give it an order.
- Open the certification's Editions tab and choose Add edition.
- Select the course and set the order.
Use this when the number of courses is small and known, and you are content to add next year's course by hand when it exists.
An edition linked by hand is the only kind you can delete from this page.
By course ID number
LOOP looks for courses whose ID number matches CERT_{certification id}_{order}. A course with ID number CERT_5_20 becomes edition 20 of certification 5, with nothing to do inside LOOP at all.
The mark is read as a whole word, so it can sit among whatever else the field already carries: SAFETY-2029 CERT_5_20 is edition 20 of certification 5. A mark run together with other text is not a mark — ABC123CERT_5_20 and CERT_5_20_3 name nothing. The certification is written as its number is written, without a leading zero: CERT_05_20 names nothing either. The position may carry one, since it is read off the mark rather than written into it, so CERT_5_020 is edition 20.
- Note the certification's id — it is the first column of the Manage certifications table.
- In Course administration → Settings, set the course ID number accordingly.
- Wait for the nightly synchronisation, or run it from Site administration → Server → Scheduled tasks.
Use this when courses are created in bulk or by another system, and you control the ID number field.
By course custom field
The same idea using the course custom field Certification Edition, which LOOP creates when it is installed. The value uses the same CERT_{certification id}_{order} format, read the same way: a whole word, among other text if the field carries any.
Use this when the ID number field is already used by an integration with another system.
Linking courses from a file
A configuration file can do two of the three:
| Method | From a file? |
|---|---|
| By hand | Yes — an edition row with chaining_method set to manual |
| By course custom field | Yes — the row writes CERT_{certification id}_{order} into the course's Certification Edition field, and the edition follows from it, without waiting for the nightly synchronisation |
| By course ID number | No — the row travels in the file so that the file is a complete record, and the course is left alone |
The ID number is the one LOOP will not write: that field belongs to whoever administers the course catalogue, and it carries a uniqueness constraint across the whole site. A row that disagrees with what the course actually says is reported as read and not applied, naming the course.
Removing an automatic edition
An edition recognised from a course cannot be deleted from the Editions page: the next synchronisation would recreate it. Remove the code from the course instead — clear it from the course ID number, or from its Certification Edition custom field — and the edition goes with it.
When two courses claim the same position
That is a conflict. LOOP cannot tell which edition comes next, so it flags the certification: a Conflicts badge in the Warnings column of the Manage certifications table, and a Resolve edition order action on the Home dashboard.
Fix it by changing the order on one of the two courses, or by removing the code from the course that should not be there.
What happens on completion
Completing an edition issues a certificate: the completion date, and the validity window this certification's validity period defines. The person's status then follows from whether that window covers today.
Which edition it was makes no difference to whether the completion counts — it is recorded on the history row, so what the certificate was earned on stays visible. See The renewal cycle.
Somebody who completes two editions in one cycle earns two certificates, and their coverage runs to whichever window reaches furthest, so finishing an older edition late cannot shorten coverage that is still running.
Editions and course visibility
The Visibility column reads the Moodle course's visibility, and says Visible or Hidden. Hiding a course takes an edition out of circulation — before it is ready to take anybody, or once a later edition has taken over. LOOP does not record which of the two you meant, and never says: nothing in Moodle carries that. The current edition is the most advanced visible one.
Hiding a course does not block anything — a completion recorded on a hidden course issues its certificate like any other, and somebody already enrolled stays enrolled. If more than one edition is visible and taking enrolments at the same time, the Manage certifications table says so, which usually means a course that should have been hidden when a later edition took over.