Set up LTI

Introduction LTI –  Learning Tools Interoperability

This is an education technology standard developed by the IMS Global Learning Consortium. It specifies a method for a learning system to invoke and to communicate with external systems. For example, a Learning Management System (LMS) may use LTI to host course content and tools provided by external, third-party systems on a web site, without requiring a learner to log in separately on the external systems, with information about the learner and the learning context shared by the LMS with the external systems.

LMS Students

There are 2 “types” of student accounts, regular accounts and LTI accounts. In reality these accounts are basically exactly the same, the only difference is in how they’re created. Regular accounts are manually created with the “CREATE NEW STUDENT” button on the student page on the EyeQ CMS, these accounts will not work with LTI. LTI accounts are created via the LMS when the student starts a course for the first time.

Their scores get tracked the same way and can be reviewed in the same way as normally in the CMS. These accounts can also be deleted the same way. In case an LTI account is deleted it’ll be recreated if that particular student starts a new course from the LMS. Any changes made to the LTI account will be overwritten when the LMS student starts a course.

Create the LTI Provider

• Log in your LMS environment.

• Go to ‘Beheer’ and then ‘Beheer LTI-providers’.
• Create a new provider by clicking on ‘Toevoegen’.
• Give it a name, in this case we called it ‘EyeQ VR tutorials’. In the CustomerKey provide ‘eyeqlti’ as the consumer key. In the Secret provide the LTI Secret Key that we provided. Press the OK button to add it.

Creating a LTI Module

• For this, it is convenient to have some information ready that can be obtained from the CMS. So, in the EyeQ CMS, go to your project and there select the linear or non-linear course you want to connect to LTI. 

• Then at the bottom of the course form there is a red button that says ‘LTI LINKS’. Press it and it will generate a URL that looks something like https://cms.eyeq-learning.com/LTI/lti-verify.aspx?sid=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx&cid=1337. Keep this URL in a browser tab, because you need to copy paste this later in the LTI module.

• Now we’re ready to add the course to LTI, so browse to your LTI environment.
• Go to ‘Beheer’ and then ‘Beheer LTI-modules’.
• Create a new module by clicking on “Toevoegen’.
• Provide a ‘Naam’ and ‘Omschrijving’. They can be the same as the course name and description as in the CMS.
• For LTI provider, select the provider you created in the step above, so in this case that was ‘EyeQ VR tutorials’.
• In ‘LTI Adres’ copy paste the URL that the LTI LINKS button generated. So again, the URL that looks like https://cms.eyeq-learning.com/LTI/lti-verify.aspx?sid=xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx&cid=1337.
• Toggle on ‘Active’, ‘Score’ and ‘Score als Cijfer’.
• Press the OK button to save this module.

• Now you can test whether the connection works by pressing the ‘Afspelen’ button in the last column of the listed module. (see more on starting courses in the next section).

Adding the module to a ‘cursus’

The module can be added or combined with other modules to a cursus sjabloon. Make sure this cursus sjabloon is of the ‘E-learning’ type and you toggle ‘Publiceren’ and “Sec e-learning’ on. Other settings like publication dates etc are all optional, depending on how you want this cursus to be available.