[Courses] Comprehensive Course Search Tool (Searching Course Content for a Topic)

[tweiler]

I always find it useful to search for content using an index or an actual search tool rather than just scrolling through all of the pages one by one to find what I need.  I can see many uses for this:

1. As a student, I know that a particular topic was covered but I'm not sure where.  I can search the course for the keyword and the page hits will come up.
2. As an instructor, I want to know where else these students have seen a particular concept.  I can search a bunch of courses for a keyword and the courses and page hits will come up.
3. As a student, as I am trying to integrate information from multiple lectures within a course or within multiple courses, it would be useful to see where a particular concept has been covered.

Tracey

[laurensimpson22]

There should be a search function on the Canvas homepage, or Dashboard page to search for documents and files within different courses. When looking for a specific document, we are having to click through dozens of courses and search within each course for a specific file, rather than being able to search for the file once, and being able to locate it more quickly.

[douglas_rolley]

What’s at the top of this page? A search tool! Please add it to Canvas. 

[ZeSteele]

It is unbelievable that this has been an ask for 2015 and Instructure doesn't care to implement the feature. I guess the schools already paid for Canvas and are tied to it, so they don't really care how well it works for the students?

It isn't like this is rocket science. Almost everywhere you go on the Internet has search.

[AngelaTapp]

CANVAS DEVELOPERS!! WORKING IN ATLASSIAN, SCRUM, KANBAN OR AN AGILE DEV ENVIRONMENT?  CERTAINLY, THIS ISSUE IS IN ONE OF YOUR EPICS?  IT DOESN'T GET ANY EASIER, COPY THIS AND PASTE THIS INTO YOUR PLATFORM - SHOW IT TO YOUR PRODUCT MANAGER.

USER STORY

• As a Canvas developer, I want to reduce a number of feature requests that are in my log file so that I can focus on developing new feature requests to keep up with the strategic direction of the overall product roadmap, I need to be able to simply activate the ability to search Canvas for a key word so end users can get off my back.

STORY POINTS = .00000001

RESOLUTION = Look at the search source code at the top of this page and publish it into Canvas.

DONE!  

UNLESS OF COURSE, YOUR EXECUTIVE TEAM BELIEVES A BASIC SEARCH FUNCTION IS A REVENUE LINE ITEM AND ENJOYS PROFITING FROM STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIPS WHO OFFER THE SOLUTION FOR A 'SMALL FEE'.  IN WHICH CASE, WE ARE ALL DEFEATED.

[mbflatau]

A global search function for a course is a no-brainer. Why hasn't this been developed yet? What am I missing? It's extremely difficult to achieve community buy-in to a platform that lacks basic functions such as this. It's 2022. As far as I can see, people have been asking for this since 2015. What do I not understand as far as the addition of this tool - is this not possible? Has Canvas ever addressed the reasons why this is not possible? An explanation would be helpful, so we could create some sort of work around. 

[AA_AdminVUB]

Agreed with the user above, this is a feature that users have been asking for for 7 years now, please implement.

[AlistairF]

I completely agree with the OP, for me as a student, this search feature would be incredibly useful.

I'm also used to search in a real life book with an index, and a pdf of a course is also easy to search, even a kindle book has a search feature. I've lost lots of precious time opening module after module and using ctrl+f just trying to find something I knew was there somewhere.

I thought I wasn't using the tool right, but no, it's in fact quite incredible when you think about it. I must say this makes me a little angry. Can you please implement it, and if not, provide a (good) reason for refusing to do it. After so many users reacting here (I'm sure you can multiply the number of frustrated users by 10 or even 100) and the time since it was first asked, it looks like you don't care.

I found a way to search my course modules, but it's not very practical:

- Download the course (e.g. Down Them All add-on firefox)
- Search the downloaded files

Really not a good option, when you open the file, you don't know where you are in the course, and you can't move around to next or previous pages.

[kiran_zaman]

Has this or a similar feature made any way into development? My students struggle to find anything on their Canvas app, and having a search function that they could use to find assignments would be extremely time-saving for both students and teachers.

[kyh802]

@kiran_zaman  Don't hold your breath. Canvas is slow to do anything that will help instructors or students, it seems. This was first suggested in 2015, and I've seen many more urgent requests suggested as early as that that get absolutely no traction, despite the many, many, many people begging for them.

[BryanneNgo]

Currently, CANVAS does not have a search bar for users to find specific content/resources within an organization.  A support member suggested the use of CTRL+F, but that only works if all the modules are expanded and the words are visible on the page.  If the modules are collapsed, students cannot easily search documents.

This is essential for organizations because the page is used as a resource and students do not need to access every item.

Please add a search bar in the home page of each course/organization so students can easily access the resources they are looking for.