[Speedgrader] Add option: "View as plain text" in docViewer

Problem statement:

Canvas offers a limited number of file types that are supported for DocViewer, however there are many courses for programming that require submissions of files with various extensions (.R, .py, .css, java, cpp, .c to name a few) that cannot be viewed in DocViewer, but could be viewed if there was an option to convert the file to text. At our organization alone there are at least 70 different programming courses offered every year. Every semester we are contacted by frustrated instructors who are unable to use Speedgrader to view student submissions.

Proposed solution:

Whenever DocViewer cannot process a document, instead of, or in addition to the message "Error while processing or retrieving the document", provide the option, such as a button or link to convert the file to a simple text document.

User role(s):

instructor,designer

2 Comments
AmandaONeal
Community Member
Problem statement:

Coding files (.java, .py, .php, .html, .css, etc) are not officially supported by SpeedGrader, even though they are the same as .txt files under the hood. I want to be able to Preview these files in SpeedGrader and leave line-by-line feedback. I think there's a similar Idea posted that's specific to Java, but I would like this to be true for files across coding languages.

Proposed solution:

Treat the following the same as .txt files for the purposes of SpeedGrader Preview/feedback: .java, .py, .php, .html, .css, .cs, .cpp, .c, .json

User role(s):

instructor,student

marjeta
Community Participant
Problem statement:

As instructor for computer programming courses, I receive student submissions of C++, Python, and Java code. I am very disappointed to notice that .java files do not render in SpeedGrader. The workaround of downloading the files slows me down. I can NOT ask students to rename the files as .txt, because a big part of programming instruction is to teach the students to use proper extensions.

Proposed solution:

Please add the functionality to render programming files. This should not be very complicated, as they are PLAIN TEXT files. Specific extensions I need: .cpp, .h (for C++), .py (Python), .java (Java) I also recommend the following: .js (JavaScript) and .sh (shell script)

User role(s):

instructor