Mobile app opening to Home page instead of Dashboard?

[ShirleyC11]

Can a course be set up so that when students first open the course on the mobile app, it opens to the Home page instead of the dashboard?

[chriscas · Accepted solution]

Hi @ShirleyC11,

I'm a bit confused by the wording, but I think what you are asking is if a certain course can open by default when a student logs in to the Canvas mobile app instead of showing them their dashboard.  If that is the question, I don't think that is possible right now, but it does also depend how the students are opening the app.  In my experience, the app will often open to wherever I left off with it the last time it was open.  In addition, if the students are clicking on a link to a specific course, it should take them right there.  If a new student is just downloading and logging in to the app directly for the first time or perhaps haven't used the app in quite a while, I think they'd usually end up on the dashboard.

As a short aside, I think this would be a tough thing to add.  I guess it would have to be done by an administrator, because if it were able to be done by a teacher I could envision multiple teachers enabling the "open my course" option for their courses, and then that would all conflict when a student enrolled in multiple courses logged in.

Hope this helps!

-Chris

[chriscas · Accepted solution]

Hi @ShirleyC11,

I'm a bit confused by the wording, but I think what you are asking is if a certain course can open by default when a student logs in to the Canvas mobile app instead of showing them their dashboard.  If that is the question, I don't think that is possible right now, but it does also depend how the students are opening the app.  In my experience, the app will often open to wherever I left off with it the last time it was open.  In addition, if the students are clicking on a link to a specific course, it should take them right there.  If a new student is just downloading and logging in to the app directly for the first time or perhaps haven't used the app in quite a while, I think they'd usually end up on the dashboard.

As a short aside, I think this would be a tough thing to add.  I guess it would have to be done by an administrator, because if it were able to be done by a teacher I could envision multiple teachers enabling the "open my course" option for their courses, and then that would all conflict when a student enrolled in multiple courses logged in.

Hope this helps!

-Chris

[SusanNiemeyer · Accepted solution]

With the mobile app, what pops up for the user when the course is selected is the Course Navigation Bar. That's the one that the list of items such as "Modules, Announcements, Syllabus, People," and so on. With the mobile app, students will only see the Home Page if they click on Pages first and then look for the "Front Page." As you've noted, the student using the app will have a different experience than the student logging in with a laptop, Chromebook, or PC.

As far as I know, there is no way to change the experience of the mobile user so that the Home Page pops up first. Therefore, personally, I don't put a lot of content on the Home Page. I have a welcome banner, a welcome message, and one button that sends students to their first module when they start the course at the beginning of the semester.

There is no way that you can change the experience for the mobile app user.