Moodle Plugins - What Can I Plug In?

Having readied our development environment and explored the thought processes that support building a Moodle plugin, in this chapter we will be investigating the types of
plugin Moodle supports. Remember that the "M" in Moodle stands for modular; if there is a feature you need that Moodle doesn't support then we can build a plugin to implement it. Any aspect of the user experience can be enhanced and/or modified by a plugin. In this chapter, we will be mapping out the most common user journeys through the platform, from initial log on (authentication), through being assigned to courses (enrolment), and ultimately completion reporting.

As described in the previous chapter, we will be taking an Agile approach to plugin development, and that means we will be working with user stories (a description of what our work needs to achieve) rather than the more standard use cases (what our work needs to do) that you may be used to. This will require us to have an appreciation of how a user will interact with Moodle.

By the end of this chapter, you will:

• Have gained an appreciation of the more common user journeys, and will know how this understanding will inform the need for a new plugin
• Have a thorough understanding of the types of Moodle plugins available
• Have a complete understanding of the structure of a plugin (building on ideas introduced in Chapter 2, Moodle Plugins - What Can I Plug In?)
• Be able to select the best type of plugin to develop for the particular task in hand

Let us begin by considering plugins that manage getting users onto the platform.