Chat FAQ

How can I enable guests to participate in a chat activity?

Create a visitor role with the capability mod/chat:chat allowed, then create an account and assign it the role of visitor. Guests can then share this visitor account.

(The guest role has some special functionality, for example when a guest attempts to participate in a chat, they obtain the message "The chat is not open to guests. Would you like to log in now with a full user account?". Despite the permissions interface suggesting otherwise, it's not possible to modify the guest role to allow guests to participate in chat activities.)

How can I use audio chat?

Moodle itself does not yet include an audio chat solution, due to the large server requirements to implement a standalone solution.

However, there is a choice of free third party modules that you can install into your Moodle to achieve this:

1. Big Blue Button -FREE audio and video conferencing http://moodle.org/plugins/view.php? plugin=mod_bigbluebuttonbn
2. OpenMeetings - FREE full audio/video conferencing http://code.google.com/p/openmeetings/

How can I restrict Chat so certain users cannot access it?

You need to create a new role -such as "NoChat" and apply it in the system context to the student(s) you want to prevent from chatting.

1. Go to Settings>Site administration>Users>Permissions>Define Roles

2. Click Add a new role - name it for example "NoChat"

3. In the context types, select "system"

3. Type "chat" in the filter box.

4. Set the button for Access a Chat room (mod/chat:chat)to Prohibitand save.

5. Go to Settings>Site administration>Users>Permissions>Assign system roles

6. Click on the new "NoChat" role and assign your chosen student(s) this role

7. When they try to go into a chat room they will get a message that they cannot access the Chat.

See also

• Using Moodle Chat module forum