Moodle 2.1 release notes

Moodle 2.1

Release date: Not yet released

Major new features

New question engine

• Moodle question system has been rewritten to make it much more robust and to support lots of new possible functionality.
• See summary of changes at the New question engine page and more details in the tracker MDL-20636.
• Warning: This change requires a major database upgrade.
• Backward compatibility warning: Random short-answer matching question type was moved out of the main Moodle distribution.

Ability to restore the course contents from Moodle 1.9 backup files

• Course backup files created in Moodle 1.9 can be now restored during the normal restore process.
• No user data (like forum posts, grades, submissions, ...) are supported yet. Blocks are not restored yet.
• See MDL-22414 for details.

Enabling Web Services for mobile devices

• Moodle 2.1 comes with a built-in web service designed for mobile applications.
• It is required to run the official Moodle app.
• Enable it only if you want people to use the official app or if third party app explicitly requires it.
• See MDL-27551 and Enable mobile web services documentation for details.

Other highlights

• MDL-11288 Ability to copy (or clone) an activity
• MDL-27428 Ability to navigate navigation/settings menu and dock with keyboard
• MDL-26784 Improved plugins check/overview page
• MDL-27500 Upgraded TinyMCE to the latest version 3.4.2
• MDL-26105 User friendly block settings and help information
• MDL-27251 internet (file)timeout estimation based on minimum bandwidth config
• MDL-25805 friendlier navigation for parent roles to see mentees in courses

Security issues

To be released later

Upgrading

When upgrading to Moodle 2.1, you must first upgrade to Moodle 2.0 or later. We advise that you test the upgrade first on a COPY of your production site, to make sure it works as you expect.

For further information, see Upgrading to Moodle 2.1.

For developers: API changes

• The new question engine changes the API for question types. See dev:Developing a Question Type.
• The new question engine changes the API for activity modules that use the question bank. See dev:Using the question engine from module.