What Is The Backup Function?

A course backup is a Angel generated file of all course files, including all student information. However, this file can only be "unzipped" during the import process within Angel. The time required to backup your course depends on both the size of the course and the speed of the server.

NOTE: Angel allows storage of only one backup on the server (the most recent one). Therefore, to preserve a history of your course (i.e. a backup of each quarter's course), you must download the backup to your hard drive.

Why Is The Backup Function Important?

Backing up your course to your local drive on a regular basis makes good sense for the following reasons:

• Provides a course snapshot(s), including student data, on a schedule of your choosing.
• Safeguards your course content and files, allowing you to easily restore your course in an emergency.
• Provides a personal archive of each quarter's class information (including student data), if done at the end of each quarter.
• Locating a single course on a server backup takes time.

How Do I Perform A Backup and Restore Within My Course?

Create the Backup:

1. Log on to your "my.Sinclair" Account
2. Click the course and then "Manage" and then "Import Wizard"
3. Check the box next to the course name
4. Click "Create Backup" button on right-hand side of screen
5. If you so choose, type a description (optional)
6. Click "Create"
7. Click "Continue" at the confirmation screen

Download the backup to your computer:

1. Log on to your "MyWebCT" account
2. Click "Course Functions" at the top of the screen
3. Select the backup by checking the box next to the course backup title
4. Click "Download Backup" button on the right-hand side of the screen
5. Click "Save"
6. Select a location on your local drive to save the file, and click "Save"
7. At the "Download Complete" confirmation screen, click "Close"

To upload a backup of a WebCT Course from your local drive and restore it, complete the following steps:

1. Log on to your "MyWebCT" account
2. Click the "Course Functions" button at the top of the screen
3. Select the course you intend to upload the backup into by clicking the box next to the course title
4. Click "Upload Backup" button
5. Click "Browse" and find the backup to be uploaded, click "Open"
6. Click "Upload"

To Restore a WebCT Backup:

1. Log on to your "MyWebCT" account
2. Click the "Course Functions" button at the top of the screen
3. Click The box next to the backup title you intend to restore
4. Click "Restore Backup" button on the right-hand side of the screen
5. Select the course you intend to restore the backup into by selecting the box next to the course title
6. Click either "Restore" to replace the students with the students in the backup file (if any) or "Restore (keep students)" to ignore the students in the backup file
7. Click "Restore"

*** NOTE: Performing a backup and restore will overwrite the current course deleting all information.

Note: You must update the student view after copying one course to another. WebCT must regenerate the static student pages for all the links to work properly in the new course.

To upload a backup of an Angle Course from your local drive and restore it, complete the following steps:

1. Log on to your "MyWebCT" account
2. Click the "Course Functions" button at the top of the screen
3. Select the course you intend to upload the backup into by clicking the box next to the course title
4. Click "Upload Backup" button
5. Click "Browse" and find the backup to be uploaded, click "Open"
6. Click "Upload"

To Restore a WebCT Backup:

1. Click The box next to the backup title you intend to restore
2. Click "Restore Backup" button on the right-hand side of the screen
3. Select the course you intend to restore the backup into by selecting the box next to the course title
4. Click "Replace Users" to restore the student data in the backup file.
5. Click "OK"

*** NOTE: Performing a backup and restore will overwrite the current course deleting all information.

To add one user (shared designer or a student) at a time to your course:

1. Log on to your course
2. Click "Manage"
3. Click "Roster" and then "Add a User"
4. use the search feature and find the user (search by either last name, or user name is known).
5. Find the correct user name and click "select"
6. Choose the user's role and click "Ok"
7. The student list will appear with the student added to the course

To download your WebCT gradebook into Excel:

1. From the homepage, click "Control Panel"
2. Click "Manage Course" then "Manage Students"
3. Under "Options: Records" select "Download" then "Go"
4. Select the record separator (for Excel recomment comma" "Comma" and click "Download"
5. Select a drive to save the file to (will automatically save in .txt format) and click "Save"

6. Open Excel
7. Click "File" and "Open" and select the saved file
8. At the Import Wizard:
   1. Select "Delimited" and "Next"
   2. Select "Comma' (or Tab if you selected this option during the download process) and "Next"
   3. If applicable, change the column types (defaults to General) NOTE: Suggest any column that has leading zeros, for instance the student ID column, be formatted as "Text" otherwise Excel may drop the leading zeros in the column.
   4. Select "Finish"
   5. The gradebook should open in Excel.

To add existing WebCT students to a course or update the gradebook, an upload file can be prepared and uploaded into WebCT.

The text file must be formatted according to the following rules:

1. First line of file must contain the names of the columns to be updated or created
2. Successive lines contain the data, with one student record per line.
3. Column names and items must be separated by a field separator (delimiter) which can be either a comma, space or tab (happens when file is saved as .txt).
4. The User ID field must always be present when uploading a file, since this ID uniquely identifies each student record
5. File should be saved as .txt

To upload an existing Excel worksheet into WebCT:

1. From the homepage, click "Control Panel"
2. Click "Manage Course" then "Manage Students"
3. Under Options: Records category, select "Add or Import Students" and "Go"
4. Click the "Browse" button and then under "Upload File" at the bottom of screen, click "Browse" and locate the .txt file prepared using the rules identified above
5. Click "Upload" (to the My-Files area)
6. Once added to My-Files area, select the radio button next to the file and click the "Add Selected" button at the bottom of the page.
7. Once back at the "Add Student" page, select the separator (generally Comma) and click "Import"
8. At the import confirmation screen, review the fields shown and click "Continue"
9. If completed successfully, a confirmation message will show.

You can download a course from the WebCT server hosting your course to your personal computer.
Note: If you want to download multiple files, zip them first and then download the .zip file.

1. From the Control Panel, click Manage Files. The Manage Files screen appears
2. Under Folders and Files, select the file that you want to download.
3. Under Options: Files , click Download. The Download File screen appears.
4. Click Download. Your computer's file download dialog box appears.
5. Follow the instructions in the dialog box to save the file to your computer.

You can compile Discussion messages into one file and download the file.

1. From the Course Menu, click Discussions. The Discussions screen appears.
2. In the Discussions table, click the topic containing the messages you want to compile and download. The Discussion Messages screen appears.
3. From the list of messages, select the messages to be compiled. To compile all messages in a thread, select the check box next to the thread. To select all of the messages displayed, select Subject.
4. Click Compile. The Compiled Messages screen appears displaying your compiled messages. Note: If this message option is not visible, click Designer message options to move to the bottom of the screen.
5. To download your compiled messages, click Download. Your browser's file download dialog box appears. Follow the on-screen instructions.
6. When the download is complete, click Close. The Discussion Messages screen appears.

You can compile mail messages into one file and download the file.

1. From the Course Menu, click Mail. The Mail screen appears.
2. From the Mail Folders table, click the folder that contains the messages that you want to compile and download. The Mail Messages screen appears.
3. From the list of messages, select the messages to be compiled. To compile all messages in a thread, select the thread.
4. Under Apply to message(s) selected above, click Compile. The Compiled Messages screen appears.
5. Click Download. Your browser's file download window appears. Follow the on-screen instructions.
6. When the download is complete, click Close. The Compiled Messages screen appears.
7. Click Close. The Mail Messages screen appears

Twenty-five accounts with an attached training course, as well as five archive accounts with demo course, are available for restoring backups. Each account with shell will allow faculty to download gradebooks, discussion or email areas from WebCT backups. To access one of these accounts, simply log in using one of the following accounts.

• ID's student_1, student_2 etc. through student_20
• Password for each ID: webct
or
• ID: archive1, archive2, archive3, archive4, or archive5
• Password: webct is password for each account

NOTE: Once you have finished using the shell, you may want to overwrite your last backup by restoring the backup entitled a_dltemplate2003_mcandrew or the train_webct backup for that shell.