lms-canvas-multiclassmessenger

App for sending messages and announcements to multiple Canvas classes at once.

Running standalone

Add env vars or system properties as desired.

ENV Property	System Property	Default Value	Description
APP_FULLFILEPATH	app.fullFilePath	/usr/src/app/config	Directory for configuration files
APP_OVERRIDESFILENAME	app.overridesFileName	overrides.properties	Customizable filename for additional configurations. Would be located in the above directory.
SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE	spring.profiles.active		Supply spring profiles to activate. See configuration details below for potential values.
APP_ENV	app.env	dev	Environment designator. Free-form and can be used for your own purposes. Shows up in the application footer.

Setup Database

After compiling, see target/generated-resources/sql/ddl/auto/postgresql9.sql for appropriate ddl. Insert a record into the LTI_AUTHZ table with a key and secret. The context should be either lms_lti_multiclassmessenger or *. A wildcard (*) is useful for testing multiple tools, but may not be recommended in production environments.

Test a local launch

Use an LTI tool consumer launcher, like http://ltiapps.net/test/tc.php. Provide an appropriate key/secret, as defined above.

Property	Value
Launch URL	http://localhost:8080/lti
Consumer Key	<value from database above>
Shared secret	<value from database above>
Role	An appropriate LTI role, like Instructor, Learner, etc
Custom parameters	canvas_course_id=123456 canvas_user_login_id=chmaurer instructure_membership_roles=http://purl.imsglobal.org/vocab/lis/v2/membership#Instructor mcm_tool_id= mcm_tool_id will accept a value of either msg or annc, depending on which flavor of the tool you want to launch.

Canvas XML

Example xml for both the announcements and messages tools can be found in the examples directory.

Configuration

If choosing to use properties files for the configuration values, the default location is /usr/src/app/config, but that can be overridden by setting the APP_FULLFILEPATH value via system property or environment variable. You may use security.properties, overrides.properties, or set the APP_OVERRIDESFILENAME value with your desired file name.

Canvas Configuration

The following properties need to be set to configure the communication with Canvas and Canvas Catalog. They can be set in a properties file, or overridden as environment variables.

Property	Default Value	Description
canvas.host		Hostname of the Canvas instance
canvas.sso.host		Hostname of the Canvas OIDC auth domain
canvas.baseUrl	https://${canvas.host}	Base URL of the Canvas instance
canvas.baseApiUrl	${canvas.baseUrl}/api/v1	Base URL for the Canvas API
canvas.token		Token for access to Canvas instance
canvas.accountId		Your institution's root accountId in your Canvas instance
catalog.baseUrl		Base URL of the Canvas Catalog instance
catalog.baseApiUrl	${catalog.baseUrl}/api/v1	Base URL for the Canvas Catalog API
catalog.token		Token for access to the Canvas Catalog instance

Database Configuration

The following properties need to be set to configure the communication with a database. They can be set in a properties file, or overridden as environment variables.

Property	Description
lms.db.user	Username used to access the database
lms.db.url	JDBC URL of the database. Will have the form jdbc:<dbtype>://<host>:<port>/<database>
lms.db.password	Password for the user accessing the database
lms.db.poolType	Fully qualified name of the connection pool implementation to use. By default, it is auto-detected from the classpath.

Configure support contact information

The following properties need to be set to configure the contact information on the global error page. They can be set in a security.properties file, or overridden as environment variables.

Property	Description
lti.errorcontact.name	Display name for your support organization
lti.errorcontact.link	Contact mechanism - URL or mailto:email (e.g. http://support.school.edu or mailto:support@school.edu)

LTI issuer configuration

Be sure to configure an environment appropriate issuer for the Canvas instance that is launching the tool.

See https://canvas.instructure.com/doc/api/file.lti_dev_key_config.html#overview-of-an-lti-launch for details.

Property	Description
canvas.issuer	Issuer for the Canvas instance doing the LTI tool launch

Redis Configuration (optional)

If you would like to use Redis for session storage, you will need to enable it by including the value redis-session into the SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE environment variable. Be aware that if the tool requires multiple values, that there could be more than one profile value in there.

Additionally, the following properties need to be set to configure the communication with Redis. Then can be set in a properties file, or overridden as environment variables.

Property	Description
spring.redis.host	Redis server host.
spring.redis.port	Redis server port.
spring.redis.database	Database index used by the connection factory.
spring.redis.password	Login password of the redis server.

Vault Configuration (optional)

If you would like to use HasiCorp's Vault for secure property storage, you will need to enable it by including the value vault into the SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE environment variable. Be aware that if the tool requires multiple values, that there could be more than one profile value in there. Include any spring.cloud.vault.* properties that your environment requires in a properties file, or override as environment variables.

Exposing the LTI authz REST endpoints

If you would like to expose the LTI authz endpoints in this tool (for CRUD operations on the LTI authorizations), you will need to enable it by including the value ltirest into the SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE environment variable. Be aware that if the tool requires multiple values, that there could be more than one profile value in there.

Enabling swagger-ui for the LTI authz REST endpoints

⚠️ Experimental ⚠️

If you would like to enable the swagger-ui for interacting with the endpoints, include the value swagger into the SPRING_PROFILES_ACTIVE environment variable. Once enabled, the ui will be available at /api/lti/swagger-ui.html. There are some additional OAuth2 considerations that need to be accounted for while using this setup.

This is marked as experimental due to the fact that we aren't running with this option at IU. We are running into CORS issues when trying to talk to our OAuth2 service via swagger, so we can't verify if it really works or not!