How do I create a backup of a GauchoSpace course and import it into Canvas? – UCSB Support Desk Collaboration

Materials from a GauchoSpace course can be exported and imported into a Canvas course. This article will walk you through how to:

Create a backup of a GauchoSpace course.
Import that backup into a Canvas course.

Once materials have been imported, they can be edited or deleted in the Canvas course site.

Note: There is not a direct 1-to-1 import process between GauchoSpace and Canvas. With some adjusting, most materials can be brought into Canvas from GauchoSpace. Refer to this help article to refer to what activities will map to in Canvas: GauchoSpace to Canvas Introduction

GauchoSpace and Canvas gradebooks operate differently. We recommend reviewing this article and your course's Grades tab after importing to ensure that your Canvas gradebook is working as expected.

Here's how to create a backup of a GauchoSpace course:

1. Log into GauchoSpace and enter the course you wish to copy materials from.

2. From the Administration block, click Backup.

3. This page shows you which broad categories of items will be imported. Uncheck all materials that you do NOT wish to import. Then, click Next.

4. You will see a list of all specific resources and activities that are available to include in the backup. By default, everything is selected; uncheck any items that you do not wish to include in the backup. Note, In order for items within a section to be imported, the title for that section needs to be selected. Click Next.

5. Review the list of items to be imported. Scroll to the bottom and click Perform Backup.

6. A progress bar will indicate that the backup is being created. When completed, click Continue.

7. In the User private backup area, click Download next to the backup you created. This will download the backup onto your computer. You are now ready to import this backup to Canvas.

Here's how to import the GauchoSpace backup into a Canvas course:

1. Log into Canvas and enter the course you wish to import materials into.

2. On the left side of the Home tab, click Import Existing Content.

3. In the Content Type dropdown, select "Moodle 1.9/2.x".

4. For Source, click Choose File. Find the GauchoSpace .mbz file created in the Step 1: Create a backup of a GauchoSpace course section above and click Open.

5. For Default Question Bank, select "Create new question bank" and add a title.

6. For Content, select the "All Content" option.

7. To adjust events and due dates programmatically, select the box under Options. You will then be able to Shift dates by entering in the GauchoSpace course beginning and ending date and the Canvas course dates. You can also Remove dates. More information about how to Shift dates can be found here: How do I adjust events and due dates in a course import?

8. Click Import. A progress bar will indicate that file is successfully uploading.

9. The Current Jobs section will indicate the status of the import. The Issues link will list any problems such as external tool that need to be re-added or broken course links.

After restoring content from GauchoSpace to Canvas there are a few settings we recommend checking depending on how you used GauchoSpace and what sort of content your course has brought over into Canvas.

Quizzes restored into Canvas come over as Practice Quizzes. To have them count toward student grades they will need to be changed to Graded Quizzes.

To do so go to the Quiz page of the course by clicking on "Quizzes" in the course navigation menu. You will then see the imported quizzes under the heading of "Practice Quizzes", click on the three dots to the right of a quiz you would like to change to a graded quiz and then click "Edit".

In the quiz settings change the "Quiz Type" setting from "Practice Quiz" to "Graded Quiz".

At the bottom of the quiz settings click on "Save" or "Save & Publish" if you would like students to be able to access the quiz.

Some question types do not come over from GauchoSpace to Canvas properly, in some cases there isn't an equivalent question type or the restore does not match them to their corresponding type accurately. The table below goes over whether the question will transfer into Canvas and what the equivalent question type is in Canvas.

*Moodle*	*Transfers*	*Canvas Equivalent*
Calculated	Yes	Formula
Calculated multichoice	Yes	Formula
Calculated Simple	Yes	Formula - simple
Drag and Drop (all types)	No	None (alternative: Fill in Multiple Blanks)
Embedded Answers (Cloze)	Yes (comes over as Fill in Multiple Blanks)	None (alternative: Multiple Dropdown)
Essay	Yes	Essay
Essay (auto-grade)	No	Essay
Formulas	No	Formula
Matching	Yes	Matching
Multiple Choice	Yes	Multiple Choice
Numerical	Yes	Numerical
Select Missing Word	No	None (alternative: Fill in Multiple Blanks)
Short Answer	Yes	Fill in the Blank
True/False	Yes	True/False
Description (label)	Yes	Text (no question)

To ensure your quizzes work as expected we recommend reviewing your quizzes by previewing and making any adjustments needed to the questions.

One other problem that can arise with quiz questions coming over into Canvas is that images added to questions can break if they were copied and pasted into the question in GauchoSpace and not uploaded through the text editor. Because of this potential, we recommend reviewing your quiz questions which contain images and in cases where the picture does not load it will need to be reloaded in Canvas using the Canvas Rich Text Editor and embedding the image.

If your GauchoSpace course used Labels or Section summaries displayed directly on the course page these will come over into Canvas as either Text Headers or Pages. Depending on how you used Labels or Section summaries in your GauchoSpace course the corresponding created Text Headers or Pages may need to be adjusted to display as expected in Canvas.

As an example below is a screenshot of three labels in a GauchoSpace course site, the first label is a text header, the second is a picture, and the third is two paragraphs of text.

Seeing the separation of these labels is earlier understood with Editing turned on in the course. In the screenshot below you can see the separation of these two labels with the two separate compass icons on the left-hand side and the two "Edit" options on the right side.

In Canvas, these will come over as three separate pieces. In the screenshot below we can see the text header label came over as a Text Header in Canvas, the picture label came over as its own page, and the two paragraphs of text label came over as its own page.

To consolidate this content we recommend selecting one of the Pages and use it to house all of the content. In this case we will use the Page containing the picture to consolidated the other pieces into. To start we copy the text of the text header and then Edit the picture page by clicking on the three dots to the right of it and then click on "Edit".

In the pop-up window, we can then paste the copied text header text and rename the page where we are consolidating the content, with the title changed, then click "Update".

Now that the text header has been copy/pasted into the consolidated page the original text header can be deleted, to do so click on the three dots to the right of the text header and then click "Remove".

Lastly to incorporate the text page click on the text itself to open the page.

You will then see the page and its content, if the text included is simple text you can simply copy and paste the text body, if it is more complex text you can click on "Edit" in the top right and then you will have full access to the text editor of the page.

With the text copied, go back to the Module page and click on the text of the page where you are consolidating the content.

With the page open click on "Edit" in the top right to edit the page.

You can then place your cursor in the desired area you want the copied text to appear and paste it in. Depending on the formatting of the text you may need to adjust it using the text editor option in the toolbar. Once it appears as you'd like click on "Save" in the bottom right.

You can then navigate back to the Modules page and click on the three dots for the page of copied text and then click on "Remove" to delete the page of now copied text.

The end result will be one page with the contents of the three content pieces combined.

You will need to repeat this process of consolidation as need with the variously created text headers and pages in your Canvas course.

When you restore GauchoSpace content into Canvas the default course navigation settings will change. The course navigation links that we recommend having enabled for your course are Home, Syllabus, Announcements, Modules, Grades, Assignments, Discussions, Quizzes, and People.

To adjust the Navigation settings go to the "Settings" link at the bottom of the course Navigation menu.

Once in the settings area click on the "Navigation" at the top.

Once on the Navigation settings page, click on and drag "Files" from the top list (this is enabled links) to the bottom list (disabled links).

Even though "Files" link is Disabled, this means it is hidden from students in the course Navigation menu however it does not mean that student don't have access to files in the course. Files that are given to students as links, placed in text boxes (in Pages, or other content text areas) or Modules and they will be able to access them there. We recommend placing files individually in the course in thise way rather than enabling Files as a course navigation link as this would give student access to all files in the course including files such as images placed in quiz question or other exam related files such as prompts or problem set (if you have these files in your course). We also recommend that Pages remains a disabled link in the course navigation so that students don't see the information out of context, we recommend that individual Pages be placed within Modules in the context of the other related materials.

When you import your course from GauchoSpace to Canvas gradebook categories from your GauchoSpace course will not be brought over into Canvas. In Canvas the equivalent of gradebook categories in Canvas are assignment groups. To create assignment groups follow the steps below.

To create assignment groups go to the Assignments link in the course navigation. By default, there will be an assignment group already created names "Assignments", you can use the default grouping as one of your assignment groupings, to change the name of the grouping click on the three dots to the right of the grouping and then click "Edit".

In the pop-up window, you can change the group name to one of your categories of assignments that your grading scheme uses, then click "Save".

Back on the "Assignments" page, to add a new assignment group, click on the button in the top right for "+ Group".

Give the new assignment group a name to correspond to one of the categories of your grading scheme and then click "Save".

You will the have the newly created assignment group at the bottom of the Assignments page. To move assignments into the assignment group, click on the series of dots to the left of the assignment you want to move and drag the assignment down and into the newly created assignment group. Repeat for all assignments that need to be moved to the new assignment group.

Repeat this process for all of the categories in your grading scheme so that there is an assignment group for each. Note: If a single assignment has a specific percentage (such as the final exam) according to your grading scheme you will need to create an assignment group for it and place the assignment in the assignment group.

Once you have created your assignment groups you can then assign the weight for each assignment group according to your grading scheme. Begin by clicking on the three dots next to the "+ Assignment" button in the top right, then click the option for "Assignment Groups Weight".

In the subsequent pop-up window, check the box for "Weight final grade based on assignment groups".

You will then have the ability to assign percentages to the assignments groups you've created, once the percentages have been entered click "Save" in the bottom right.

You will then see the weight for each assignment group to the right of the assignment group heading.

The course total will then be calculated based on the assignments and the assignment group percentages allocated to them.

Here are some issues that can arise:

Not all materials will be imported into a Canvas course. For example, there is no equivalent of the GauchoSpace "Lesson" activity in Canvas and therefore, lessons will not be imported. For information on activity compatibility between GauchoSpace and Canvas, please review the "Activity and Resource Equivalencies from GauchoSpace to Canvas" section in this article: GauchoSpace to Canvas Introduction
Only one import can processed at a time.
Quizzes typically come over as "Practice Quizzes" and will need to be changed to "Graded Quizzes"
Canvas does not support subfolder structure in Question banks (Classic Quizzes) or Item Banks (New Quizzes). When importing question banks, questions will be added to their most granular category and some organizational structure may be lost. For example, if there is a category titled Exam 1 that contains three sub-categories “A”, “B”, and “C”, Canvas will import the sub-categories “A”, “B”, and “C” but they will not be nested under a larger category titled Exam 1.

Articles in this section

Step 1: Create a GauchoSpace Backup

Step 2: Import Backup into Canvas Course

Step 3: Post Import Checklist

Troubleshooting