Best practice forum (Archived)

Changing Certificate Print Date

Hi there,

I hope someone can point me in the right direction, as I've run out of steam looking through the documentation. In short, the issue is this:

We host several courses for a customer on an install of Totara 2.9.2. One of the courses has been updated, and users who have bought the course are free to come back and retake it to obtain a certification at the new standard. Unfortunately - and this was an oversight on my part - when they retake the course and view their certificate, it still has the original issue date.

Totara's documentation states "Once a date is printed on a certificate, it cannot be changed unless you have customised your type/certificate.php file." - can anyone point me to documentation that details what has to be done to customise the file and allow it to have the most recent attempts date printed on the certificate?

Many thanks for any assistance.

John Laidlaw

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Hi John

The certificate.php found in the \mod\certificate\type folder creates the certificate and has a variable $timecompleted that comes from the certrecord . This output to the Certificate that could be adjusted in the code.

I think the documentation is referring to creating another certificate format and creating a copy of the code with the timecompleted variable changed then regenerating the certificate.

The customisation of the certificates in some areas requires coding we are looking at better ways to do this such including a text editor and custom certificate editor.

I can't think of a workaround for this but someone else may have as it seems a common scenario.

regards

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Hi Craig, I need to make a change to the position of the text that appears on the certificates available, I have produced a customised certificate and have uploaded it as a border image and now I need the standard text to be positioned more to the right hand side of the page. I'm struggling to find where the the followoing area is in the \mod\certificate\type folder that you mention above can be found.

I've read the link to the customisation of certificates but struggling to locate how to get to the correct area in Totara. Can you share some steps or screenshots to help?

Thanks

Sue

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Hi Sue

It is tricky to judge where a text box should be placed as the font and image size vary.

Using a custom border to set all the fixed information is a good idea.

Are you able to edit the language string to include some spaces to move everything to the right?

Regards

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Hi Craig

I am able to edit the language pack (under Site Admin/Localisation/Language Customisation but not sure where/how to edit the language string to include more spaces. Can you provide some instructions?

I've attached a copy of the certificate so you can see what the problem is.

Diamond Example Certificate.pdf

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Hi Sue

Thanks for the certificate file - there are some instructions on changing the language strings .

In this case you would select in the filter string under mod - certifficate.php and change the wording to shorten some of the phrases. However my idea of adding leading spaces doesn't work as the spaces are stripped out so you will either have to include a non space character or abbreviate the wording.

Are you able to edit the border image to be lighter or smaller so the text content is able to be fully shown

If this doesn't work then there are some third party plugins that some partners have used that make modifying certificates easier.

Regards

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Thanks Craig, I hadn't realised changing the position of the text was so difficult, as the section below mentions adjusting the placement of text when adding a new line.

We made the decision to change our certificate design instead and have made it so the Totara generated content is as standard and our company design is a full page watermark.

Many thanks for your help.

Sue

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Hi John,

I've created a Feature request TL-20316 Enable a certificate to be re-issued on a learner becoming certified. Please feel free to post any suggestions you may have.

regards,

George.

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Craig, George - many thanks for the replies, and apologies for the delay in replying. I appreciate the responses, as they help me formulate a plan for going forward.

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