Moodle Front Page Customization

The front page is the initial page seen by someone reaching a Moodle site after or before a login. Typically a student will see courses, some blocks of information, displayed in a theme. In the Navigation bar and Navigation block it is called "Home".

A combination of site policies, user authentication and front page settings determine who can get to the front page. And once they get there what they can see and what they can do.

In many ways, a Front Page has similar features and functions to those in a Course. For example, Activities, Resources and Blocks can be added to the Front Page to give it different looks.

The site's Front page is similar to a course page. The front page settings, roles, filters, backup, restore and questions are currently duplicated in Settings > Front page settings AND Settings > Site administration > Front page.

Front page and front page items when logged in

The centre of the front page can display any combination of the following: news items, a list of courses, a list of course categories, a list of categories and courses or none. The order is determined by a combination box.

It is possible to create one setting for anyone who gets to the front page without logging in to the Moodle site, and another look for only those who have logged into the Moodle site. There are two combination boxes.

Include a topic section

This adds a topic section to the centre-top of the front page. When editing is turned on, resources and/or activities can be added to the topic section using the dropdown menus, in the same way as on a course page.

Note: The label resource can be used to add text and/or an image to the centre-top of the front page.

Default front page role

The default frontpage role enables logged-in users to participate in front page activities. It is recommended that it is set to frontpage role. It should never be set to Guest.

For sites which do not have a default frontpage role (because they upgraded from 1.9), it is recommended that the administrator creates a new role with frontpage archetype, resets it to default and then sets it as the default frontpage role.

Front Page roles

As in a course, you can assign users roles just in the context of this page. Note this is different than the default Authenticated User on Front Page role found in front page settings. As a security issue, usually only admins can modify the front page, other users do not.

Front Page backup

You can backup the front page, similar to a Course backup.

Front Page restore

As in a course, you can Restore a backed up version of the front page. However, there are currently issues with front page restore, as outlined in MDL-31500 and MDL-30808

Front Page questions

The Question bank is accessible from the Front Page. For example, if "topic" is checked in the front page settings, you can add a Quiz module activity.

Tips and Tricks

A Moodle site's front page can be reconfigured from the default standard to give it a different look and or change how it functions. Depending upon the changes, this can be a simple or a more complex process. Of course a custom theme may have its own unique front page format.

Source by Moodle.org

Moodle Customization --> just a glimpse

Most schools and colleges or corporate training departments prefer to customize the Moodle LMS so that it meets their precise needs and also helps reinforce their branding. Many also prefer to conduct training and administration in-house. Here I will provide as much (or as little) customization as you require.

We can customize a Moodle theme to match your identity. We integrate Moodle in you Drupal, Joomla, WordPress as part of our customization service. Lambda Solutions offers you a choice of popular Moodle modules and plugins such as grade books, certificates to add functionality on top of the Moodle core functions.

Moodle customization includes with the theme to match your identity. Moodle can be integrated with Drupal, Joomla, Wordpress. Customized modules and plugins like gradebooks, certificates and report functionalities can be added to the developed moodle LMS.

Language customization:

Moodle is translated into many languages - see Moodle.org: Language packs for their list and the translation completion status. The translations are distributed in so called language packages (or just lang packs) that are maintained by kind volunteers, community contributors and Moodle partners. Please read the page Translation first to understand how the whole localization machinery works.
Moodle site administrators can customize any language pack to fit their individual needs (for example to use the term "Unit" instead of "Course"). You are discouraged from direct editing the files coming as a part official language pack. Such changes would be silently overwritten during the next upgrade. Instead, you should create a local language pack that holds all your changes from the official pack.
Local language packs have the same structure as the official ones. They are saved in your Moodle data directory in moodledata/lang/xx_local/ folder where 'xx' is the code of the language. You have to have the official language pack installed before you can customize it. Local language pack should contain just strings you have customized - you should not copy whole official language packs.

When displaying a string, Moodle first looks if a local customization of it exists in moodledata/lang/xx_local/component_file.php. If so, it is used. If not, the string from the official language pack is used (eventually, if the string has not been translated yet, the original English version is displayed). Please note that the strings are cached for better performance so you have to purge Moodle caches after you modify a file in your xx_local pack (caches are purged automatically if you use the tool described below).

Moodle comes with a tool that allows you to edit your local language pack via web interface. This tool is available for the site administrators in Settings > Site administration > Language > Language customization.