If you want to provide students with multiple H5P contents that they should study or work on, it is quite normal that some students may already be familiar with certain topics. You may want to help them choose before they start reading all texts, watching all videos or trying all exercises.
The Hochschule für Angewandte Wissenschaften (HAW) in Hamburg, Germany, hired me to create a separate H5P content type to help with exactly that: Content Compiler. And as part of the Hamburg Open Online University, they are more than happy to make the content type and its source code available to anyone.
The basic idea of the content type is to stuff it with different H5P contents and add tags to each of them – even though setting tags is not mandatory. Students can then select or unselect tags that they think are relevant for them and select or unselect corresponding cards that represent the content. They can re-arrange their selection if they want content to be presented in a specific order. Well, and then they can work on the exercises that they have chosen.
The author may tweak the visual design and the behavior a little in the settings, the user state can be stored and re-created, but that’s it.
Some may wonder: Even though you may have added content that awards a score, the Content Compiler does not report anything itself. Not commissioned, and doesn’t really make sense, does it? 😉
Want to use it already?
I will ask the H5P core team to review the content type. Afterwards, they should release it on the H5P Hub, but this process usually takes some time.
If you want to use the content type right away, look for the Reuse button underneath the content. Use that button to download the demo content, and then upload the .h5p file onto your H5P enabled platform. Please note that you will need to have permission to install H5P libraries. Otherwise, you cannot install the content type this way. In that case, your system admin will need to assist you.
The source code is available as well, if you want to check it before installing or if you want to build the libraries yourself:
Is it available in my language?
In theory: yes! If it’s missing, you can fill in the gaps yourself on translate-h5p.tk.
Any future plans for that content type?
Not really. I was merely a contractor – like an architect that created a building but doesn’t keep working on it once the building is done. I’ll take care of all the change requests that the H5P core team may have to bring the content type onto the H5P Hub. Additionally, I suppose that I will find time to help you on the H5P forum if you have questions. That’s what I usually do anyway. But if you claim free support or demand features as if it was your right, you’ll most likely get a “no” from me. I may add things, even consider your ideas, but at my own pace – or expect you to toss me some coin. I hope you understand that. Not all do, as I know from bad experience.