22 February 2014, 17:47

A large number of my Mahara users log in directly without using Moodle. Now I want them all to log in via Moodle but it creates them as a new user in Mahara (even though their details are the same ie when I login direct to Mahara I am admin but when logging in from Moodle I become admin-1 and have a blank portfolio. How can I connect the old data to the new names?

Kathy Hooper

24 February 2014, 11:49

Hi Kathy,

To avoid getting duplicate accounts created when users log in via Mnet and directly at Mahara, you need to use the "parent authority" flag on the MNet auth instance. See https://mahara.org/interaction/forum/topic.php?id=5751#post24680

Unfortunately once the duplicate accounts have been created, there's no easy way to merge them back together. There is some advice on that other thread I linked to, about how to handle these accounts manually.

Cheers,

Aaron

24 February 2014, 22:32

Hello Kathy,

If you want to connect existing user accounts to Moodle so that you can log in via Moodle, you'd need to follow the instructions for changing the authentication method and remote username in bulk. This will connect your existing accounts to the MNet authentication method that you have set up.

As Aaron wrote, you'd still need to delete the newly created accounts. If users haven't used them yet, it's easy because you can just delete them. However, if they have used their accounts, you'd need to ask them which account they want to keep.

If they'd like to keep both accounts and you use Mahara 1.8, it's relatively easy though a bit laborious if many accounts are affected. You could export the portfolio of a user that was newly created via Moodle. Then log in as the original user and import the portfolio (Portfolio -> Import). You can then decide which content to merge into the original account.

Cheers

Kristina

24 February 2014, 23:22

Hi thanks for those replies.  I think it may be easiest to export the files and then import them again under the new logins.

cheers

kathy