Lets Chat about Homestead…

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Update (04-21-23 3:20pm)  NEW Updates: Known Issues | FAQ Bugs currently being worked on:

1) Lesson PDF Downloads sometimes don’t work – A fix is in development and will be pushed out asap.
  Update (04-21-23 3:21pm)  This Bug has been fixed! We now have a shiny-spiffy all new Presentation Conversion and Download service working on all the main lessons 😀 (Note if you find one I missed let me know in the form below) 

 

2) My course percentage completion is different since the update – This is a result of a previous bug that was only calculating percentage of course completed as quizzes completed. Your new percentage now accurately measures your total completion of the course and its content.

3) The search bar inside of the course is missing – A fix is in development and will be pushed out asap.

Update (04-20-23 10:20am)  This Problem is deeper than originally anticipated and will require a more significant time investment and may take a bit for me to sort out. Please be patient with me while I redevelop a solution for this issue.

Update (07-10-23 9:50am) Search has been reenabled! Bug Squashed! 

 

4) I cannot complete Quizzes, the progress bar just loads forever and nothing happens – A fix is in development and will be pushed out asap.
Update (04-19-23 11:20am) This bug is Fixed!!! Huzzah the quizzes are working properly again 😀

5) I cannot complete some lessons – Any lesson with a quiz attached cannot be completed manually, but will autocomplete once you passed the quiz. Quiz completions are currently bugged so this is a symptom of the previously mentioned bug (see #4 /)
Update (04-19-23 11:20am) This Bug is fixed!!! WooHoo!

6) The “When There is no Doctor Section has missing/ Broken Content
Update (04-20-23 10:20am) This Bug is fixed!!! WTIND Content is back!

Thanks for you patience while I try and fix these issues

Hey there, your friendly neighborhood web-developer here!

I’m so excited to share that I’ll be making some significant changes to our learning platform site in the next few days.

As you know, Homestead Academy has been a long-term passion project, and I’ve poured my heart and soul into creating a platform that I hope will make your learning experience better than it ever has been… and there have been so many discoveries and opportunities for progress along the way I’ve barely been able to keep my head screwed on right.

It may come as no small surprise that I’ve never developed a site like this… and that most features and benefits that we’ve been using on Homestead had no precedence or previous experience to benefit from. So naturally the linear evolution of the site matched my own knowledge of best practices and strategies to develop a learning platform.

 

What that means in a practical sense is that as soon as each piece of this site was completed I was that much more knowledgeable on how to do that thing even better. Also, at a fundamental level, everything that I created here was instantly antiquated the second it was released 😁

Working in tech is F.U.N! Frenzied Upgrades are Never-ending!

So over the last 3 or 4 months, I’ve been using everything I learned about the initial development of this site, and applying it to Homestead 2.0. The time has now come where I’m comfortable with the changes enough to share it with all of you.

First and foremost, I want you to know that your progress on courses will remain safe. All of your courses, lessons, and quizzes will be exactly where you left them. I’ve taken great care to ensure that your learning experience won’t be affected during this transition.

Probably 🙃.

I do want to give you a heads up that there may be will be some bugs & issues that pop up during and shortly after the update process. But don’t worry, I’ll be monitoring the site closely and working hard to fix any issues that arise as quickly as possible.. I’ve stocked up on Zip Fizz and anticipate spending several nights as a coding zombie working through everything that comes up.

Image Generated by Ai via Stable Diffusion

I’ve been listening carefully to your feedback about Homestead, and I’m thrilled to say that these changes are based on what you’ve told me you need and want, and I’m excited to show you the new design, which is modern, intuitive, and will make your learning experience that much better. Plus, it’s faster, more mobile-friendly, and easier to navigate!

Here’s a surface level rundown of the most important features and improvements to the platform that I think you’ll love:

  • Wildly improved layout and frontend site navigation.
  • Enhanced course progress tracking and reporting for both students and professors.
  • Expanded lesson and quiz creation tools.
  • Streamlined user management and course enrollment processes and user management features for HSA admin and staff.
  • Hundreds of user interface improvements that dynamically change site content and page layout to keep the user informed, aware, and in control of their own experience.
  • Foundational Changes to the core of the site making it lighter, more mobile friendly, and faster in just about every metric.

I’m confident that these updates will make your learning experience even better, and I can’t wait for you to see everything in action!

So, what should YOU do?

First and foremost, as the great Douglas Adams said:

LOTS of things are going to break and go wrong, and that is super okay!

While we’re making these changes, I’ll be implementing a special temporary reporting system for questions, bug reports, and issues. This will help me address any concerns you may have during this time. I kindly ask that you use this system instead of sending emails or calling, as it’ll be easier for me to keep everything organized and respond to you quickly.

I’m so grateful for your support and feedback as I make these changes.

Homestead Academy has been and will continue to be a labor of love, and I have been so honored to be able to assist you in your journey toward self-sufficiency and independence.

If you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to reach out through the reporting system form below ↓, and I’ll be happy to help.

Thanks so much for being a part of Homestead Academy, and thank you so much for your patience and understanding as I get all this smoothed-out!

-Evan

 

Bug Report Form:

 

39 thoughts on “Lets Chat about Homestead…”

  1. Tracy Judd

    Evan
    No bugs, Just awesomeness!
    You’re doing a great job! Thank you for all you do for us.
    We are real people too and will be patient with you during this transition.
    You are precious and we appreciate you and Doc with family, so greatly.
    Praying for your transition and your restfulness. :)TJudd

  3. CarolAnn

    Hi Evan,
    Looks great ! is definitely better to navigate. 🙂
    I do have a few questions though:
    -I noticed the comment sections under the videos in the lessons are no longer there. Will they come back later ?
    -My progress fell from 80% complete to 47% complete. Will it come back?
    -As new things are added, perhaps the quantity of courses required to finish increases? I also have quiz grades back on Canvas… but I was still 80% complete without them.
    Thanks !

    1. HGH I.T.

      Hi there!

      The comments Section has been moved to the Forum , we’ll be holding all future discussion there where students have much easier access to the questions and responses.

      There was a bug with progress calculation where the percentage was only counting quiz items towards progression and that has been fixed. Your new percentage more accurately reflects your total progress in the course as a whole.

  4. Teresa Fields

    I finished the program in December but still login and listen to lectures (I listen over and over again to some of them) I think I have learned a lot, but now it is showing that I’m only partially through the program and doesn’t want me to skip around to different lectures. Sometimes it tells me I haven’t completed the previous section. I even tried going back and taking the quiz but it still didn’t progress. I’ve been really limited in what I can access. I know I need to be patient but I wanted you to know what it was doing. Thanks.

  5. susan freeman

    hi i wanted to report that i was working on lessons yesterday and it did not log that i had completed either the video or the quiz that i had completed.

  6. Mary Crowder

    I was working on the Female Reproductive Module and it doesn’t have a button to print out lesson and the video only has 30min of Doc talking after that you need to be a lip reader. Went on to Male Reproductive Module and it has no slides either. I didn’t try the video since I was so frustrated with the Female counter part.

    1. HGH I.T.

      Hi Mary I’ve tested the video and it seems to be working fine with moderately loud audio. Please check your device audio settings to adjust the volume. The video is 3 Hours and 10 minutes long.

      I’ll ask Doc to add the slides to the lessons, it looks like those two haven’t had them added yet.

    1. HGH I.T.

      The search function was breaking some stuff, so I turned it off. I’ll get it fixed and back in asap

      In the meantime, if you press ctrl+f on your keyboard you can use the built in browser search function (on chrome anyway)

  9. hdinehart

    I completed most things before it changed to the homesteading academy. Finally, today, I was going through my account, hoping to mark things complete, but I am not able to do that with most modules. I am not able to access ANY PDF’s; itt redirects to the Homesteading home page :(, which I am VERY sad about. Also, none of my quizzes are allowing me to complete and record them (all of the progress I made before the change is completely gone and has been since then). I am able to answer the questions, then it states it’s recording the score, and then nothing.

    Honestly, I feel like I cannot use anything right now so it’s pretty frustrating. Some of the videos I have watched recently, cut off part way through, so I can’t even watch those. Hopefully we can get full access soon. My push to continue learning is greater than ever right now, yet I can’t. I am having to resort to all my old stuff that I printed about 3 years ago. Thankfully I have that, still.

    Let me add, that I feel that when I log in we should be immediately directed to a place where I can see my course, not a long doc about what is offered. (I know, because I am already enrolled). It’s even worse on my phone; it took me a good 5 minutes to find my course today.

    Hoping things get better quickly.

    1. HGH I.T.

      Hi There,

      I’m sorry this has been so frustrating and i am working on making the experience of using my site as simple as possible.

      1) To mark a lesson as complete you can press the “Mark as Complete” Button at the bottom of the lesson. If the Lesson has a quiz attached to it you must complete and pass the quiz, at which time the lesson will be marked as complete automatically. If there are any you have already done and don’t want to repeat them, shoot an email to info@homegrownherbalist.net with a list and we can do it manually for you.

      2) PDF downloads have been fixed. It was a bug at launch and was quickly resolved.

      3) Which videos are being cut off? I’ve skimmed a few and they seem to be working. let me know.

      4) After you login, you are directed to the Homepage of the website. This is the optimal strategy as we have multiple course offerings on the site and sending everyone to any one specific course page would not make sense for the other part of the student population that isn’t enrolled/interested in that specific course.

  10. Kathryn Wood

    Good morning, I have not been able to see the two tests I did last week and do not want to go on until I can finish those and see how I did. I look forward to these class’s in the mornings. I will wait until I can find the test where are they? I hope you have a blessed day and thank you so much for all you do to help us.

  11. Laura Bird

    Thank you for your hard work, and I see a previous person mentioned that the PDF isn’t working and that you fixed it. I am unable to download the PDF. So sorry.

  13. Rosalyn Long

    Hello, Evan

    Technology is great until it isn’t 🙂 Best wishes as you work to update the site, route out all the unwanted bugs, etc.

    When I press the printable PDF slides button for the Cardio Lesson 1 slides, I am automatically routed to the homepage. Can you tell me how to access the PDF of the cardio lesson slides, please?

    Thanks so much
    Rosie

    1. HGH I.T.

      Hi Virginia,

      Please send me an email with screenshots of the lessons that aren’t showing the correct pages and I’ll get them fixed.

      The course search button broke my site once we went live so I need to refab that whole system. It’ll take me some time to bring that back.

  15. Mary J Oliver

    I just finished the quiz on Learning the Lingo and It is stuck on Results are being recorded. I sat waiting for 4 minutes and gave up and pushed the back button. I took it again and the same thing happened. Help!!!

    also it wont let me download any of the PDF files. It takes me to the beginning page.

    Sorry about the problems.
    MJ

  16. Mary J Oliver

    I started the section on Kidney and Bladder formula and i went to print the formula but it wont let me print the entire formula so i downloaded it to my desktop and when I opened the file there are two pages of Files that downloaded on to my computer. they are the background stuff when writing code. EX 291666104 _viewer_css_ltr
    about 130 lines of the code to make the one slide.

    I thought you might want to know
    MJ

  17. Christine Natvig

    It’s saying that I have not completed several of the lessons and quizzes that I have previously done. I am now confused about where I left off. About 3 or 4 are from the first few modules.

  18. Maggie

    Hello there! Thank you for all your hard work to get this new update up and running!

    I did want to let you know that a couple of the lessons aren’t showing the video files on my end. Two examples are Part 10 and Part 12 of the Where There Is No Doctor series. The PDF document loads, but no video. Part 13 doesn’t appear to have any content. I can certainly work on other areas, but I wanted to let you know! And I just completed Part 11 and it worked great!

    I am really enjoying the new format. I know it’s hard work to get all this worked out, but it’s going to be amazing! Thanks for all your hard work! God bless you!

  19. Rachel

    Hi Evan, excellent job on the site! I was curious if you know that the home grown herbalist Q&A forum is viewable without being a registered student? I am a student in the retired Canvas platform. Today, I decided to (re)register here and before I did, I poked around. I imagine that since there is a lot of great info on the forum and right now I can search it without being logged in, it might be that it was better if it was behind the “paywall”. I have no idea if that is the correct term or not yet I am hoping you know what I mean. It tells me that I cannot comment since I’m not registered, although I can do a search for a term and find some great info. Maybe it is intended to be that way and I am mistaken in thinking it should be viewed after registering and logging in? All the best!

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