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Roles and Rights: Guest access

Login page with the three tabs for login with an account, Cloud Login and Guest access; people without an account enter OpenOlat via the Guest access tab

Besides registered users, people without an OpenOlat account can also access the system as guests. Guests are anonymous, unregistered users who cannot be managed in the user management.

For guests to gain access, the system administrators of the OpenOlat instance must activate the guest login. It is also possible to configure which OpenOlat areas guests can access and which not. Only the system administrators can make these basic settings.

Generally, various learning resources, e.g. wikis, blogs, tests, videos or glossaries, can be released for guests.

Course level

Important

Guest access can only be activated for conventional courses, not for learning path courses.

In a conventional course, course owners can set up the access configuration so that guests can also access the course: Course > Administration > Settings > Share. Set "Access for participants" to "Bookable and open offers". Then add an offer of the type "Guest" in the "Offer" section via "Add offer".

Offer type Guest selected in the Add offer menu, above it the option Bookable and open offers and an existing offer for guests, Share tab of the course settings

Guests can see or partially edit the following course elements:

  • Read only: CP learning content, blog, wiki, forum, notifications, calendar, single page, external page, file dialog, link list
  • Forum: In the course editor, course owners can use the option "Allow guests to post" to define whether guests may also create forum posts
  • Watch podcast and video
  • Folder: download files
  • SCORM: run
  • Test: run depending on configuration
  • Self-test: run
  • Participate in BigBlueButton, OpenMeetings and similar meetings
  • Edit surveys

Guests stay anonymous

Guest access does not create a membership in the course. All guests use the same anonymous guest account. The member management of the course and the user management therefore do not list any guests, and individual guests cannot be told apart. If you want to record the participants by name, invite them as external members.

If you want to give a guest direct access to a course, send them the external link to the course.

External link of a course with the suffix guest=true, highlighted in the External link section of the course info page

Tip: Alternative to guest access

If you want to invite someone to an OpenOlat course who does not yet have an OpenOlat account, as a course owner you can alternatively use the option "Invite external members" in the members management. The invited person then receives a registration link and limited access to OpenOlat, but has more possibilities than a guest.

Note

OpenOlat administrators find further information on configuring OpenOlat for guests on the pages "Anonymous guests and external users" and "Customizing".

Further information

Mentioned on this page
User management >
Members management >
Anonymous guests and external users >
Customizing >

Further reading
Access configuration >
Offer types >
Roles and Rights: User Types >
Login Page >

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