[DEPR]: Legacy Problem Editor

[kdmccormick]

Please first read the parent DEPR ticket, [DEPR]: All Legacy Studio Frontends.

Proposal Date

2025-02-19

Target Ticket Acceptance Date

2025-03-05

Earliest Open edX Named Release Without This Functionality

Deprecated but available (via opt-out) in Teak. Opting out will also require opting out of the new Unit editor and using the deprecated legacy Unit editor, which will lack some Content Libraries features.

Full removal on 2024-09-08, landing in Ulmo.

Ulmo - Removed

• Legacy problem editor will be completely removed.

Rationale

The legacy ProblemBlock (aka "CAPA") editor is based on outdated frontend technologies that do not integrate well with the new React-based Studio micro-frontend. There is a newer React-based editor that replaces it. Supporting both editors is a major burden for maintenance and feature development.

Removal

The old pop-up modal Problem editor will be removed.

[ NEED: SCREENSHOT ]

[ NEED: CODE LINKS ]

Replacement

The full-screen React-based Problem editor is the replacement.

[ NEED: SCREENSHOT ]

CODE: https://github.com/openedx/frontend-lib-content-components/

Deprecation

We will warn about the pending deprecation in the Sumac release notes.

Migration

N/A

Additional Info

Before removing the legacy editor, we need to resolve the following:

• Proposal: (re) Enable Markdown editing of CAPA problems to meet various use cases platform-roadmap#384
• Epic 15: Editors are viewed in modals in Studio (parity with library component editing) frontend-app-authoring#1644
• [Editor] Show Answer setting cannot be switched back to "Finished" after first edit frontend-app-authoring#1491

At the time of writing, there is a known feature delta between the old editor and the new one, which the tickets above should resolve. These include:

• The default Markdown editing mode is removed and replaced with a default WSISWYG editing mode.
• Multi-response problems, which supported in Markdown, are not supported in WSIWYG (they are still available in the advanced editing mode.
• The Advanced (raw XML) editing mode is now nested under "Advanced Settings"
• The editor takes up the full screen and cannot be minimized.
• The editor cannot be opened in a new tab with right click.
• [Editor] Show Answer setting cannot be switched back to "Finished" after first edit frontend-app-authoring#1491
• Numerical Input Component Incorrectly Handles Formulas as numericalresponse frontend-app-authoring#1680

[ NEED: SCREENSHOTS ]

Additional feedback on the new editor:

• @SIdnani:

  "Overall, it took someone between 2-10 times as long to build content in the new MFE editors vs. the Legacy editors. Building a basic assessment item, like a Multiple Choice Question, from content written elsewhere went from 30 seconds in Legacy to 3 minutes with the forms required in the MFE editor. Advanced Editors are also a couple of more clicks to access. Toggling back and forth between the Advanced and Basic editors required to preview and complete LaTeX content became more time consuming. (This is where we get into content taking 10 times or more to build.)"

• [ NEED: Finish compiling feedback ]

Task List

TBD

[kdmccormick]

@pdpinch , here's a DEPR for the old Problem editor as we discussed. You mentioned that there were more Problem-specific editor concerns--let's collect those here.

[SIdnani]

Some more specific feedback I have gathered comparing the Legacy Problem Editor to the MFE Editors:

1. Ease of Copy-Paste: The Legacy Editor(Basic or Advanced) allowed you to copy-paste entire problems from text-editors outside the platform to build assessment items. As opposed to the MFE editor that requires you to copy-paste assessment items line by line into a form. A 10-item MCQ quiz with a standard 4 choices and solution and 2 hints goes from 10 copy-pastes actions from an external design doc to the Legacy Basic Editor and becomes 80 copy-paste actions with the addition of extra clicks to select the "correct" answer. This is a huge waste of time and will create errors.
2. The building everything as a form is only useful to folks as a learning aid, the first time they attempt something. After that, bulk building becomes the norm. Not one Instructional Designer or SME across all the institutions I have worked ever wrote content in the CMS of any LMS. So the forms required to build items makes them shy away from building online assessments.
3. Instructional Designers (IDs) often use a multi-step assessment items to hit one learning objective. These items have 1 submit button. For example: Putting an image, e.g. A Graph, with significant areas labeled a, b, c, etc., then 3 text-entry, or 3 numerical entry, or 3 drop-downs asking learners to identify, categorize, or compute values for each of those indicated areas. Sometimes IDs mix assessment types (Drop-downs, MCQ, Text-Entry, Numerical Entry) within one problem to hit different parts of the same learning objective and grade them as one whole.
4. The Legacy Editor allowed multi-assessment items to be generated at the WYSIWYG-level vs. the MFE Editor that forces you through the process of creating only one problem with the form editor for non-technical users then you need to end up in the advanced editor to be able to do anything else. Note: You are required at that point to know the weeds of the XML to get the same problem created.
5. Flexibility of formatting: Legacy Advanced Editor allowed you to implement and preview inline. This meant that you could compare your changes against other items in the Unit and re-format problems using HTML on the fly. You are not stuck with the default formatting available to an individual problem.
6. All of the standard usability changes that applied to Text components applies here as well. Things like location within the course, publication status, and advanced editors require more effort to access when the new MFE editor navigates folks away from their content on the Unit page.

[kdmccormick]

Thank you @SIdnani. Noted on all counts.

[SIdnani]

This was possible in the Legacy editor because the modal wasn't fixed in the window. By scrolling the page, it's possible to remain in the editing state but still see other parts of the courses. So it's not a preview of the content currently being edited, but you can see other parts of the course page and make edits based on the context.

[kdmccormick]

Product proposals relevant to this feedback:

1. https://openedx.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/COMM/pages/4517232656/Re-enable+Markdown+editing+of+CAPA+problems+to+meet+various+use+cases
2. https://openedx.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/COMM/pages/4517920789/Help+course+authors+understand+the+context+of+the+text+and+problems+they+are+editing

[kdmccormick]

Communicated via: https://discuss.openedx.org/t/deprecation-removal-all-legacy-studio-frontends/15049

[pdpinch]

I think this bug is pretty serious and should be fixed before we remove the legacy problem editor: openedx/frontend-app-authoring#1491. We're experiencing it on edx.org currently and it's another reason for us not to deploy the new problem editors to our other systems.

[kdmccormick]

Thanks, noted, I've added that bug to the list of items that need to be resolved before removing the legacy editor.

[pdpinch]

I think this is another issue that should be resolved, one way or another: Numerical Input Component Incorrectly Handles Formulas as numericalresponse (openedx/frontend-app-authoring#1680)

[kdmccormick]

Thanks Peter, noted. Keep 'em coming.