The following is taken from the official Intelligent Agents Guide by D2L.
What Are Intelligent Agents?
Intelligent Agents automatically scan the Learning Environment for user-defined criteria. If the criteria are fulfilled, the intelligent agent sends an email to predefined addresses to alert them. This can be accomplished by using the email address in question or by utilizing replace strings.
Intelligent agents work well with Release Conditions, but also use some unique criteria.
Back to top of pageWhy Use Intelligent Agents?
Use the Intelligent Agents tool in your course to:
- Send emails to stakeholders if users have not logged into the system for a prescribed period of time
- Trigger an email to stakeholders if users have not accessed a course for a prescribed period of time
- Alert stakeholders if a user has met the criteria established by a release condition
- Email stakeholders if a combination of the criteria above are met
User Story
Mr Green is a manager of a team at his organization. Several members of his team are taking a training course. He receives an email communication that has be triggered by an Intelligent Agent that indicates every time a member of his team has completed the training course. Ian Boon has been working on completing the training course over the past month. When he finishes the last requirement of the course he receives an email that includes a course completion certificate. He can save this for his records and future reference.
Back to top of pageCriteria Unique to Intelligent Agents
Intelligent Agents incorporate the same release conditions criteria found throughout the Learning Environment. They also have two unique sets of conditions not found in release conditions.
- Login Activity: The agent will activate if users haven’t logged into the system for a prescribed period of time
- Course Activity: The agent will activate if users haven’t accessed a course for a prescribed period of time
These criteria can be combined with each other and/or with release conditions. You can make the agent as general or specific as you like (i.e. agent will activate if user hasn’t accessed the course for five days and/or hasn’t accessed the Learning Environment for two days and/or scored less than 50% on a quiz and/or hasn’t participated in a discussion).
Back to top of pageReplace Strings
Replace strings call system databases to automatically replace the string with names and terms by using curly brackets { }. For example, you could write the following:
| Your Input | Hi {InitiatingUserFirstName}, Our records indicate that you haven’t logged in to your {OrgUnitName} course in more than 5 days. Remember it is important to keep in regular contact and to set aside time every few days to login and work on your course. If there are reasons that you haven’t been able to login, then please contact your instructor right away. Here is the link to the site. We hope to see you soon. {LoginPath} If you would like to respond to this email, please reply to the CC’d email above. Just choosing “Reply” will not work because it comes from a different account. |
| Message User Sees | Hi Bill, Our records indicate that you haven’t logged in to your English 101 course in more than 5 days. Remember it is important to keep in regular contact and to set aside time every few days to login and work on your course. If there are reasons that you haven’t been able to login, then please contact your instructor right away. Here is the link to the site. We hope to see you soon. https://academy.desire2learn.com If you would like to respond to this email, please reply to the CC’d email above. Just choosing “Reply” will not work because it comes from a different account. |
Replace Strings for Addresses
| {InitiatingUser} The user whose behaviour meets the agent’s criteria, for example, a student who has not logged in for 5 days. | {InitiatingUserAuditors} The auditors for the user whose behaviour meets the agent’s criteria. |
Replace Strings for Body Text
| {OrgName} The name of the organization. | {OrgUnitCode} The code for the Org Unit. |
| {OrgUnitName} The name of the Org Unit. | {LoginPath} The address of the site login path. |
| {OrgUnitStartDate} The start date specified for the Org Unit. | {OrgUnitEndDate} The end date specified for the Org Unit. |
| {InitiatingUserFirstName} The first name of the initiating user. | {InitiatingUserLastName} The last name of the initiating user. |
| {InitiatingUserUserName} The username of the initiating user. | {InitiatingUserOrgDefinedId} The Org Defined ID of the initiating user. |
Notifications
After an intelligent agent has run, the user who created the intelligent agent will receive a confirmation email with the following information:
- Org Unit Code and Name
- The agent that ran
- Whether the agent took action
- Any error text
Back to top of pageNote: You will not be notified as to who triggered the agent. To see a list of all initiating users, you could CC yourself on the email.
