Thursday, September 6, 2007

A disturbance in the Moodle


The Moodle, disturbingly, does not always stay still and co-operate. It upgrades itself over night, suddenly offering a larger menu, more choices, more decisions. Rather like a teenager growing up too fast for her parents' comfort. Sometimes it locks itself away, like Greta Garbo, and becomes inaccessible for a while. Occasionally, just for fun, it hides things so we cannot find them.

As a consequence of these vagaries, our merriment and forward progress are, from time to time, interrupted by frowning moments of frustration. In one especially disturbed interlude, the dark side of the Moodle emerged on three computers simultaneously. The air in the small office suddenly went still and damp; the light flickered; suddenly I was in a crowded sweatshop, with three women glaring (Mandy), tutting (Sarah) and muttering mild but distinct imprecations (Renee) as their respective machines stuttered, denied access, lost things or demanded word files instead of pdfs (or rtfs, or something). Somehow, they were chained to their station, many minutes to the next bathroom break, behind on their quotas, not happy; not happy at all.

I huddled over my notes, trying not to look anything like an evil overseer. I tried Jedi mind tricks to get things working again. I sketched out exciting and creative ideas for the next module of the course. I breathed extra quietly.

I should not have been concerned. With the tenacity of Luke, the patience and concentration of Yoda, the dashing spirit of Leia and the superior mind power of Obi Won, my colleagues soon wrestled the Moodle to the ground and light-sabred the problems out of existence. Sarah even produced a second laptop, apparently senior in rank to the first, which instantly began to comport itself with meek obedience.

Then it emerged that as the originator of the pdfs (or rtfs, or whatever), I was responsible for all the problems. And so everything was completely as it should be: God was in her heaven and all was right with the world. And with the Moodle.

1 comment:

Android said...

The Moodle must be a highly-protected species; I still don't know what it is....A