To all AU Students, Staff and Faculty;
Many of you have noticed within the last few months that there has been a timing out issue with AU Online, where the system basically closes your window and does not allow you back in. The tech team for Moodle (the system that runs AU Online) asks that you not go through a third party proxy, such as AOL. Make sure you are typing the url (web address) directly into your browser’s address bar. Accessing Moodle through AOL or other third parties often causes a problem with the Moodle coding. Some company or school networks can also present a similar problem, depending on what firewalls are in place. A way to test this is to access AU Online when you are not part of a network, such as when you are at home.
In general, the Moodle system is not designed to have a session open for hours at a time while typing. As a precaution, it would be good practice if you are posting a lengthy response to a discussion forum or exam to first type it out in a word processing doc such as Microsoft Word, then copy and paste it into the Moodle window. This way you will not lose your work should the internet window close unexpectedly (of course, you should also do frequent saves in your Word doc as a precaution as well!).
You should already be aware that Moodle advises using Firefox as your internet browser to access the AU Online System. That said, it is also possible that the recent upgrades installed by Firefox are somehow interfering with the coding of Moodle. The Moodle tech team is also investigating this, but cannot confirm any information yet. If you are in Firefox and are timed out, opening AU Online in Internet Explorer or Safari seems to be a good work-around for the situation.
We apologize for any inconvenience or frustration that has been caused by this situation. We will keep you posted as improvements are made. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me.
Sincerely,
Leona Owens, Web Content Manager & Editor
Anaheim University