Create OLX Course Policies

Tags: educator how-to

You create a course policy file to specify metadata about your course.

Create the Course Policy File

You define policies for your course in the policy.json file.

Save the policy.json file in the policy/<course-name> directory.

The <course-name> directory must match the value of the url_name attribute in the course.xml file.

Course Policy JSON Objects

Note

This is a partial list of supported fields in the policy.json file. Many more are available; these can be variously found on the Open edX Studio’s “Advanced Settings” page, the Pages & Resources view, and the Course Settings page.

start	The start date for the course, in UTC. For example: "2025-06-01T00:00:00Z".
advertised_start	The start date, in UTC, displayed in the course listing and course about pages. For example: "2025-06-15T00:00:00Z.
advanced_modules	A list of non-standard XBlocks to use in the course, eg ["lti", "scorm"]
enrollment_start, enrollment_end	The dates (in UTC) in which students can enroll in the course. For example, "2025-05-01T00:00:00Z". If not specified, students can enroll any time.
end	The end date for the course, in UTC. For example: "2027-06-01T12:00:00Z".
graceperiod	The amount of time learners have after a deadline to provide their answers, for example, "7200 seconds".
tabs	Custom pages, or tabs, in the courseware. See below for details.
discussion_blackouts	An array of time intervals during which students cannot create or edit discussion posts. For example, you could specify blackout dates during exams. For example: [[""2017-10-29T04:00", "2017-11-03T04:00"], ["2017-12-30T04:00", "2018-01-02T04:00"]] Course team members with the Discussion Moderator, Community TAs, or Administrator role are not restricted during blackout periods.
show_calculator	Whether the calculator is shown in the course (true) or not (false).
days_early_for_beta	The number of days early that students in the beta-testers group can access the course.
cohort_config	cohorted : Boolean. Set to true if this course uses student cohorts. If so, all inline discussions are automatically cohorted, and top-level discussion topics are configurable via the cohorted_discussions list. Default is false, not cohorted). cohorted_discussions: list of discussion topics that should be cohorted. Any not specified in this list are not cohorted. auto_cohort_groups: ["group name 1", "group name 2", ...] If cohorted is true, each student is automatically assigned to a random group from this list, creating the group if needed.
pdf_textbooks	Have pdf-based textbooks on tabs in the courseware. See below for details.
html_textbooks	The addition of HTML-based textbooks on tabs in the courseware has been deprecated.

Example Course Policy File

An example with a few of the settings defined in the course policy file follows.

{
    "course/2025": {
        "advanced_modules": [
            "edx_sga",
            "lti",
            "scorm",
            "poll",
            "survey"
        ],
        "cert_html_view_enabled": true,
        "certificates_display_behavior": "CertificatesDisplayBehaviors.END",
        "course_image": "Intro_to_OLX_course_card.png",
        "discussion_topics": {
            "General": {
                "id": "course"
            }
        },
        "discussions_settings": {
            "enable_graded_units": false,
            "enable_in_context": true,
            "provider_type": "openedx",
            "unit_level_visibility": true
        },
        "display_name": "OLX Example Course",
        "end": "2027-06-01T00:00:00Z",
        "enrollment_end": "2026-01-31T00:00:00Z",
        "enrollment_start": "2025-05-01T00:00:00Z",
        "graceperiod": "7200 seconds",
        "instructor_info": {
            "instructors": []
        },
        "language": "en",
        "learning_info": [],
        "lti_passports": [
            "codeboard:codeboard_key_1:codeboard_secret_1234",
            "jupyter:811a447706c152588c436ee13addeeb889e7f256033679408737bd5bc4118225:869e9639af7de74929b13ae17ad22e4efb60d9d112143e287589289102e1de00"
        ],
        "minimum_grade_credit": 0.8,
        "pdf_textbooks": [
            {
                "chapters": [
                    {
                        "title": "Full Book",
                        "url": "/asset-v1:OpenedX+OLXex+2025+type@asset+block@Education_for_a_Digital_World.pdf"
                    }
                ],
                "id": "6Education_for_a_Digital_World",
                "tab_title": "Education for a Digital World: Advice, Guidelines and Effective Practice from Around Globe"
            }
        ],
        "start": "2025-06-01T00:00:00Z",
        "tabs": [
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "Course",
                "type": "courseware"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "Progress",
                "type": "progress"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "Dates",
                "type": "dates"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "Discussion",
                "type": "discussion"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "is_hidden": true,
                "name": "Wiki",
                "type": "wiki"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "Textbooks",
                "type": "textbooks"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "Textbooks",
                "type": "pdf_textbooks"
            },
            {
                "course_staff_only": false,
                "name": "HTML Custom Tab",
                "type": "static_tab",
                "url_slug": "html_custom_tab"
            }
        ]
    }
}

See also

Create Course Assets and Textbooks in OLX (reference)

What is Open Learning XML? (concept)

Example of an OLX Course (reference)

Getting Started with OLX (quickstart)

What is the OLX Course Structure? (reference)

Maintenance chart

Review Date	Working Group Reviewer	Release	Test situation
2025-11-06	sarina	Ulmo	Pass

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