Courses
Courses are displayed using information from the Banner database.
In general, the courses displayed under each program are determined by their department field in Banner.
For example, if the program is Photography, we display all courses with a department matching “Photography”.
This is all achieved using the Course Listings by Department widget, and tailoring the widget to search for a particular department in the Banner database.
e.g. for Anthropology, the widget looks like this:
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_DEPARTMENT=Anthropology</arg>
</widget>
Many programs don’t conform to this general search pattern: some programs require courses from multiple departments, other programs require a handful of specific courses. For these programs, there’s no way of saying “choose all the courses with such and such a field in Banner”. The course listings for these programs will need to be hand-tailored.
Customizing the course listing
If you need to change the course listing on the program Courses page:
- First go to the page details, and change the page template to Level 3 - Program Courses Page (editable).
- Then, edit the page and select the source code button. This lets you add widgets with custom arguments.
- Now you can add the Banner widget and tailor the arguments to display specific courses for that program using the examples below.
Refer to this table to see all the course data from Banner »
Once the customized course listing has been added to the courses page, you need to add it to the College Catalog.
You will need FTP access for this part:
- Open the College Catalog courses include located at: /_ingredients/templates/includes/college-catalog/courses.php
- Add a new conditional statement for the program, following the existing examples.
- Add the same customized courses widget and the “Courses” title inside the conditional (the same widget you just added to the program courses page).
- Scroll up to the top of the file, and add a new not_equals statement to the first conditional, following the existing ones. It should look like this:
<if var="program" type="GET" not_equals="Your Program Name"/>
To show courses from a specific department:
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_DEPARTMENT=</arg>
</widget>
To show courses listed under a specific subject:
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=</arg>
</widget>
To show courses with a specific subject and number:
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=</arg>
</widget>
To show courses in a specific range:
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search”>SZMCRSE_NUMBER>1000</arg>
<arg id="search”>SZMCRSE_NUMBER<2000</arg>
</widget>
For example, to show the Studio Production undergraduate composition courses, enter the following into the page source code:
<h3>Composition: Undergraduate</h3>
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=MCO</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=1010</arg>
</widget>
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=MCO</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=1020</arg>
</widget>
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=MCO</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=2010</arg>
</widget>
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=MCO</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=2020</arg>
</widget>
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=MCO</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=3020</arg>
</widget>
<widget id="174_data_source_course_listings_by_department">
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_SUBJECT=MCO</arg>
<arg id="search">SZMCRSE_NUMBER=3030</arg>
</widget>
Additional Table SZMSECT
Another table Has been added called: “SZMSECT”, that allows for more details on each course.
When building a SZMSECT widget:
- For the input “Widget type” select: “data source” from the drop down
- For the input “Show data from the table:” add the table name text: SZMSECT
Other inputs like “Show data matching the search pattern” and “Sort data using the field:” can be customized using the data from this table.
Here is an example of all the banner data available from the SZMSECT table shown live.
All the SZMSECT data parameters you can search by and display:
- SZMSECT_TERM
- SZMSECT_TERM_DESC
- SZMSECT_SUBJECT
- SZMSECT_NUMBER
- SZMSECT_CRN
- SZMSECT_TITLE
- SZMSECT_COURSEDESC
- SZMSECT_PREREQ
- SZMSECT_STARTDATE
- SZMSECT_ENDDATE
- SZMSECT_CREDITS
- SZMSECT_INSTRUCTORS
- SZMSECT_DAYSORT
- SZMSECT_MEETINGS
- SZMSECT_SESSIONS
- SZMSECT_FEES