Creating a channel and adding content

Tags: Skills

Who can use this?

 StndPremStrtProEnt
Learners:
Managers:     
Admins:     


Creating a channel

To create a channel:

  1. Go to the Channels home page (opens in new tab).
  2. Click Create channel.
    • For team plans: Create a name, description, objective, privacy level, and account you want your channel to live in. If your privacy level is company-wide, select which advanced settings you'd like to include for your channel.
    • For individuals: Add the name and description for your channel.
  3. Click Create.

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Adding content to your channel

You can add the following content types to a channel:

Adding courses, paths, and guides

You can start out within an existing channel, from the results of a search, or from a specific piece of content you wish to add.

From a channel

You can use an existing channel as the starting point to find content to add.

  1. On your channel's details page, click Add content.
  2. Choose the content type you wish to add.
    Channel - add content
  3. Find the content you wish to add, and follow the directions below (from the results of a search or from a specific piece of content) to add it to your channel.

From search results, all paths, or bookmarks

You can add content that you find from search results, the all paths page (opens in new tab), or the bookmarks page (opens in new tab) directly to a channel—without actually having to open the content.

  1. Find the content you wish to add and click the  ••• options menu on the far right of that content.
  2. Click Add to channel.
  3. Add the content to an existing channel.
        —or—
    Type a new channel name and click the + plus icon.

From a specific piece of content

You can also add a piece of content to a channel after you've opened it. This allows you to verify that it's really something you want to add.

  1. Open the content you wish to add.
  2. ClickAdd to Channel.
    • For labs, this is located to the right of the Start lab button.
      • Qwiklabs must be added as an external link
    • For paths, this is located in the top right corner.
    • For video courses—including conferences and webinars—this is located under the course description.
  3. Add the content to an existing channel.
        —or—
    Type a new channel name and click the + plus icon.

Adding Skill IQs

  1. On your channel's details page, click Add content.
  2. Choose Skill IQ.
  3. Click in the search box and choose from the list of Skill IQ assessments. You can begin typing to filter the drop-down choices.
  4. Add one or more assessments, then click Add assessment.

All members of the channel will see their own individual Skill IQ scores if they've taken the assessment and a Retake available button, when available. Otherwise, they'll see a Measure now button.

On a team plan, plan admins and team managers will be able to see individual proficiency levels (Novice, Proficient, Expert), and an average Skill IQ score for members of the channel. Please see Who can see my Skill IQ for details.

  1. On your channel's details page, click Add content.
  2. Choose External Links.
  3. Paste or type the URL into the link field.
  4. Complete the following fields which will then appear: Title, Content type, Skill level, and Duration.
  5. Click Add link.

Tip: Make sure to give the external link a good title so it's easy for your team to recognize.

Why use external links?

You may have resources on your organization's website, GitHub, Dropbox, Google Drive, or elsewhere that you want to make sure your learners know about. This is where external links come in.

Add a link to these valuable resources to your channel for easy reference. Clicks on an external URL will reflect in channels analytics. Be aware that external links may have their own privacy settings, independent of the channel's privacy settings.

To edit the external link—for example, change its title or skill level—click the ••• options menu on the far right of that content, then click Edit.

Adding specific modules of a course

It's possible to have just certain modules—instead of the whole course—in a channel. This doesn't prevent other modules in the course from playing, but it does serve as a suggestion of which modules to view.

To add a specific module from a course:

  1. Add the entire course to the channel.
  2. In the channel page, expand the course, and click Edit.
  3. Remove any modules you wish to exclude.

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Keeping your channel content up to date

Your Pluralsight Skills subscription gives you access to the most up-to-date content, with new content released weekly. In addition to releasing new courses, Pluralsight retires older content when updated courses are released.

When a new course is available to replace a retired course, you'll see a New course available notification in the channel prompting you to swap out the old for the new.

  • If you're the channel owner or a channel contributor, clicking the notification will give you the option of swapping out the old content. Once replaced, this cannot be undone.
  • If you're a channel member (not an owner or contributor), clicking the notification will prompt you to contact the channel owner to refresh the content.

Important: If you swap older content to newer content, the completion rate for any channel member who has completed the replaced course will update (decrease).

If the newer content already exists in the channel, replacing the old content with the new will cause an error. Instead, just remove the old content since its replacement already exists in the channel.

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Sharing channels and controlling privacy settings

If you aren't a member of a team plan, here's how to share a channel. By default, any Skills user can see a channel another individual user creates, if they have a channel URL.

  1. Navigate to the channel you wish to share.
  2. Click the ••• options menu next to Add content.
  3. Click Share and choose how you'd like to share the channel.

For team plans, new channels are private to the channel owner's organization. This way, your whole organization can get the benefit of channels created.

However, the channel owner can change the channel privacy setting to Personal - you and people with the link. This is helpful when creating a channel that's still in development before sharing it, or for personal learning.

Tip: Channels on team plans can be shared in even more ways. Check out how to add members, contributors, and owners.

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If you need help, please contact Pluralsight Support.