Display Course Summary Text in Course Overview block Moodle

Question

I would like to display the course summary text underneath the course title within the Course Overview block. How would I go about accessing and displaying this information?

Answer 1

Doesn't look like there is an option to display the summary.

The code to display the course name and link is in

function course_overview() in /blocks/course_overview/renderer.php

If you look for $coursefullname, you should see something like this

$coursefullname = format_string($course->fullname, true, $course->id);
$link = html_writer::link($courseurl, $coursefullname, $attributes);
$html .= $this->output->heading($link, 2, 'title');

So you'll need to add something like this

$html .= $course->summary;

The $course->summary normally contains a lot of html, if you want to remove that then use this instead

$html .= format_string($course->summary);

Answer 2

If the previous doesn't work, try this:

global $DB;
$result = $DB->get_field("course", "summary", array("id"=>$course->id));
$html .= $result;

Found here in the Moodle Forums: https://moodle.org/mod/forum/discuss.php?d=148324#p1002697

Answer 3

I put this code in line (moodle 2.9.1) after line 112 (/moodle/blocks/course_overview/renderer.php) can you try?

$link = html_writer::link($courseurl, $coursefullname, $attributes);
$html .= $this->output->heading($link, 2, 'title');

//start new code

global $DB;
                $result = $DB->get_field("course", "summary", array("id"=>$course->id));
                $modinfo = get_fast_modinfo(1);
                $context = context_course::instance($course->id);
                $section = $modinfo->get_section_info(1);
                $summarytext = file_rewrite_pluginfile_urls($result,
                            'pluginfile.php',
                            $context->id,
                            'course',
                            'summary','');              
               
                $html .= $summarytext;
   //end new code
            } else {               

                    $html .= $this->output->heading(html_writer::link(
                    new moodle_url('/auth/mnet/jump.php', array('hostid' => $course->hostid, 'wantsurl' => '/course/view.php?id='.$course->remoteid)),
                    format_string($course->shortname, true), $attributes) . ' (' . format_string($course->hostname) . ')', 2, 'title');
            }