v18 Login screen consideration and recommendations
V18 Login screen changes and effects on site
With version 18, there have been significant changes to the login screens for both the Totara core theme and the CLS theme. The two main changes that will affect most customers and need to be taken into consideration before upgrading are the update to the login screen image and the changes to the 'instructions' option, which allows you to add text to the login page.
The new Totara login page and image size
The instructions area in v17.
Login screen image
As can be seen in the above screenshot, the Totara login page image has been completely changed in v18. This means any customers currently using the option of a login page image will be affected. The current login page options displays like the below -
Images that are currently being used are were created for the above option and will end up being formatted for the new size of the login image. For most images, this will not be suitable and will affect the look of the site on the main login image. We do have two solutions for this, which are listed below.
Option 1 - Enabling the legacy login page in the backend config:
This option allows us to enable the old style of login page from version 17 and earlier, allowing the use of the same images, and it should mean that no changes are required from the customer. When the live site upgrade tickets are sent out, we will ask the question to you if you would like this option enabled with the live upgrade. If the answer is yes, we will enable this in the config well we do the upgrade, and users shouldn't be affected.
Option 2 - Updating the login image to fit the new theme option:
If you choose this option, then your first step will be to create a new login image to fit the new size. The size of the new image is 693 x 1001, and this will fit the dynamic size requirement for the image, meaning that the image will resize correctly when the window is made smaller or bigger. Once the image has been created, you can test this or your staging before applying to live by following the below steps -
- Login as an admin user.
- Click the admin cog located in the top left hand side of the main menu bar.
- Click 'Appearance'.
- Click 'CLS' if you use the CLS theme or Ventura if you use the default Totara theme.
- Click 'Edit site brand'.
- Then click onto the 'images' tab.
- You can then upload the new image by drag and dropping into the upload box for 'Login background image' setting.
- Once done click 'Save changes' at the bottom of the page.
You can then test this by logging out and refreshing the login page.
Login screen instructions
The login screen instructions text that has been highlighted above has also been changed with version 18. It is now linked to 'Self-registration with approval' and the 'email-based self-registration' authentication methods. If neither of these options is enabled as authentication methods the setting for instructions will now not apply. The instructions have also been moved and now display at the beginning of the self-registration form and do not display directly on the login page. This means that any instructions that are currently set up on your site will no longer display with the upgrade to version 18. There only one option if you want to keep this the same as it was in version 17.
Option 1 - Enabling the legacy login page in the backend config:
This option allows us to enable the old style of login page from version 17 and earlier, allowing the use of the instructions are again, and it should mean that no changes are required from the customer. When the live site upgrade tickets are sent out, we will ask the question to you if you would like this option enabling with the live upgrade. if the answer is yes, we will enable this in the config while we do the upgrade, and users shouldn't be affected. We also recommend this if you have any sort of customisations done on the login page.
If you have any questions about the above, please feel free to send a ticket into help. and we will reply as soon as we can.
Thank you,
Chambury Learning
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