Syncing Google Classroom to MIS data - take 2

I've previously blogged about how to make Google Classrooms and sync them from Capita SIMS using GAM - you can see that post here. However, that post required groups made by Hapara Teacher Dashboard to work. What if you don't want or cannot afford a paid-for solution? Well, a couple of scripts will allow you to to do this.

I've gone through the process in this video:

Script to clean out "s from SIMS output (run in the path oif the script):

$Path = "c:\gam\hapara\students.csv" 
(Import-CSV -Path $Path) | Select-Object -Property 'Email', 'Class Code', 'UID'| Export-CSV -Path C:\gam\hapara\classroom\students.csv -notype
(gc C:\GAM\hapara\classroom\students.csv) | % {$_ -replace '"', ""} | out-file C:\GAM\hapara\classroom\students.csv -Fo -En ascii
py classes.py 

Change the file names and paths to suit yourself.

The Python code

def readStudents(infile):
    students = []
    try:
        studentFile = open(infile, "r")
        for line in studentFile:
            student = line.split(",")
            student[2] = student[2].replace("\n", "")
            students.append(student)
    except IOError:
        print("Couldn't read CSV file!")
    finally:
        if "studentFile" in locals():
            studentFile.close()
    return students

def findUniqueClasses(students):
    uniqueClasses = []
    for i in range(1, len(students)):
        if not students[i][1] in uniqueClasses:
            uniqueClasses.append(students[i][1])
    return uniqueClasses

def findStudentsInClasses(uniqueClasses, students):
    studentsInClasses = []
    for theClass in uniqueClasses:
        studentsInClass = [theClass, ""]
        for i in range(len(students)):
            if students[i][1] == theClass:
                # studentsInClass[1] = studentsInClass[1] + students[i][0] + "," + theClass + "\n"
                studentsInClass[1] = studentsInClass[1] + students[i][0] + "\n"
        studentsInClasses.append(studentsInClass)
    return studentsInClasses

def createClassFiles(studentsInClasses):
    for className in studentsInClasses:
        try:
            newFile = open(className[0] + ".csv", "w")
            newFile.writelines(className[1])
        except IOError:
            print("Couldn't save the class file!" + className[0])
        finally:
            if "newFile" in locals():
                newFile.close()

if __name__ == "__main__":
    infile = "students.csv"
    students = readStudents(infile)
    createClassFiles(findStudentsInClasses(findUniqueClasses(students), students))

Again - this might need modding based on your file names. Code produced by my son Robert Nixon.

And finally, sync to classroom vis the following PowerShell (run in your GAM directory)

$list = Import-Csv C:\GAM\groups.csv
foreach ($entry in $list)
  {
    .\gam.exe course $($entry.group) sync students file $($entry.file)
  }
  exit

Again mod paths and filenames to suit you.

To get this working in any specific environment will take a little work - but once done - will run as scheduled tasks for as long as you want without issue or cost.