release notes initial draft

docs/en_us/release_notes/source/08-26-2014.rst → docs/en_us/release_notes/source/08-27-2014.rst

 ###################################
-August 26, 2014
+August 27, 2014
 ###################################
 
 The following information reflects what is new in the edX Platform as of August
-26, 2014. See previous pages in this document for a history of changes.
+27, 2014. See previous pages in this document for a history of changes.
 
 ****************************************
 edX Release Announcements Mailing List
@@ -33,107 +33,117 @@ edX Studio
         icon at all three levels is available to publish all content within
         that level.
 
-    The "Publish" icon is also available on the **Course Outline** page for
-    individual units.
+    The "Publish" icon is also available for 
+    individual units on the **Course Outline** page.
 
   * You can now hide all of the content in an entire section or subsection on
     the **Course Outline** page. To ensure that students cannot see a part of
-    the course, select the "Settings" icon and in the dialog that opens select **Hide from students**. The same feature is available for units.     
+    the course, select the "Settings" icon and in the dialog that opens select
+    **Hide from students**. The same feature is available for individual units.
   
   For more details, see our most recent `edX Product and Engineering
   Newsletter`_.
 
-* You can now build content experiments (also known as A/B tests) entirely
-  within edX Studio. With a content experiment, you show different course
-  content to different groups of students. Research teams can compare the
-  performance of students in different groups to gain insights into the
-  relative effectiveness of your course content.
+* You can now build content experiments (also known as A/B tests or split
+  tests) entirely within edX Studio. With a content experiment, you show
+  different course content to different groups of students. Research teams can
+  compare the performance of students in different groups to gain insights into
+  the relative effectiveness of course content.
 
 * A defect in the drag and drop feature for course content on the **Course
   Outline** page has been fixed. Dropping a unit into a collapsed subsection
-  now adds that unit without changing any existing content in that subsection.
+  now adds the unit without changing any existing content in that subsection.
   (TNL-56)
-
-
   
 
 *******************************
 edX Learning Management System
 *******************************
 
+* When you click **Sent Email History** on the Instructor Dashboard **Email**
+  page, the list of messages now identifies the sender of each message in a new
+  **Sent By** column.  
+  
+* The Instructor Dashboard no longer displays instructions on how to access an
+  older version. The **Revert to Legacy Dashboard** button is still available
+  to provide access if needed.
+  
+* The computations for demographic distributions that are reported on the
+  **Analytics** page of the Instructor Dashboard have been updated. The level
+  of education and gender distributions now include currently enrolled students
+  only. Previously, these distributions were computed for all students who were
+  ever enrolled in the course. (LMS-11228)
 
-* When you click **Sent Email History** on the Email page of the Instructor
-  Dashboard, the list of messages now identifies the sender of each message in
-  the new **Sent By** column.
-
-
-* Bulk email now available for all courses? Instructor Dashboard , Email page. %%%%%
-
-**************************
-edX Data & Analytics
-**************************
-
-* 
-
+.. * Bulk email now available for all courses? Instructor Dashboard, Email page
 
+.. **************************
+.. edX Data & Analytics
+.. ************************** 
 
 **************************
 Coming Soon
 **************************
 
-We're pleased to announce these upcoming changes, which will release in the
+We're pleased to announce these changes, which will be released in the
 next few weeks:
 
 * In addition to the existing Discussion post type, course discussions will
   soon include a new Question post type. Students and course teams will also be
   able to filter posts to find unanswered questions easily.
-
+  
 * A new user experience design for course discussions is coming! The new user
   interface controls will provide consistent methods for taking action on
   posts. A set of colorful badges will also make it easier to identify posts.
-
+  
 * To make the process of registering faster and easier, students will soon be
   able to both register and log in to the edX.org and edX Edge web sites with
   their existing Google or Facebook IDs.
 
-
-
 **************************
 edX Documentation
 **************************
 
-Some of you have had problems with bookmarks and existing links to the edX
-`Building and Running an edX Course`_ guide. These were the result of a
-reorganization that we made as part of pur preparations to expand the
-documentation set. A redirect is now in place for this guide in its new
-location, at http://edx.readthedocs.org/projects/edx-partner-course-
-staff/en/latest/. And, you can always find the complete documentation set at
-`docs.edx.org`_.
+All guides now include a section that lists browsers supported for
+use with the edX platform.
 
 The following documentation is available:
 
 * `Building and Running an edX Course`_ 
 
-  Click **Help** in the upper-right corner of any page in the edX Studio
-  user interface to access relevant sections in this guide. You can also
-  download the entire guide as a PDF.
+  Update your bookmarks and links! To prepare for some upcoming additions to
+  the edX documentation set, we recently changed the location of this guide
+  and its URL changed as a result. You can always find `Building and Running an
+  edX Course`_  and the rest of our documentation set at `docs.edx.org`_.
+
+  You can also click **Help** in the upper-right corner of any page in the edX
+  Studio user interface to access relevant sections in this guide, and download
+  the entire guide as a PDF as needed.
 
   Recent changes include: 
 
-  
+  * The chapter on "Developing Your Course" has been updated to include the new
+    capabilities for publishing and hiding multiple units on the **Course
+    Outline** page.
+
+  * A new chapter on "Creating Content Experiments" is now available.
+
+  * An additional sample email message for students, announcing a new run of a
+    course, is now available in the "Course Launching Activities" section.
+
+  * Messages about the effect of changes to the grading policy, graded
+    subsections, or graded components in a live course are now included.
 
 * `Creating Peer Assessments`_
 
-.. Recent changes include: 
-  
-  
-       
 * `edX Research Guide`_
 
    Recent changes include: 
 
-   * Removed chapters on "Course Grading" and "XML format of drag and drop
-     input". These topics are covered in the `Building and Running an edX
+   * The "Tracking Logs" chapter now includes a section on open response
+     assessment events.
+
+   * Chapters on "Course Grading" and "XML format of drag and drop input" were
+     removed. These topics are covered in the `Building and Running an edX
      Course`_  guide.
 
 * `edX Developer's Guide`_

docs/en_us/release_notes/source/index.rst

@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ email message when we have updated the edX Course Staff Release Notes.
    read_me
    preface
    browsers
-   08-26-2014
+   08-27-2014
    08-12-2014
    08-07-2014
    07-30-2014