BuildAI

BuildAI is an AI-powered course-authoring tool that works directly inside Totara. It converts existing organisational content, such as policies, procedures and compliance documents, into structured, interactive learning modules. Content can also be created from scratch using natural-language prompts. Modules are generated by AI, reviewed and refined by a human author, then published directly into Totara as courses.

BuildAI works with Totara version 18 onwards.

Note: BuildAI is not included with Totara by default. It is a separately licensed, per-author add-on. Existing customers should speak to their Totara partner or Totara contact for pricing and enablement.

Key terms

Administering BuildAI

Access to the BuildAI admin pages is restricted to Site Administrators. By default, Site Managers also hold the local/ctxbuildai:manage capability, which lets them create clients and authors and view logs; this default access can be turned off at a site level if required.

Note: Further restrictions and defaults, such as limiting admin-page access to administrators from a specific organisation, or changing the role automatically assigned when an author is enrolled on a published course, are set through advanced site configuration. This is typically handled by a developer or Totara partner, since these settings can carry cost or permissions implications.

Clients

Each client has its own settings, including:

• Whether the client is enabled. Disabling a client also disables all of its authors

• The client's name

• The course category that all of the client's published courses are created in

• A default theme colour for new modules

• Whether module translation is enabled (this may incur a cost)

• The default AI content language for the client

• Whether file upload from OneDrive is enabled

• Whether file upload from Google Drive is enabled

• Whether module narration is enabled

• Whether authors can download static SCORM packages

• Whether authors can download dynamic SCORM packages

• Whether the Loom screen recorder can be used when creating a module

Authors

Each author has the following settings:

• Whether the author is enabled. A disabled author cannot access BuildAI

• The client the author is assigned to

• The Totara user the author account applies to

• Whether the author has module admin rights

Tenancies

On sites with tenants, tenanted users can be added as authors with module admin rights (the Tenant Domain Manager role). Tenanted module admins can only add new authors from within their own tenancy, cannot choose a client when editing authors, and cannot view clients or logs.

Creating a BuildAI course

Note: Creating a course in BuildAI is different to creating a course in Totara. A Totara course contains the activities and resources that learners access to complete their training. Creating a course in BuildAI means creating an interactive learning module directly within the Totara site.

BuildAI is accessed from the BuildAI icon ( ) in the site menu once it has been installed on the site.

Start a new course

1. Select the BuildAI icon ( ) from the main menu.

2. Select Create new.

3. Choose how to create the course:

   • Transform a document – convert an existing document into a course.

   • Convert a presentation – convert an existing presentation into a course.

   • Generate using a prompt – describe the course and let BuildAI generate it.

   • Start from scratch – build a course without a starting document or prompt.

     

A new folder can also be created from this screen, to help organise courses within the author's personal folder.

Supported upload formats for Transform a document are Word (.doc, .docx), PDF, plain text (.txt) and Rich Text Format (.rtf). Convert a presentation supports PowerPoint (.ppt, .pptx). BuildAI can also extract images from an uploaded document, and prompts the author to confirm whether these should be included in the final course.

Answer the guided questions

When generating a course from a prompt (or from an uploaded document or presentation), BuildAI asks a series of questions to tailor the content:

1. A description of what the course should cover.

2. How familiar the intended audience is with the topic (for example, Beginner, Intermediate, or Advanced).

3. A phrase describing the audience — a suggested option can be selected, or a custom phrase entered.

4. What the audience should achieve from the course — a suggested option can be selected, or a custom outcome entered.

5. The language to publish the course in.

6. The tone the course should be written in (for example, Motivational and persuasive).

7. The expected length of the course, in screens (for example, 5–10 screens).

Select Generate course outline once these have been answered.

Review and edit the outline

BuildAI generates a course outline made up of a series of screens. Before creating the course, the outline can be reviewed and adjusted:

• Edit the course title.

• Edit screen names, and reorder, add, or remove screens.

• Select Regenerate outline to have BuildAI produce a new outline.

• Enable Generate AI images, if AI-generated images should be included.

Anything set at this stage, including AI-generated images, can be changed later. Select Create course to continue; BuildAI then builds the course screen by screen.

Edit the course content

Once built, each screen can be edited, including:

• The screen layout

• A background or static image, where applicable

• Which assets appear on the screen

• Text alignment

• Background colour

On-screen text can be edited manually, or using the Refine option in the editor, which applies AI-assisted text refinement.

To add an image to a screen with an empty graphic asset, select Add an image. Images can be:

• Uploaded

• Generated by AI, using a text prompt, an image style, and an aspect ratio

• Added from the integrated Pexels or Giphy libraries

Generated images can be replaced or edited at any time, using the Replace image and Edit image options.

Set language and theme

Selecting the Language icon ( )allows a default language to be set, and dynamic translation to be enabled, so the course automatically adjusts to match a learner's browser language.

Selecting the Theme icon ( )allows a preset theme to be applied, or a Brand kit to be used to apply the organisation's own branding, including logos and other brand assets.

Brand kit

The Brand kit option allows you to create your own brand themes, upload your primary, secondary, and icon logo variants and access your assets library where you can view your existing assets and upload new assets.

To manage your Brand kit theme:

• Select the Theme icon ( ) when you are creating or editing a BuildAI course and click Brand kit.

• To create a new theme select Create theme.

• Give your theme a name.

• Select the Accent, Background and Heading colours.

• Enable Emphasise Start and Finish screens and set the Accent, Background, Heading colours and Gradient if you want to apply different colours for Start and finish screens.

• Set the Headings/labels and body font.

• Enable Display logo to display your logo, this will display in the bottom-left corner of your course. And choose Bounding box if the logo is to be within a white bounding box.

• Once complete click Save changes.

Themes can be edited by

• Select the Theme icon ( ) when you are creating or editing a BuildAI course.

• Click the three dots under the Workspace theme to edit and choose Edit.

• Edit the theme as required and select Save changes.

Preview and publish

Select Preview to review the course before publishing.

To publish:

1. Select the back arrow to return to the BuildAI interface.

2. Select the on the course to open the menu options, from here you can select to Edit, View, Move to folder or Delete the course as well as publish. To publish the course select Publish course.

   

3. Enter a Course short name.

4. Select the Course category dropdown and select the category on your Totara site to publish your course to.

5. Select Create.

The course is then created directly in Totara.

Organising your BuildAI courses

Modules are stored in a folder structure:

• Every author has their own personal folder, which is private to them

• Each client also has a shared folder, accessible to all of that client's authors

• Authors can create subfolders within their own folder by selecting Create new within their folder and selecting New folder in…

• Modules can be moved between folders

• All modules within a folder can be published together as a single, multi-activity Totara course

• Module admins can access any folder within their client, including other authors' folders

The BuildAI dashboard shows an author the modules they have created or are working on. Available actions are shown against each module and depend on the author's settings and their location within the folder structure. See Creating a course above for starting a new one.

Publishing BuildAI courses to Totara

A BuildAI course can be published in one of the following ways:

1. As a standalone course.

2. Grouped with other BuildAI courses into a single, multi-activity course.

3. Reused across multiple existing courses.

To publish a course, the author must have permission to create courses in the category configured for their client. Once a course is created, the author is automatically enrolled on it, in the role of editing teacher, unless the author is a Site Administrator or Site Manager (the default role assigned can be changed at a site level).

Note:

• Course completion settings are not configured automatically when a course is published from BuildAI, and need to be set up separately.

• When a single-activity course is published from BuildAI, the SCORM activity's grade setting defaults to Learning objects rather than Highest grade. This means a learner who completes the module is recorded as achieving 100%, regardless of their actual quiz score. Where the grade should reflect quiz performance, the activity's grading method should be changed to Highest grade after publishing.

Human review and control

BuildAI is designed to keep a human reviewer in control of published content:

• All AI-generated content should be reviewed and refined before publishing

• Access to Totara can be controlled so that only appropriate users are able to create or publish content

• BuildAI works with Totara's in-built approval workflows. For example, subject-matter experts can be given rights to create content, while a separate reviewer or team retains the rights needed to publish it

• AI-generated content is clearly labelled, to support audit and identification

Translation and narration

BuildAI supports content creation and narration in 35+ languages. Translated text, including narration, can be edited to ensure accuracy and meet localisation needs.

A dynamic translation option can also be set during creation, which automatically translates content based on the learner's browser language settings when the module is viewed.

Module translation and narration are enabled per client, and may carry an additional cost.

Data and privacy

BuildAI is a single, integrated authoring tool within Totara; no separate connection to an external AI provider or large language model is required. The subscription includes use of the underlying AI. Fair usage policies apply.

Content is not used to train the underlying AI. This applies both to documents uploaded to BuildAI and to the content it generates. All content created using BuildAI remains the customer's own property.