Draft, built, and live

This page explains the states a module and a course can be in, and what learners see in each. Read it when you want to know whether a change has reached learners, or what publishing, withdrawing, or archiving will do.

Vidext keeps what you are working on apart from what learners see. A module is worked on as a draft, frozen into a built version when it is ready, and becomes live only when its course is published. Modules are built one by one; publishing happens once, for the whole course.

A module's statesCopy Anchor Link

A module is one short interactive video lesson, built by Vidext's agents in the chat.

Draft is the module as it stands right now. Every build lands on the draft, it is always saved, and it is never shown to learners. Preview plays the draft for you in the learner player, without building or publishing anything.

Built is a frozen copy of the draft that is ready to go live. Every build in the chat makes one. Build makes one on demand: on the module line of the module's conversation, beside the studio, it builds the module again from its current script, and on the Modules tab of Modules and courses it freezes the draft as it stands. A module with a presenter is built only once its presenter video has rendered, so a course never goes live with a presenter that shows only a still image; until then the module is Building. Building never shows learners anything.

Live is the version learners get. A module is live when its course is published and its built version has been made live. Having a live version is all that being live means; there is no separate status.

A module can have all three at once: a live version learners are using, a newer built one waiting for the course's next publish, and a draft you keep working on.

Withdrawn is a module of a published course that is hidden from learners until someone restores it and publishes the course again. A built module that is not live yet can also be withdrawn, in a course of any state, to keep it out of the next publish.

A course's statesCopy Anchor Link

Draft is a course that has never been published. Published is a course the learners on its teams can see. Unpublished is a course someone took away from learners after publishing it; it can be published again from there.

Archived is separate from those states: an archived course is never published, and restoring it brings it back unpublished, or as a draft if it was never published.

Publishing a course makes every built, non-withdrawn module in it live at its built version, in one step that either completes or changes nothing. Modules that are not built, still building, or withdrawn stay hidden, and they don't count toward completing the course. While none of a published course's modules is live, the course itself is hidden from its learners; it comes back once one of its modules goes live again. A course with no team can't be published, since no one would see it.

How to publish, update, withdraw, unpublish, and archive is in Publish a course.

Every way in has a way outCopy Anchor Link

Each way of hiding something keeps learners' progress:

• Unpublish takes a course away from the learners on its teams, until it is published again.
• Withdraw hides one module of a published course. Withdraw before publishing keeps a built module that is not live yet out of the next publish, the same way.
• Removing a module from its course, moving it to another course, or archiving it hides it at once.
• Archive unpublishes a course and moves it out of the way.

There is no rollback. Publishing only moves forward, and earlier versions are not served again, so old content can't come back by accident.

Live is not publicCopy Anchor Link

A live module is live for your organization: the learners on its course's teams get it, and other signed-in members can open its link. It is not on the open internet.

Sharing a module publicly is a separate decision. Its Public access switch is off by default and can be turned on only while the module is live. When it is on, anyone with the link can open the module without signing in. Public modules are hidden from search engines, and an optional AI assistant for anonymous viewers, billed to your organization, stays off unless you turn it on. Turning the switch off, or anything that stops the module being live (unpublishing or archiving its course, withdrawing the module, or taking it out of the course), makes the link return not found at once. Only organization admins and members can change a module's public access.

Why it works this wayCopy Anchor Link

• Trust: the agents propose; you decide. They can build every module of a course, but nothing reaches learners until a person publishes it.
• Safety: learners always get complete, consistent versions, never a draft, a half-finished edit, or a presenter still waiting for its video.
• Confidence: you get each module ready at your own pace, check it in preview, and then move the whole course in one step.