Force New Occurrence Behavior for Viewer Completion Affirmation
Seantel Cunningham
Tyro
Overview
United Airlines’ Tech Ops division recently transitioned to using Panopto’s Viewer Completion Affirmation feature to meet FAA regulatory compliance standards. This feature was implemented specifically to ensure learner accountability due to prior behavior where Panopto granted video completion at approximately 93% watch time.
Current Issue
During testing, we identified a gap when a video is reassigned within our LMS (Cornerstone). If a user has previously viewed the video, Panopto does not treat the reassignment as a new occurrence. Instead, the user retains the ability to fast-forward or skip content — even though Viewer Completion Affirmation is enabled — and is not required to rewatch from the beginning.
This behavior undermines the compliance intent of the reassignment and introduces FAA audit risk.
Request
We are requesting a configurable setting or forced behavior where, when an LMS (SCORM/Deep Link/LTI) assignment is reissued, Panopto automatically treats that launch as a brand-new attempt, regardless of prior viewing history.
Specifically:
- Disable fast-forwarding / seeking on reassigned launches
- Require the user to fully rewatch from timestamp 0:00
- Preserve Viewer Completion Affirmation behavior (affirmation at start + required click at end for credit)
- Ideally tied to the LMS occurrence or assignment ID, not past Panopto viewing session history
Business & Compliance Impact
This is a critical FAA compliance requirement. Currently, reassigned regulatory training can be completed without a true full rewatch, which will not satisfy mandated audit thresholds. We urgently need parity with “first-time watch behavior” anytime training is reissued.
Desired Priority
High — regulatory compliance risk
Optional UX Suggestion
A toggle such as: "Treat reassignment as a new occurrence (reset watch state and disable fast-forwarding)."
Comments
This is something that we often run into in higher ed and how I recommend our folks handle it is to make a new reference copy for each cycle. I'm not sure if Cornerstone has support for a "Course Copy" feature, but if it does, it's very possible that Panopto could develop a process to make new reference copies each time a course in the LMS is copied. This is what is done in Canvas with the LTI 1.3 integration, and it works fairly well.
Panopto doesn't (yet) have support for "terms" so there isn't anything on the Panopto side that would allow them to identify/differentiate views coming from different contexts or times within a single artifact. Unless reference copies are used, all of the views are pooled together.
Thank you for this insight, Michael. I'm going to share this information with my supervisors and see if making reference copies would work for us. I'm glad they implemented the VCA feature and interested in seeing what adjustments they make in the future.