Complete User Manual — Instructor & Student Guide
Launch via the course navigation menu or a module item. Holon Files opens inside the Canvas iframe — no separate login required.
Click Documents or Images in the sidebar. All Canvas course files appear in a grid. Use the search bar to filter by name.
Click any card to open it. PDFs render with page navigation. PowerPoints play as animated slide shows. Word, Excel, and other Office formats convert automatically. Images, video, and audio play inline.
Click the ↑ Upload button in the toolbar to add PDFs, PPTX, DOCX, images, video, audio, and more directly to your course.
From any file card or the open-file view, click ＋ Add to module to create a deep-linked module item, or 📄 Add to page to insert a link or embedded image into a Canvas page.
Use the ⊟ / ☰ toggle buttons in the toolbar to switch between the card grid and a compact list layout. Your preference is saved automatically.
Holon Files connects directly to your Canvas course file library and renders documents, presentations, images, video, and audio inline with no downloads required. Instructors get additional tools to upload files, create module deep-links, and insert content into Canvas pages.
| Role | What they can do |
|---|---|
| Instructor / Admin | Browse, view, upload, add to modules, add to pages, switch grid/list view |
| Student | Browse and view all course files; launch deep-linked items from modules |
PDFs render page-by-page with zoom. PowerPoint files play as animated slide shows with transitions. Word and Excel documents convert to PDF automatically. All rendering happens in the browser — no plugins required.
A dedicated Images view shows all course images in a thumbnail grid with full-size preview on click.
MP4, WebM, MP3, WAV, and other media files play inline with native browser controls.
One click creates a Canvas module item that deep-links directly to the file inside Holon Files — students get the full viewer experience, not a raw file download.
Insert a hyperlink or embedded image into any existing Canvas page, or create a brand-new page — directly from the file viewer.
Instructors can upload new files directly to the Canvas course without leaving Holon Files.
Switch between a visual card grid and a compact single-row list layout. Preference is saved per browser.
| Control | Description |
|---|---|
| ≡ (hamburger) | Collapses or expands the left sidebar to give more room to the content area. |
| Holon VIEW pill | Identifies the tool. The green dot confirms a live session. |
| User avatar / name | Shows the logged-in user's name and role (Instructor / Student). Initials appear in the avatar circle. |
| A / A+ / A++ | Three accessibility zoom levels that scale the entire interface. Affects font size and layout proportionally. |
| ? (Help) | Opens the in-app help panel with a quick guide and a link to this manual. |
| ⚙ (Settings) | Opens the Settings panel for Canvas token management and theme options. |
| Menu Item | Description |
|---|---|
| Holon Hub | Returns to the Holon Hub tool launcher (if launched from Hub) |
| Dashboard | Overview of file statistics, recent files, and quick-action buttons |
| Documents | Grid or list of all non-image course files (PDFs, PPTX, DOCX, video, audio, etc.) |
| Images | Thumbnail grid or list of all image files in the course |
Sidebar items can be reordered by dragging. The active view is highlighted with the Holon blue accent bar.
The dark gradient banner at the top of the Dashboard shows a personalised greeting with your name and the active course name.
| Stat | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Total Files | All files currently in the Canvas course (documents + images) |
| Documents | Count of non-image files |
| Images | Count of image files |
| Total Size | Combined file size of all course files |
Shows the 6 most recently added files. Click any row to open the file immediately. Click Browse all → to go to the full Documents view.
Three shortcut buttons: Documents, Images, and ↑ Upload — for fast access without using the sidebar.
Each card shows a thumbnail preview or file-type icon, the filename, type badge, and file size. Instructor cards also show action buttons below the metadata:
Click anywhere on a card (except the action buttons) to open the file.
In List mode each file is a single compact row: icon/thumbnail on the left, name and type/size in the middle, and action buttons on the right. Much faster to scan for a specific file in a large library.
The search input filters live as you type. It matches any part of the filename (case-insensitive). The count shown in the content header updates to reflect the filtered count.
Supported image types: JPG, JPEG, PNG, GIF, WebP, SVG, BMP, TIFF, HEIC.
Thumbnails are loaded lazily for performance. If a thumbnail fails to load, a placeholder icon is shown instead. The same toolbar (search, grid/list toggle, upload) applies as in Documents view.
Clicking an image opens it full-size in the file viewer, centred in a clean white card.
PDFs are rendered page-by-page using PDF.js. Use the slide navigation controls to step through pages. The viewer fills the full content area width.
PPTX and PPT files are converted server-side to an animated SVG slide show by LibreOffice. Slide transitions and entrance animations play as authored.
DOCX, DOC, XLSX, XLS, ODT, ODS, and RTF files are converted to PDF server-side and rendered with the PDF viewer. The original file is available via the download link.
Images are displayed centred in a white card with responsive sizing. The image scales to fit the viewer width while maintaining aspect ratio.
MP4, WebM, MOV, and AVI files play with native browser video controls. The player fills the content area. Captions embedded in the video file are supported.
MP3, WAV, M4A, OGG, and other audio files play with standard browser audio controls.
Plain text, Markdown, CSV, and code files are rendered as readable formatted content.
| Category | Formats | How it renders |
|---|---|---|
| Page-by-page with PDF.js | ||
| Presentations | PPTX, PPT, ODP | Animated SVG slide show (LibreOffice); PDF fallback |
| Word Documents | DOCX, DOC, ODT, RTF | Converted to PDF via LibreOffice |
| Spreadsheets | XLSX, XLS, ODS | Converted to PDF via LibreOffice |
| Apple Pages | .pages | Converted via LibreOffice (PDF) |
| Images | JPG, PNG, GIF, WebP, SVG, BMP, TIFF | Inline image viewer |
| Video | MP4, WebM, MOV, AVI | Native browser video player |
| Audio | MP3, WAV, M4A, OGG | Native browser audio player |
| Text / Code | TXT, MD, CSV, JSON | Formatted text viewer |
PDF, PPTX, PPT, DOCX, DOC, XLSX, XLS, Pages, ODP, ODT, ODS, RTF, TXT, MD, CSV, JPG, JPEG, PNG, GIF, WebP, MP4, WebM, MP3, WAV.
When a file is open, click ＋ Add to module in the breadcrumb bar on the top right.
When you add a file to a module, Holon Files creates an External Tool module item whose launch URL encodes the Canvas file ID. When a student clicks the item, Canvas launches Holon Files with that file pre-selected, and the viewer opens it automatically. No navigation required.
Click 📄 Add to page on any file card (grid or list) or in the breadcrumb bar when a file is open.
| Mode | What gets inserted | Available for |
|---|---|---|
| Link to file | An HTML hyperlink <a href="...">filename</a> that opens the file | All file types |
| Embed image | An inline <img> tag that displays the image on the page | Image files only |
| Mode | Best for | What you see |
|---|---|---|
| ⊟ Grid | Browsing visually; images; finding a file by its thumbnail | Cards with large thumbnail/icon, filename, type badge, size, and action buttons stacked below |
| ☰ List | Scanning a long list of files; searching by name quickly | Compact single-row items: small icon, filename, size, and action buttons inline on the right |
Your preferred layout is saved in the browser's local storage and remembered across sessions on the same device.
The A / A+ / A++ buttons in the topbar scale the entire interface. Three levels are available. The setting is saved per session.
Open Settings (⚙) to switch between Light, Dark, and High Contrast themes. High Contrast mode uses pure black and white with increased border weight for maximum readability.
Tab to navigate, Enter or Space to open).Escape.complementary, navigation) are applied to structural elements.aria-label attributes.aria-live="polite") announce status messages from modals.alt text from the Canvas filename.The ADA panel (accessible via the Settings area) provides a Text-to-Speech reader that reads the currently visible document text aloud using the browser's Web Speech API.
Students see the same Dashboard, Documents, and Images views as instructors, and can open and view any file the course Canvas library contains.
When an instructor uses Add to Module, students see the file as a module item. Clicking it launches Holon Files with that file already open — they do not need to browse or search for it.
Students do not need to configure a Canvas token. When an instructor adds a file to a module, a service token is stored so the file can be served to any student who launches that module item.
Holon Files reads files directly from your Canvas course Files library. If a file is missing, verify it has been uploaded to Canvas Files (not just attached to an assignment or page). Also check that your Canvas token is connected in Settings (⚙).
The animated SVG conversion requires LibreOffice to be available on the server and may take a few seconds for large files. If conversion fails, Holon Files falls back to a static PDF render automatically. Try reloading the file — the first load triggers conversion and subsequent loads serve the cached result.
Open Settings (⚙) and connect your Canvas API token. The token is required for any operation that writes back to Canvas (uploads, module items, page edits). See your Canvas admin for token generation instructions.
The module item was likely created manually or by a different method. Re-add the file using the Add to Module button inside Holon Files — this stores the service token needed for student access.
PDF rendering quality scales with the device pixel ratio. On high-DPI screens the renderer automatically increases resolution. If pages still appear blurry, try the A+ or A++ zoom levels which increase the render size.
Verify your Canvas token is connected (⚙ Settings). If the course has no pages yet, use the New Page tab to create one. If pages exist but don't load, check that your token has course Pages — Read scope enabled.
The file list refreshes automatically after upload. If the new file doesn't appear, click Documents or Images in the sidebar to force a refresh. Canvas occasionally has a short propagation delay for newly uploaded files.
Your layout preference is stored in the browser's localStorage. If you are in a private/incognito window, local storage is cleared when the window closes. Use a regular browser window for the preference to persist.