One organization (curated mode)

There are two ways to get a branded app

This page is the self-hosted one: you run the registry, and it lists only your organization's platforms. If you'd rather not operate a server, the provider portal gives you the same result on shared infrastructure. Both look identical in the app. See Three ways to run it.

The pilot runs an open catalog: anyone can register an Open edX platform, learners search for it, and moderators clean up what doesn't belong. That model assumes you don't trust the list.

An institution that runs a handful of its own platforms has the opposite problem. Say you're a university with three Open edX sites — one for undergraduates, one for the graduate school, one for continuing education. You want a single branded app where students pick their site and sign in. You don't want a search box, you don't want strangers adding entries, and there's nothing to moderate because every platform on the list is yours.

That's curated mode (DIRECTORY_MODE=curated). It turns the whole public marketplace layer off and treats the registry as one organization's own catalog.

No search, no landing screen — the app opens on your platforms and a student taps one to sign in

What changes

Everything that exists to police an untrusted list goes away.

• No moderation. A platform you add is live and marked reviewed the moment you save it. There's no "pending" or "unreviewed" state, because you're not vetting submissions from strangers — you're listing your own sites.
• No learner reports. The app hides Report this LMS, and the report endpoint is closed. Nobody reports a platform they were handed by their own institution.
• No public sign-up. The account form only signs people in. You provision admins yourself (an environment variable at first boot, or the Team tab afterwards), and any admin can add a platform.
• The app skips search. Learners don't hunt for a platform. The app opens directly on your platforms, and tapping one themes the app to that site and drops the student on its sign-in screen.

Public visibility is the one control that still matters: a platform set to public shows up in the app, and one set to hidden doesn't. That's how you stage a site before students see it, or retire one without deleting its history.

The console, trimmed to match

Because there's nothing to moderate, the admin console loses the parts that only made sense for an open catalog. The Complaints tab is gone, the review queue and the reviewed/featured badges disappear, and the LMS list keeps a single filter: public or hidden.

"Your platforms" — add one, brand it, and toggle whether it shows in the app. No triage inbox, no review backlog.

The console is responsive, so you can add or hide a platform from a phone as easily as from a desktop.

On a small screen the sidebar becomes a bottom tab bar

Curated vs. the open pilot

	Search mode (pilot default)	Curated mode (provider)
Who fills the catalog	Anyone who registers	Only admins you provision
The learner's first screen	A search box	Your platforms, listed directly
New submissions	Auto-approved, then reviewed	Live and reviewed on save
Learner reports	Routed to a triage inbox	Off
Public sign-up	Open to LMS owners	Closed
What "in the app" means	Public + not blocked	Public (hidden = staged/retired)
Best fit	A shared, public app	One organization's branded app

Set it up

1. Deploy your own registry. Fork this repository and stand it up following Configuration & deployment. A provider runs its own instance rather than sharing the public pilot.
2. Switch the mode on. Set DIRECTORY_MODE=curated, and set PROVIDER_NAME and PROVIDER_TAGLINE so the console and app carry your name.
3. Provision the first admin. Set ADMIN_EMAIL and ADMIN_PASSWORD before the first boot. After that, add teammates from the Team tab.
4. Add your platforms. In the console open LMS instances → Add a platform and run the wizard for each site: base URL, OAuth client, logo, colours, sign-in background. Each one goes live immediately. Keep a platform hidden until it's ready, and use its sort_order to set where it sits in the list.

5. Point your app at the registry. Both apps read the same block from default_config/<env>/config.yaml in your fork — do it for every environment you actually build:

   LMS_DIRECTORY:
     ENABLED: true
     DIRECTORY_URL: "https://registry.example.edu"
     DIRECTORY_MODE: "curated"
   

   DIRECTORY_MODE is not redundant

   The server already reports curated, but both apps fall back to search mode when they can't reach the registry — Android silently. Without the local flag, a learner opening your branded app offline gets a search box over every public Open edX platform. The flag can only add curated mode, never remove it.

Flip DIRECTORY_MODE back to search and the same registry reopens as a public catalog, moderation and all.

Example provider_config.json

Drop this at the repository root. Environment variables override anything set here.

{
  "directory_mode": "curated",
  "provider_name": "Acme Learning",
  "provider_tagline": "All of Acme's academies in one app",
  "webhook_url": "https://hooks.slack.com/services/…"
}