Skip to main content

Documentation Index

Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://mintlify.com/ateeducacion/moodle-playground/llms.txt

Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

Moodle Playground has two entry points: the hosted app at moodle-playground.com (zero install, works in any modern browser) and a local build for contributors and power users who need to develop against the full toolchain. Both paths are covered below.

​
Try it online

The fastest way to a running Moodle is to open the hosted app — nothing to install, nothing to configure, nothing leaves your browser.
1

Open the playground

Navigate to https://moodle-playground.com. The runtime boots in a few seconds — a full Moodle site is compiled from WebAssembly and loaded into memory. Boot progress is visible in the Logs tab of the side panel.
2

Log in

When the address bar becomes editable, the site is ready. Log in with the default administrator credentials:
UsernamePassword
adminpassword
3

Explore

You now have a full Moodle 5.0 site running entirely in your browser tab. Navigate using the toolbar’s address bar — for example, type /admin/index.php to open site administration, or /course/management.php to manage courses.
Everything runs in memory. A reload keeps your data within the same tab session, but closing the tab destroys it entirely, and clicking Reset Playground starts a clean install. Do not use the playground to store real data.

​
Load a blueprint

A blueprint is a JSON file that provisions a Moodle instance at boot — courses, users, plugins, site config, and more. The easiest way to load one is via the ?blueprint-url= query parameter: 
https://moodle-playground.com/?blueprint-url=/assets/blueprints/examples/course-with-content.blueprint.json
This boots a Moodle with a ready-made course already in place. You can browse other shipped examples under assets/blueprints/examples/ and learn to write your own in the Blueprints overview. A minimal blueprint looks like this: 
{
  "landingPage": "/course/view.php?id=2",
  "steps": [
    { "step": "installMoodle", "options": { "siteName": "My Moodle" } },
    { "step": "login", "username": "admin" },
    { "step": "createCourse", "fullname": "Physics 101", "shortname": "PHYS101" }
  ]
}

​
Run it locally

You only need a local build to develop or contribute. The hosted version requires no local setup whatsoever.

​
Prerequisites

Before running the local build, make sure you have:
  • Node.js 18+ and npm — for the JavaScript build toolchain.
  • Python 3 — used by Moodle patch and build helpers.
  • PHP 8.3 with the pdo_sqlite extension — required by make bundle to build the Moodle install snapshot. On macOS with Homebrew: brew install php@8.3.
  • Git — to clone the repository.
PHP 8.3 is required specifically for the local build step. The hosted playground itself runs PHP inside WebAssembly — so no local PHP is needed to use the hosted version.

​
Build and serve

1

Clone and install dependencies

git clone https://github.com/ateeducacion/moodle-playground.git
cd moodle-playground
npm install
2

Build the worker and bundle Moodle

make prepare && make bundle
make prepare compiles the PHP-WASM worker bundle. make bundle uses your local PHP 8.3 to build the Moodle core ZIP and install snapshot for the default branch (MOODLE_500_STABLE). This step takes a minute or two on first run.To build all supported branches at once (4.4, 4.5, 5.0, 5.1, 5.2, and main), use make bundle-all instead.
3

Start the local server

make serve
Then open http://localhost:8080 in your browser.
Why a local HTTP server? The playground relies on a Service Worker to intercept and route requests to the PHP-WASM worker. Service Workers only register on https:// origins or http://localhost. Opening index.html directly from the filesystem will not work — the Service Worker will not register and the playground will fail to boot.

​
Shortcut: make up

If you want to build everything and start the server in one step: 
make up
This runs deps → build-version → build-worker → bundle-all-pretty → serve in sequence, building every Moodle branch in parallel and then starting the server on port 8080.

​
Next steps

Usage

Navigate the toolbar, switch Moodle and PHP versions, manage blueprints, and reset your session.

Blueprints

Provision courses, users, plugins, and site config with a declarative JSON blueprint.

Architecture

Understand how the Service Worker, PHP-WASM worker, and in-memory filesystem fit together.

GitHub PR Previews

Automatically boot a playground from a pull request build and validate changes before merging.

Build docs developers (and LLMs) love

Get started for freeTalk to us