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Overview

DISCLAIMER

This is an independent open-source project and is NOT affiliated with, endorsed by, or supported by Moodle HQ or Moodle Pty Ltd. Moodle™ is a registered trademark of Moodle Pty Ltd.

Integration Hub for Moodle (MIH) is an independent plugin for the Moodle™ platform that provides a centralized, production-grade integration layer between your Moodle™ site and any external service — REST APIs, message brokers (RabbitMQ), or SOAP web services.

The Problem​

Modern Moodle™ deployments are rarely standalone. They connect to external systems: gamification engines, analytics platforms, notification services, ERP systems, SIS integrations, and more. Without a centralized solution, this creates a pattern of duplicated, fragile code:

  • Every plugin that needs to call an external service implements its own HTTP logic
  • Authentication tokens are scattered across multiple settings.php files
  • Retry logic and timeout handling are inconsistent or missing entirely
  • There is no central place to monitor what is happening across all integrations
  • When an external service goes down, there is no protection — requests pile up and fail silently
  • Adding a new integration requires writing PHP code, even for simple event-to-webhook mappings

This is the integration sprawl problem. MIH solves it.

The Solution​

MIH provides two complementary systems:

1. MIH API (Facade)​

A PHP facade (mih) that any plugin can call to make HTTP or AMQP requests to registered external services. The MIH API handles:

  • Service resolution — looks up the service configuration from the database by name
  • Authentication — automatically applies Bearer tokens or API keys
  • Circuit breaking — refuses to call services that are known to be down
  • Retry with backoff — retries failed requests with exponential delays
  • Logging — records every request, response, and error to a central log table
  • Response wrapping — returns a consistent mih_response object regardless of transport

2. Event Bridge​

A no-code system for mapping events to external service calls. Administrators configure rules in the dashboard — no PHP required. The Event Bridge handles:

  • Universal event listening — a single observer catches every event (core and third-party)
  • Rule matching — checks which rules apply to each event
  • Deduplication — prevents the same event from being processed twice
  • Async dispatch — queues work as adhoc tasks so user actions are never blocked
  • Template interpolation — builds JSON payloads from event data using {{variable}} syntax
  • Dead Letter Queue — stores permanently failed events for manual review and replay

Core Capabilities​

CapabilityDescription
MIH APIReusable PHP API for HTTP/AMQP calls from any plugin
Event BridgeAutomatically react to any Moodle event without writing PHP code
Circuit BreakerPrevents cascading failures when external services go down
Retry with Exponential BackoffAutomatic retries with configurable delays
Dead Letter Queue (DLQ)Failed events stored for review and replay
Monitoring DashboardReal-time charts for success rates and latency trends
Multi-transportREST/HTTP, AMQP (RabbitMQ), and SOAP support
Multilingual UIFull English and Spanish support
Auto-purging LogsLog table is automatically pruned to prevent database bloat

Design Philosophy​

MIH was built with the following principles:

  • Centralization over duplication — one place to configure, monitor, and debug all integrations
  • Resilience by default — circuit breakers and retries are always on, not opt-in
  • Non-blocking — the Event Bridge uses async tasks so user-facing actions are never delayed by integration failures
  • Zero-code integrations — common event-to-webhook patterns require no PHP
  • Moodle-native — uses Moodle's own DB layer, task system, cache API, and output renderer; no external frameworks

What MIH Is Not​

  • MIH is not a replacement for the platform's web services (REST/SOAP API for external systems to call in)
  • MIH is not a full ESB (Enterprise Service Bus) — it is focused on outbound integrations
  • MIH is not a message consumer by default — the AMQP transport publishes messages; consuming responses is handled by a separate scheduled task

Next Steps​