Every question, answered.

No. Course Compass uses a read-only Canvas access token — a key you generate once from your Canvas account settings, not your login credentials. The token lives only on your device and is never transmitted to Charted Edu Tech servers. It gives Course Compass the same read-only view of your assignments that the Canvas API exposes to any student-authorized app.

On your device by default, in your browser's local storage. Your notes, uploaded PDFs, and the search index never leave your computer unless you explicitly opt in. On paid plans you can enable cloud backup so your library follows you across devices — but it's off unless you turn it on, and you can request a full export or deletion of your backed-up data at any time by emailing [email protected].

No. Course Compass reads your assignment data using a read-only Canvas API token you provide — those requests go directly from your browser to your own Canvas domain, the same read-only access any student-authorized app gets. They don't create any records visible to Canvas administrators or leave any footprint on your school's servers. Your professor and institution have no way to see that you've installed it.

Course Compass is a browser extension that runs locally on your computer. We don't receive your educational records, and we don't have a direct relationship with your school — so a formal FERPA relationship doesn't apply to us the way it does to institutions. All AI features are opt-in and process only content you voluntarily submit. We still recommend reviewing your institution's own policies before running AI on graded work.

No — full stop. Course Compass has no ads, no data brokering, and no third-party analytics or tracking scripts in the extension. We make money through subscription plans, not by monetizing your information.

Your local data (notes, files, game progress) stays on your device — unsubscribing doesn't touch it. If you had cloud sync enabled on a paid plan, you can export a full copy or request deletion by emailing [email protected]. You're never locked in.

To uninstall: right-click the Course Compass icon in your Chrome toolbar and choose Remove from Chrome. All locally stored data — notes, imported files, game state, and settings — is deleted when Chrome removes the extension. It was never sent to our servers unless you explicitly enabled cloud sync. If you're on a paid plan, cancel your subscription first — tap your profile in the extension to reach the Account panel and click Cancel subscription (or email [email protected]) — before removing the extension. Want a copy of your data first? There's no one-click export button yet — if you have cloud backup enabled, email [email protected] for a copy of your backed-up notes index before uninstalling.

Yes — Course Compass is live on the Chrome Web Store. Install it in one click — no account required to start using all free features.

Yes — our roadmap lays out all five development phases honestly. Phase 0 (the free extension with smart prioritization, Clipper, and the dubloon economy) is complete and live on the Chrome Web Store. Phase 1 is largely done — CWS launch, Google sign-in, and cross-device sync are all live. Phase 2 (managed AI + Plus/Pro billing) is now live as well — AI study features and paid subscriptions are available for Plus and Pro subscribers today. Phase 3's companion web app is live too — assignments, notes, Clipper chat, and the "Read to me" reader at app.chartededutech.com, with an annotated PDF viewer still in progress. Phase 4 (semantic search and deeper Canvas intelligence) is what's left ahead.

Install Course Compass from the Chrome Web Store — a welcome screen opens automatically. It scans your open tabs to find your Canvas URL, so you usually don't have to type anything. Next, add your Canvas API token in Settings ⚙ (see How do I get my Canvas API token? below) — this is the one required step that lets Course Compass read your assignments. Once the token is saved, the priority list fills in immediately. You can also configure Clipper's talkativeness and enable AI features from the same Settings page at any time.

Your Canvas API token lets Course Compass pull your assignment details, due dates, and course data directly. To get one: inside Canvas, go to Account → Settings, then scroll to Approved Integrations and click + New Access Token. Give it a name (e.g. "Course Compass"), set no expiration if you like, and copy the token that appears. Paste it into Course Compass via the extension icon → Settings ⚙. Course Compass uses the token read-only — it never submits assignments or modifies anything in Canvas on your behalf.

Not for the free features. Smart prioritization, the treasure hunt, dubloons, streaks, and the focus timer all work locally without any login. You only need a Charted Edu Tech account to unlock paid AI features like quiz generation, OCR, or pre-grading.

Yes — Chrome and Chromebooks are our primary target. Course Compass is built for school hardware and keeps the heavy lifting server-side on paid plans, so it runs smoothly even on modest Chromebooks. Just install it from the Chrome Web Store like any other extension.

Any institution running Canvas LMS by Instructure — which covers thousands of colleges and K–12 schools worldwide. If your school's learning management system is Canvas, Course Compass will work. It is not compatible with Blackboard, Moodle, Google Classroom, or other LMS platforms at this time.

Quite a lot. The free plan includes smart assignment prioritization, the full treasure hunt and dubloon economy, streaks, a built-in focus timer, and your local notes library. You also get a one-time taste of AI features so you can see how they feel before deciding to upgrade. All of this is free forever — no trial expiry.

Most of Course Compass is account-free forever. The features that require a Charted Edu Tech account are: AI notes indexing, quiz generation from your notes, draft pre-grading, OCR for scanned materials, page summaries, and cross-device notes library sync. Billing (Plus or Pro) also requires an account. Everything else — smart prioritization, the treasure hunt and dubloon economy, streaks, Clipper, the focus timer, the notes relevancy strip, and Ask Clipper on manually-added notes — works without any sign-in, on the free plan, forever.

Each assignment gets a score from 0–100 based on three factors: urgency (how soon it's due — items due today score higher than items due next week), point value (a 200-point exam outweighs a 5-point discussion post), and grade leverage (assignments in courses where your current grade has more room to improve carry extra weight). The top of your compass list is always the single most worthwhile thing to tackle next, given where you actually stand.

Paid plans give you access to the full AI layer: notes indexing and intelligent search, quiz generation from your notes, Clipper conversational chat, a pre-grade tool to review drafts before submitting, OCR for scanned PDFs and handwritten notes, page summaries, and automatic syllabus schedule extraction. These features consume credits from your monthly allowance.

Credits are our metered unit for AI compute — each AI action (indexing a note, generating a quiz, running OCR on a page) uses a small number of credits. Free accounts get 75 credits to start, plus 50 more every month — enough to keep using the AI features regularly. Paid plans get 1,000–2,000 credits per month depending on your tier, which is plenty for regular student use. Your credit balance is visible in the extension's dashboard.

The free features keep running completely normally — priority ranking, the treasure hunt, streaks, Clipper, the focus timer, the "From your notes" relevancy strip, and the default (local) OCR engine never use credits and are unaffected. Only on-demand AI actions stop: notes indexing, quiz generation, pre-grading, page summaries, and the optional Claude Vision OCR fallback pause until your credits are restored. Monthly credits reset automatically at the start of each billing cycle. You can also add more immediately with a top-up pack (500 credits for $3.49, available in your account) — top-up credits don't expire until you cancel.

Go to Settings ⚙ (extension icon → Settings) and find the Clipper Talkativeness slider. Set it to Quiet — in this mode, Clipper still shows the most important tips but much less frequently, and cracker rewards still fire normally. If a bubble appears at a bad moment, press Escape to dismiss it immediately. There is no full "off" switch for Clipper, but Quiet mode combined with Escape gives you complete control over timing. If you're mid-exam and don't want any interruptions, Quiet + a collapsed panel (Escape key) is the recommended combination.

Anytime, no questions asked. Open the Course Compass extension, tap your profile to reach the Account panel, and click Cancel subscription — it opens Paddle's self-serve cancel portal in one click. Or email [email protected] and we'll cancel it right away. Your local data — notes, files, and game progress — stays on your device after you cancel. You're never locked in.

A gamified study layer built right into the extension — completely free and local, forever. You earn dubloons (our in-game currency) by completing assignments on time, keeping streaks, reading your notes, and hitting focus-timer milestones. Spend them in the cosmetics shop on purse skins and Clipper accessories. The hunt gives you a daily quest to chase, and bonus multipliers kick in during finals week.

Clipper is your study parrot mascot who lives in the Course Compass panel. He reacts when you read notes, cheers you on during finals week, and drops crackers (in-game rewards) for good study habits. You can dial his personality to quiet, normal, or chatty in Settings — so he stays helpful without being annoying when you're heads-down.

A special boost mode you activate by entering your finals dates in Settings. While Finals Week is active, all dubloon earnings are doubled, Clipper shows extra encouragement, and a gold badge appears in the panel so you always know it's live. Set your dates once per semester and it kicks in automatically.

The 💰 badge flags any assignment worth 50 points or more — a quick visual reminder that this piece of work can meaningfully move your grade. Items with the badge also earn bonus dubloons when you complete them on time, making them doubly worth prioritizing in your compass list.

A streak freeze protects your daily study streak for one missed day. If you're too busy to open Course Compass on a given day, the freeze absorbs the miss and your streak count keeps going. Buy freezes with dubloons from the treasure hunt panel — stock up on more than one if you want extra buffer. Clipper will nudge you to stock up before crunch periods so you're never caught without a safety net.

When you have 50 dubloons to spare, you can open a loot box from the cosmetics shop. A case-opening animation plays — items from the full catalog scroll past quickly and decelerate until your prize lands in the center. The winner tile highlights and shows its name, flavor text, and an "Equip" button so you can apply the cosmetic immediately. Loot boxes only award unowned items, so every opening is a genuine unlock. If you prefer reduced motion, the animation respects your system accessibility setting.

These priority badges appear inline on compass list rows to flag your most pressing work at a glance. 🔥 Critical marks items the priority engine has scored in the top tier — typically assignments due very soon and worth significant points. ⚡ High marks the next tier down: important but not yet on fire. Items without a badge are Medium or Normal priority. The badges update automatically as deadlines close in, so an assignment can graduate from High to Critical as the due date approaches. Use them as a quick sanity-check: if there's a Critical row, that's your next move.

Yes. When your compass list contains items from two or more courses, a row of course filter chips appears above the list. Click a chip to show only that course's assignments — the chip highlights and a status line below confirms "Showing: CourseName (N items)" so the filter is always visible. Click the active chip again, or the "All" chip, to clear it and see everything. The filter resets on each panel reload, so it's designed for quick in-session focusing rather than a persistent view. Only courses with open items appear as chips, so the strip stays compact.

The XP bar tracks your progress toward the next level — it fills as you earn dubloons, and every 1,000 dubloons earned advances you one level. The bar header shows your current level (e.g. "Lv.3") and a tooltip shows your exact progress ("⚡ XP: 230 / 1000 — fill to level up!"). When the bar overflows, you get a "⬆️ Level up!" toast. Leveling up is a milestone trophy, not a paywall — your dubloon balance and all your cosmetics stay exactly as they are. Spend dubloons normally on freezes or loot boxes; the XP tracking runs in the background regardless.

The focus timer lives inside the treasure hunt panel — open it by clicking the ship-wheel icon on any Canvas page. When Clipper surfaces a "Start a session" tip, clicking it pre-fills the timer with your top-priority assignment so you can get going immediately. Set a session length, hit start, and a countdown begins. When the timer completes, Clipper reacts with a cracker reward and your daily streak gets a boost. The timer is free, works entirely offline, and requires no account — it's part of the core study layer available to every Course Compass user.

The gold 🗺️ Hunt button appears on each row of your priority list inside the Course Compass panel. Clicking it starts a real treasure hunt for that specific assignment right where you are — a chest gets buried, a needle guides you to it, you dig through a quick mini-game, and then the task card for that item is revealed. There's no jump back to your Canvas home page; the whole hunt plays out on the page you're already on. This is the fastest path from "I see an assignment" to "the game is already tracking my progress on it": spot it in the list, click Hunt, and Clipper's watching your back.

The 📍 pin appears on whichever row in your priority list matches the Canvas page you're currently viewing. If you're reading an assignment page, that row gets a subtle blue highlight and the 📍 badge — so you can instantly spot where you are in the list without hunting for it. The highlight clears automatically when you navigate to a different Canvas page. It's a read-only orientation marker; clicking the row or the 🗺️ Hunt button still works normally.

The dashboard (opened by clicking the compass icon in the Chrome toolbar) has seven tabs: Today shows a day-by-day view of your upcoming week with overdue items pinned at the top; Assignments shows your full Canvas workload with search; Clipper hosts a conversational chat with Clipper, grounded in your notes and Canvas context; Notes shows your indexed chapters and note count, with a quick Ask Clipper link; Study hosts your spaced-repetition review queue (Captain's Quiz Deck), streak calendar, per-course summary cards, and finals countdown; Files lists your imported PDFs and slide decks; and Import is where you add new material — type notes directly for free, or connect Google Drive on paid plans to pull in PDFs and .pptx files. Each tab can also be reached directly from links and badges inside the Canvas panel.

Your streak counts consecutive calendar days you open Canvas and use Course Compass. Your current streak count and personal best appear in the treasure hunt panel; the Study tab of the dashboard shows a 7-day heat-map calendar so you can see which days are active at a glance. If you miss a full day your streak resets to zero — that's what streak freezes are for (each freeze absorbs one missed day automatically). Streaks earn bonus dubloons during Finals Week. They're motivational, not mandatory — Course Compass works just as well whether your streak is at 50 or 0.

The Study tab in your dashboard shows a review queue (Captain's Quiz Deck) powered by spaced repetition — a learning technique that resurfaces material at the right moment for long-term retention, just before you'd naturally start to forget it. When you import notes or study materials, Course Compass schedules them for periodic review. Click a card, read through the content, and mark it "Got it" when you're solid on it or skip it to see it sooner. Cards you know well return less frequently; cards you're still learning come back sooner. Your indexed chapters and note count live on the Notes tab.

The cosmetics shop is inside the treasure hunt panel — open the panel on any Canvas page, then tap the Shop button. There are two categories: purse skins change the colour theme of Clipper's treasure chest and panel (nine paid options plus the free default, including Midnight, Golden, and Crimson), and Clipper accessories add a visual item to your parrot companion (six paid options plus "no accessory"). Hovering over any item shows its name and flavour description before you buy. All purchases use dubloons — free, in-game currency, no real money. Items you own show as "Owned" and can be equipped or swapped anytime. Loot boxes (50 dubloons each) are the random alternative: they always award an item you don't own yet.

Yes. The extension's panel, dashboard, and all UI surfaces adapt to your system's colour-scheme preference automatically — if your device is set to dark mode, Course Compass follows. You can also set a manual theme preference in Settings ⚙ to override the system default. Dark mode is fully styled and has been tested for legibility across all Course Compass surfaces.

Course Compass works in Chrome and any Chromium-based browser — including Microsoft Edge, Brave, and Vivaldi. Firefox and Safari are not supported yet, as they use a different extension platform. We recommend Chrome for the best experience, especially on Chromebooks.

No. The priority engine that ranks your assignments runs locally and is essentially instant — it doesn't make extra network calls on every page load. The heavier AI features (OCR, quiz generation, notes indexing) only run server-side on paid plans when you explicitly trigger them, so they don't affect your day-to-day Canvas browsing speed.

When you visit a Canvas assignment, quiz, or page, Course Compass automatically scans your imported notes for content that matches the current page — by title, keywords, and topic. When matches are found, a collapsible "📝 From your notes" strip appears below your priority list, showing the note title, a matching snippet, and a "View" link to jump to the original source. Free users see matches from their manually-added notes; paid plans search across the full imported file library (PDFs and slides). The match quality improves as you add more material. If you don't see the strip, it means no strong match was found for the current page — or you haven't imported any notes yet. Visit the Import tab in the dashboard to add material.

Yes, but it stays completely out of your way. The priority panel is available on quiz and exam pages if you want to glance at your task list, but it never intercepts or interferes with quiz submissions — it's a read-only sidebar you open intentionally. Clipper switches to exam-context tips during quizzes (time management, which formula sheets help most, how to triage under exam pressure). If Clipper's tips are distracting, press Escape to collapse the panel, or set Clipper to "Quiet" in Settings to pause new tips while you focus.

Yes. Once you submit through Canvas, Course Compass removes that item from your priority list on the next refresh. The panel has a refresh button (↻) in the header — clicking it re-syncs with Canvas and applies changes immediately. Submitted items are always filtered out of the list so your ranking reflects your current open workload. If a submitted item reappears, it may be a quiz with multiple attempts or an assignment your instructor re-opened — both are expected behaviour from Canvas itself.

Yes. Course Compass uses semantic HTML with ARIA labels throughout — the priority panel, buttons, and lists are screen-reader friendly. The loot box case-opening animation and other motion effects respect your operating system's prefers-reduced-motion setting and skip or simplify automatically. Keyboard users can press Escape to dismiss any Course Compass panel or tip bubble. If you find an accessibility gap, email [email protected] — we take these seriously.

Yes, one at a time. Course Compass stores a single Canvas URL and API token in Settings. To switch schools, paste the new Canvas URL and token in Settings ⚙ and save — the extension repoints immediately. For dual enrollment (two Canvas schools simultaneously), a two Chrome-profile setup works well: each Chrome profile has its own independent Course Compass settings, so you can configure each profile for a different institution and switch profiles when you change contexts.

You can install Course Compass on as many computers as you like, but on the free plan each device's data stays local to that device — nothing syncs automatically. On paid plans, sign in with Google (Settings ⚙) to opt into cross-device sync: your Canvas connection, preferences, streak, and dubloon balance follow you to every signed-in device automatically, and your full notes library is backed up to the cloud so you can restore it on a new device. Sync is off by default and only turns on when you explicitly enable it — see the privacy policy for exactly what syncs.

There's no one-click "export everything" button in the dashboard today. Your notes, imported files, settings, and game state live in your browser's local storage, so they're already sitting on your device — nothing to download separately unless you want a portable copy. On paid plans, enabling cloud backup keeps your notes index synced to our backend so "Restore from cloud" can bring it back automatically on a new device; you can request a full export or permanent deletion of that backed-up copy anytime by emailing [email protected]. A self-serve export button is on our list.

Open the Course Compass dashboard (click the extension icon → Dashboard), then go to the Import ☁️ tab. Free users can type key concepts, study notes, and chapter summaries directly into the form — no file needed. On paid plans, connect your Google Drive to import PDFs, slide decks, and notes stored there. PDF and .pptx files are both supported. Once added, your material is indexed locally and the relevancy engine surfaces matching chunks whenever you're on a related Canvas page.

Yes. Each saved note has a ✎ edit button — clicking it loads the note back into the form so you can update the title, description, tags, or page number. Click Save to apply the change in place. To delete a note, use the delete button on that row; a brief undo option appears for 5 seconds in case you change your mind. Your saved notes are listed newest-first, so recent additions are always at the top. Everything is stored only on your device — no account needed.

Ask Clipper is a note-search tool built into the Course Compass panel. A "💬 Ask Clipper" link appears below the relevant-notes strip on Canvas pages — type a question or topic and Clipper searches your notes for the closest matches, returning a preview snippet and a link back to the source. Results are grounded in notes you actually added (retrieval-based, not AI-generated, so there's no hallucination risk). Free plan users can search their manually-added notes; paid plans extend the search to the full imported file library.

No. Chrome extensions are disabled in incognito windows by default. You can optionally enable Course Compass in incognito from your browser's extension settings (chrome://extensions), but we don't recommend it — Chrome Sync, which carries your settings and streak, doesn't run in incognito. For the best experience, use a normal browsing window.

Yes. Course Compass auto-detects your Canvas domain from any open Canvas tab. If it doesn't find one automatically, just paste your school's full Canvas URL (it usually looks like yourschool.instructure.com or canvas.yourschool.edu) into the Settings page once. After that, Course Compass remembers it and runs on every Canvas page at that domain.

Not yet — Course Compass is a Chrome desktop extension and doesn't run on Chrome for Android/iOS or Safari on iPad. For mobile study, the extension works great on Chromebook, which is the most common school device it's designed for. A mobile companion is something we're exploring for the future.

Course Compass requests only what it needs to work. The key permissions are: storage and unlimitedStorage — to save your priority list, notes, imported files, and game state locally on your device without hitting Chrome's default storage cap; scripting — to inject the Course Compass panel into Canvas pages you have open; host permissions scoped to your Canvas domain — so the panel only activates there and can read the Canvas pages you're already viewing (there's no separate "tabs" permission — the Canvas-only scoping comes from that host permission); identity — used only if and when you choose to sign in with Google or connect Drive; notifications — for the optional desktop alert when a notes re-index finishes; and alarms — to schedule background tasks like cross-device backup sync. On paid plans, it also requests permission to reach the Charted Edu Tech backend for AI features. It does not have access to any other websites, it cannot make purchases, and it cannot modify any page outside your Canvas domain. You can review the full permission list in Chrome at chrome://extensions.

No. Course Compass does not send browser notifications, email alerts, or any communication outside of Canvas. All Clipper tips, streak reminders, and due-date nudges appear only inside the Course Compass panel while you have a Canvas tab open — they are not pushed to you when Canvas is closed. If you want to reduce even in-panel interruptions, set Clipper to Quiet in Settings or press Escape to dismiss any tip instantly.

Google Drive integration is an optional paid-plan feature that lets you import your study materials directly from Drive — PDFs, slide decks (.pptx), and notes stored there. Once connected, you browse your Drive from the Import tab in the dashboard and pick files to index. Free users do not need to connect Drive. The free plan's Import tab lets you type notes, concepts, and summaries directly into a form — no file upload, no Drive required. Drive integration is a convenience for paid users who already keep all their course materials there. To connect Drive on a paid plan, go to the Import tab and look for the Drive button; you'll be prompted for the OAuth permission at that point.

No. Course Compass reads assignment metadata from Canvas — point values, due dates, and submission status — but it does not store your grades, calculate your GPA, or have any access to your grade book beyond what you'd see in a standard Canvas assignment list. The "grade leverage" factor in the priority score uses your current standing in each course to weight which assignments matter most, but that figure is only used for ranking and is never displayed or stored. Course Compass cannot submit, modify, or delete any Canvas content on your behalf — it is read-only.

This is a paid-plan AI feature that reads your imported syllabus (or any text-heavy PDF) and extracts a list of chapter or topic ranges — for example, "Chapter 3 (pages 42–67): Cellular Respiration." Those ranges are then used to anchor your imported notes to the right sections of your readings. When you're viewing a Canvas assignment that aligns with Chapter 3, the relevancy strip can surface notes tagged to those pages rather than returning matches from the whole document. The extraction runs automatically in the background the next time your notes are indexed — it isn't limited to files classified as a syllabus, any imported PDF or notes with page numbers qualifies — using AI credits. If you're on the free plan, the relevancy engine still matches by keyword — it just doesn't have chapter-level precision.

Yes — in two places. For assignments, the Assignments tab in the Course Compass dashboard has a live search box that filters your full Canvas workload by title, so you can quickly find a specific quiz, essay, or lab among a long list. For notes, the Ask Clipper feature (the "💬 Ask Clipper" link in the Canvas panel) lets you type a topic or question and retrieves the closest matching chunks from your imported notes — free users can search their manually-added notes, and paid plans search the full imported file library. The "From your notes" strip that appears automatically on Canvas assignment pages works as an implicit keyword search that runs every time you open a page.

On paid plans, Course Compass can generate practice Q&A pairs from your imported notes and PDFs. After importing material on the Import or Files tab, you can trigger question generation — the AI processes your content and returns a set of flashcard-style practice pairs. Once generated, they appear in the Study tab review queue and are scheduled using spaced repetition, so Clipper resurfaces them just before you'd naturally forget the material. Each generation uses AI credits proportional to the length of the source material. Quiz generation works best for dense, fact-heavy material: textbook chapters, lecture slides, and your own typed summaries.

When you click the 🗺️ Hunt button on an assignment in the Course Compass panel, a task card opens for that item. On paid plans with AI enabled, Course Compass generates a short list of concrete study steps tailored to that specific assignment — breaking the work into next actions like "re-read the prompt," "outline your key arguments," or "check the rubric." These steps are generated once and cached, so credits are only spent on the first hunt for each assignment (and automatically regenerated if the assignment description changes significantly). The steps give you a clear starting point when you open a Canvas assignment and aren't sure where to begin.

The pre-grade tool is a paid AI feature that reviews your assignment draft against the assignment prompt and returns structured feedback — what's working well, what's missing, and where you could improve before submitting. Think of it as a smart peer review you can run yourself, available any time before your deadline. Access it from an assignment's focus card or task card in Course Compass once you have a draft ready. Each pre-grade uses AI credits. The feedback is guidance rather than a score — use it to strengthen your draft, not as a prediction of your instructor's grade (instructors weigh class-specific context the AI can't see).

Most of Course Compass runs locally on your device and keeps working without an internet connection. Offline features: the priority list (uses the last cached Canvas snapshot), the full treasure hunt and game panel, Clipper tips and the focus timer, the "From your notes" relevancy strip on already-imported notes, Ask Clipper for manually-added notes, and scanning a PDF for text with the default OCR engine (it recognizes text on-device — nothing is uploaded). Features that require internet: syncing Canvas assignment data (the ↻ refresh button pulls fresh data), most AI features (quiz generation, pre-grading, notes indexing — these call the Charted Edu Tech backend), the optional Claude Vision OCR fallback for hard-to-read handwriting, and Google Drive import. If you're studying offline, the cache holds your last-synced assignment list until connectivity returns — so your priority list and game still work without a connection.

When you import a file, Course Compass extracts the text from your PDF, slide deck, or typed notes and splits it into chunks. Each chunk is stored locally on your device with its source, title, and page location. On the free plan, the relevancy engine matches chunks against the Canvas page you're viewing using keyword similarity — fast and works offline. On paid plans, an AI-assisted matching layer also scores chunks by semantic similarity (meaning — so "photosynthesis" in your notes can match a Canvas page about "plant energy conversion" even if the keywords differ). No note content is sent off your device except during on-demand AI actions like quiz generation or indexing, and even then only the relevant portion is sent — not your whole library.

Updates are fully automatic — Chrome applies extension updates in the background without any action from you. The update takes effect the next time you restart your browser. To see which version you're on, open Settings ⚙ inside Course Compass — the version number is shown at the bottom. To force Chrome to check for an update immediately, go to chrome://extensions, enable Developer mode, and click Update. You'll never need to reinstall from scratch unless Chrome asks you to (which is rare and usually indicates a profile issue, not a Course Compass problem).

Page summaries are a paid AI feature that condenses a long Canvas assignment brief, discussion prompt, or content page into a short, scannable paragraph — useful when you need to quickly grasp what an assignment is asking before deciding how to approach it. When viewing a Canvas content page, look for the summary option inside the Course Compass panel. The AI reads the text on the page and generates the summary on demand, using a small number of AI credits per summary. Summaries use internet and credits; they don't run in the background or on every page automatically — you trigger one when you want it.

Yes — it's a rare random bonus that fires roughly once every 20 chest digs. When it hits, Clipper triggers a full celebration (coin rain animation) and you receive a bonus 100 dubloons all at once on top of the normal dig reward. It's completely fair: no purchase or paid plan is required, and it happens randomly for any user in the normal course of playing. At 100 bonus dubloons, a jackpot covers two full loot boxes (50 dubloons each) back to back. If your chest fill bar suddenly jumps — congrats, you jackpotted. Keep digging.

Assignments are one way, but there are several other earning paths: Read your notes — when you click a note link from the "From your notes" relevancy strip, Clipper reacts with a cracker and awards dubloons; finish a focus timer session — Clipper toasts a cracker when the countdown completes; mark a spaced-repetition card "Got it" in the Study tab — awards 2 dubloons per card; complete treasure hunt puzzle steps — each step milestone adds a bonus; complete all weekly tasks — triggers a weekly completion bonus; and during Finals Week, all earning rates are doubled. The more study habits you use, the faster your balance grows — the game is designed to reward the habits that actually work.

Open Course Compass Settings ⚙ (click the extension icon → Settings, or right-click the icon and choose Options). Scroll to the Finals Week section and enter your exam-period start and end dates — you can find these in your school calendar or course syllabus. The settings page validates the dates and shows an "active" status badge when your finals period is currently live. Once saved, Finals Week mode activates automatically on the start date (doubling dubloon earnings, showing Clipper's finals cheer, and adding the gold badge to the panel header) and switches off after the end date. You only need to update the dates once per semester.

Yes. The treasure hunt isn't limited to Canvas assignments — you can start a hunt for any study task, including physical lab work, a study group session, or an external project. Open the treasure hunt panel on any Canvas page, look for the manual task entry option, enter a name and description for your task, and the game tracks your progress the same way it does for Canvas assignments. When you click the 🗺️ Hunt button while viewing a Canvas assignment page, the task details auto-fill from that page; when you use the manual path, you fill in the fields yourself. Custom tasks earn the same hunt step bonuses as Canvas-linked ones.

"Points at risk" is a forward-looking warning that adds up the total points possible on your open, unsubmitted assignments due within the next 48 hours. It's distinct from your overdue section (which tracks already-missed deadlines) — it flags what you still have time to submit before more points slip away. For example, if you have a 100-point essay due tomorrow and a 50-point quiz due tonight, Course Compass shows "⚠️ 150 pts at risk." When you see this figure, those are your most urgent assignments. The warning clears automatically as you submit work or as the 48-hour window closes.

That timestamp shows when Course Compass last successfully pulled fresh assignment data from Canvas. "Synced: 5m ago" means the priority list and overdue count are based on a Canvas snapshot from 5 minutes ago. The sync happens automatically when you open or reload the panel. To refresh on-demand, click the ↻ button in the panel header — it re-contacts Canvas, updates your assignment list, and resets the timestamp. The sync footer is informational only; no data is sent anywhere — it's referring to a local refresh from the Canvas API on your own account.

Yes — Clipper follows you across Canvas, but adapts to the page type. On assignment pages, he shows study-start tips and the Hunt button. On quiz and exam pages, he shifts to exam-context tips (time management, formula sheets, priority-triage under exam conditions). On discussion pages, grades pages, modules pages, and course home pages he has distinct tip sets relevant to each context — for example, checking grades vs. checking module progress vs. reading a syllabus all get different nudges. You can dismiss any tip with Escape, or set Clipper to Quiet in Settings to pause all tips without turning him off entirely.

In Settings ⚙, look for the Test connection button in the Canvas section. Clicking it checks your Canvas URL and API token without saving any changes — it's a safe way to verify your credentials before hitting Save. A successful test shows "✓ Connected — N courses, N open items" inline; a failure shows an error message so you know exactly what to fix. This is useful if Course Compass isn't loading assignment data or if you've recently changed your Canvas API token and want to confirm the new one works.

It depends on your school's IT policy. Course Compass is designed for Chromebooks — they're our primary target device — but schools using Google Workspace for Education can restrict which extensions students may install. If Course Compass doesn't appear in the Chrome Web Store on your school device, or won't install, IT has likely blocked third-party extensions. The solution is to ask your teacher or IT department to whitelist Course Compass. On personally-owned Chromebooks and standard Chrome profiles, there are no IT restrictions — install it directly from the Chrome Web Store like any other extension.

Email [email protected] for anything — bugs, setup questions, accessibility gaps, feedback, or billing issues. When reporting a bug, including your Chrome version, Canvas domain (e.g., yourschool.instructure.com), and a brief description of what you were doing when the problem occurred helps us reproduce and fix it faster. For billing questions, Paddle (our payment processor) can also be reached via their support portal. We read every email and respond to student questions, usually within a business day.

Course Compass doesn't generate a study calendar or block time in your week — that's a separate tool category. What it does instead: ranks your Canvas assignments by urgency and importance so you always know what to tackle next, shows a day-by-day view of your upcoming week in the Today tab, alerts you when points are at risk before deadlines, and provides AI-generated step guidance for individual assignments via the treasure hunt. For full time-blocking, a calendar app like Google Calendar alongside Course Compass works well — Course Compass tells you what to study, your calendar tells you when.

Yes — Plus ($4.99/mo) and Pro ($9.99/mo) are available now via our pricing page. Semester and annual plans are also available (save up to 33%). AI credit top-up packs ($3.49 / 500 credits) are live too. All billing is handled by Paddle, our merchant of record. Cancel any subscription anytime, no questions asked.

Yes — prioritization, games, Clipper, and the focus timer are free with no expiry date. No credit card, no trial, no catch. The free plan is not a trial. Paid plans add the managed AI layer for students who want it.

Billing is handled by Paddle, our merchant of record. Paddle accepts all major credit and debit cards (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover), PayPal, and many local payment methods depending on your country. You never enter payment details on chartededutech.com — all transactions go through Paddle's secure checkout.

No — monthly credits reset at the start of each billing cycle. They're designed to be generous enough for a full month of regular student use (1,000 credits for Plus, 2,000 for Pro). If you need more, top-up packs (500 credits for $3.49) are available anytime and do not expire until you cancel.

Yes. Upgrading takes effect immediately — you get the higher credit limit right away, and Paddle applies a prorated charge for the rest of your billing period. Downgrading takes effect at the end of your current billing period, so you keep your current tier until your renewal date. Email [email protected] to switch plans — a self-serve billing portal is on the way.

First-time subscribers get a 3-day money-back guarantee — request within 3 days of your first charge and with fewer than 51% of your monthly AI credits used, and you'll receive a full refund. Outside those conditions, subscriptions are non-refundable. Credit top-up packs are non-refundable once any credits have been used. Full refund policy →

Semester and annual plans already discount significantly over monthly billing (semester saves ~15%, annual saves ~33%). We're working on .edu-verified pricing — email [email protected] with your school email to get on the early-access list. Schools interested in group licensing should also reach out.