Instructional AI: Frequently Asked Questions

TritonAI is integrated with Canvas. A participating course gets a student-facing TritonAI Tutor that answers questions using course materials you approve. You decide what it can read and how it responds.

Email the team at AI-Pilots@ucsd.edu with the subject line “TritonAI tutor.” The team verifies your request, configures the tutor for your course, and sends you a Getting Started guide and video.

Email AI-Pilots@ucsd.edu

Yes. You can create separate tutors for different units, lab sections, or study purposes, each with its own content and teaching style.

Socratic mode guides students toward answers with questions and asks them to explain their reasoning. Directive mode gives direct explanations. Choose per tutor based on what the tutor is for; for example, Socratic for problem-set practice and directive for reviewing course logistics or definitions.

The Canvas connector can index:

• Pages, Assignments, Announcements, Discussions, and the Syllabus
• Files and Modules
• Quizzes (Classic and New Quizzes)

It fetches content by type, so material can be indexed even if it is not placed in a Module. You choose which sources are selected in the tutor’s knowledge settings, and the tutor learns or unlearns content as you select or deselect it during the term.

Yes, if quizzes are selected. Classic Quizzes include question and answer text. New Quizzes include prompts and answer-choice text.

Quiz content is indexed so the tutor can be instructed to recognize quiz questions and decline to answer them. If you would rather the tutor never see quiz content, leave quizzes unselected in the tutor’s knowledge settings.

Yes. The tutor editor supports Google Drive folders and web pages as additional sources. These are attached separately from the Canvas connector.

The tutor works from extracted text. Images and files whose text cannot be extracted may be searchable by file name only, so the tutor will not know what they contain. For best results, use text-based PDFs, add alt text or captions, and post key content as Pages or text documents.

Yes. The connector checks whether each item is published, hidden, locked, or outside its unlock/lock dates. It also checks the parent Module, so items in a locked Module are excluded.

Due dates are not the same as availability. A due date alone does not hide content. To keep problem-set solutions away from the tutor until after the deadline, use an unlock date, a locked Module, or leave the item unpublished.

The connector refreshes every 30 minutes and removes content that is no longer available every 30 days. Two edge cases follow from this:

• Re-locking something already indexed. The tutor does not check Canvas lock status live. If an item was indexed and you later lock it, it can remain searchable until the next 30-day cleanup. To remove it right away, deselect it in the tutor’s knowledge settings or contact the TritonAI team.
• Date-only unlocks. Indexing picks up items based on when they were last updated. An item that unlocks on a date without being edited may not appear in the tutor as soon as it unlocks.

Tip: Keep sensitive material (solutions, exam keys) unpublished until release, rather than publishing it early behind a lock date. That avoids both edge cases.

Models available in the tutor meet UC San Diego and UC data security and privacy standards, and your data is not used to inform other users’ responses. See the Privacy Statement and Trust, Privacy & Hosting for details.

Email AI-Pilots@ucsd.edu for setup questions, content changes, or to report a problem with tutor responses. General TritonAI feedback goes to tritonai@ucsd.edu.

An AI study assistant set up by your instructor for your course. It answers questions using course materials your instructor has approved, and it is available any time you are studying.

Your instructor makes the tutor available inside your Canvas course. Check the course navigation or announcements for the link. You sign in through Canvas; there is no separate account to create.

Many tutors are set to Socratic mode. Instead of handing you an answer, the tutor guides you toward it and asks you to explain your reasoning. This is intentional: working through the steps is how the material sticks. Some tutors use a directive mode that explains more directly; your instructor chooses which.

Follow your instructor’s AI policy for the course. Tutors can be set to decline quiz questions, and content your instructor has locked or not yet released is not available to the tutor.

Only the course content your instructor selects, such as Pages, Modules, files, and the syllabus, plus any websites or Google Drive folders they add. It does not see your grades or submissions. If it cannot find something in the course materials, it may say so or answer less reliably.

Your instructor can request to review all conversations for the course, but your name and email are not shown to them. Each conversation is grouped on its own, and conversations are not linked to you across sessions in what your instructor sees.

Anything you type is visible, though. Avoid putting your name, student ID, or other personal details in your messages.

For questions about course content or how the tutor is set up, ask your instructor. For technical problems, email tritonai@ucsd.edu.