My WebCT Page and Number of Courses Listed

I've been gathering bits of information that might be useful (and cannot be stored in my memory banks) so I'll include them here on the blog as time permits.

As the number of courses in which an instructor or designer is enrolled increases, the time the system takes to display the My WebCT page seems to exponentially increase. Sometimes the time lag is so great, users think the page has failed to load. An inquiry to our TSM at Blackboard resulted in this response: "I asked our engineers and they said there is no limit [to the number of courses in which a user can be enrolled]. We have some admins in over a 1000 courses. However, once you start getting above 100 courses the user will see performance problems because the database is querying for every course, every tool, every update, for every section. It is best to enroll in only what is necessary. "

Norton Internet Security Software and Zone Alarm Pro each have their own, behind-the-scenes pop-up blocker that does not seem to be detected by the WebCT CE6 Check Browser link. If WebCT users experience problems when posting to the Mail and Discussions tools, the problem may be that these products are blocking required pop-ups (in effect disabling portions of WebCT that use the HTML Creator, the Content Manager, and the File Manager). Students and instructors should be advised that they do not need to disable the entire application. Norton IS (Zone Alarm Pro too) actually proxy incoming traffic and remove a lot of JavaScript, such as is required for WebCT to function properly.

Information on enabling and disabling pop-up blockers with Norton Internet Security is available on their site.

Information on adding a trusted zone or site (e.g. not restricted by the firewall included in Norton Internet Security) is also available on the Symantec site.

A second reason that students and instructors may not be able to successfully use the Mail and Discussions tools is encountered on systems running Windows XP service pack 1 and using Microsoft's Internet Explorer. If you watch the bottom of the browser window, you may see an indication that there are "errors on the page." The solution is to upgrade to SP2 or try a different browser, the former solution is strongly recommended.

Additional solutions and suggestions for properly configuring a web browser to work with CE 6 are included at http://students.jccc.edu and at http://web.jccc.net/edtech/notes/get.asp?DocumentID=126 ("Trusting Pop-ups in WebCT 6") and http://web.jccc.net/edtech/notes/find.asp?words=java ("Installing Java on Your Computer for WebCT 6").