Allowing Students to Add Web Links

While you, as an instructor, can add web links (using the Web Links tool) to a course, you can also enable your students to add Web Links (keep in mind that only the author of a Web Link can remove it). To enable students to add web links you must:

• On the Build tab, enable the Web Links tool (select Manage Course à Tools and select the check box preceding the Web Links tool name under Content Tools and then select the Save button).
• On the Build tab, enable student Web Link creation (from the Manage Course screen select the Settings à Web Links option and set the “Allow Web Links to be created [by] roles other than designer” option button to True…then select the Save Values button).
• On the Teach tab, go to the Web Links tool and create a new Category (such as “Student Contributions” or whatever you want to call it). Add a description if you wish (such as “A place for you to share web links.”). Then select the “Allow Student to assign links to this category” option button and select the Save button.
• If you go to the Student View tab and select the Web Links tool, you’ll now see a Create Web Link button for the student to use.

On Lurking or Working and Being Invisible

By default when you’re online, students can use the Who’s Online tool to see if you’re online. By default, you’re visible and available. You can change the setting for the current session or you can change your default setting using these steps:

1. From the My Blackboard screen, select the My Settings link.
2. Next select the My Tool Options tab.
3. Scroll down to the Who’s Online area.
4. Next select the status you wish to be your default status (starting with the next time you log-in to Blackboard CE). Your options are:
   
   * If you want your name to appear on the list of online users and appear available to chat, select Visible/Available.
   * If you want your name to appear on the list of online users but do not want users to send chat invitations, select Visible/Unavailable.
   * If you do not want your name to appear on the list of online users, select Invisible.
5. Select the Save button.

If you want to change your “visibility” for only the current session in a specific course, you can:

1. Go to the Who’s Online tool,
2. Set the status on the top of the screen to the desired setting
3. Click the Update button.

This process only effects the course in which you change the setting.

Always Use Lowercase for Filenames

Blackboard CE 6.1.1 has a nasty habit of renaming files that you upload or import using all lowercase. Further, there’s a known bug that if you have two filenames that are identical (except for the case, the course will generate a general exception error when trying to copy it into a new course shell). So the morale of the story is name all your files using only lowercase letters. Due to Blackboard CE 6.1.1’s renaming of an imported or uploaded file:

WICKED.PDF becomes wicked.pdf
Wicked.pdf becomes wicked.pdf
and
Wicked.PDF also becomes wicked.pdf

Then you’ve potentially got multiple files with the same filename and your course is headed for trouble…if it already has a file created under a previous version of CE that includes upper and lowercase letters in the filename.

Forwarding Mail from Blackboard CE to Outlook or Another Mail Program

Mail forwarding in Blackboard causes all Mail tool messages sent to you CE 6 to be forwarded automatically to an external mail box (however, you still must respond to each message within a Blackboard course shell). Enabling mail forwarding is set following these steps:

1. Go to the My Blackboard page,
2. Select the My Settings link (top right of page),
3. Select the My Tool Options tab (center of three),
4. Under the Mail/Mail Forwarding area, select the “Forward all mail messages to the e-mail address in my profile” check box,
5. Click the Save button.
6. Next select the My Profile tab (left-most tab of the three).
7. Click the Edit Profile button.
8. Enter the desired external email address in the E-mail field.
9. Click on the Save button.
10. When the My Settings screen appears, click Done.

Bug Work Around: Missing Icons or Links on Course Content Home

If you have icons or links that display in your Blackboard course shell on the Teach tab but not on the Student View tab (which means students will not see the icons or links), the only solution we’ve found to date is to follow these steps. You may find that your custom icons still show or they may be the default icons. Either way, they will be visible to your students.

• Select the Build Tab, Manage Course.
• Click on Course Content Icons.
• Click on the Select New Content Icon Set button.
• Select Learning System as the icon set in the Select Icon Set popup window.
• Click the Select button at the bottom of the page.
• After the Select Icon Set window closes, click the Apply button.

New Discussions Tool Feature

The section instructor can now lock a Blackboard CE 6 Discussion topic and still post to that topic. In other words, after you terminate student contributions, you (the instructor) can continue to comment on postings and post those comments. The steps required are:

• On the Teach Tab, select the ActionLinks icon and select the Edit Properties option.
• Scroll to the bottom of the screen and click the “Topic Behaviors Options” link to expand the list of options.
• Select the “Lock this topic for Students (Section Instructors can post in a locked topic)” option button and
• Click the Save button.

Which Browser Version & Version of Java to Use?

For Windows users who experience problems using the File Manager, posting to the Mail tool, posting to the Discussions tool, or trying to attach files, please read on.

After continued testing of various combinations of Internet Explorer 6 and 7 and Java updates 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 10 (and taking into consideration Banner and use of MyJCCC/Luminus) here’s our best recommendation:

Stick with Internet Explorer version 6 and Java update 6 or
FireFox 1.5 and Java update 6

If you want to know more about this recommendation, please read on.

We have tested using Firefox 1.5, Firefox 2.0, IE 6 and IE 7. These products work in certain configurations. We’ve tested (primarily) Java 5, 6, 9 and 10 and they sometimes work. The typical problems include:

• The Get Files button works in the File Manager initially, but after repeated use (such as attaching a file or uploading a file) the browser freezes after a 2nd or 3rd use.
• When using the File Manager and selecting the Get Files button, the list of files available (when selecting the My Files or Class Files icon) is so vertically narrow that only 1-2 file names can be displayed.

If You Need to Roll Back to Java Update 6
If you have updated to a version of Java beyond update 6 and are having problems, you can uninstall all versions of Java by following the instructions at http://students.jccc.edu/documents/javauninstall.htm. Then you can follow the instructions at http://students.jccc.edu/documents/javainstall.htm which include a link to the Java Update version 6 installer. Read the instructions for both actions carefully!

The Check Browser Link Prompts You to Install Update 5
By the way, if you uninstall all versions of Java, reboot your system, go to http://online.jccc.edu and select the Check Browser link, the Browser Checker will find that you do not have Java installed. Just below the Java Check icon you’ll see a link to fix this problem. The link takes you to a Sun Microsystems web site that installs Java 1.5.0_05 (update 5). That version of Java works okay too.

How to Disable Automatic Update Notification in the Java Control Panel
Java will continually prompt you to update to the latest version unless you turn off the automatic update feature. Here’s how to turn it off.

1. Click the Start button, then select Settings, and then Control Panel.
2. Double-click on the Java Control Panel icon to open it.
3. Select the Update tab (see below).
4. Uncheck the check box that says Check for Updates Automatically.
5. Click the OK button at the bottom of the window and the Java Control Panel will close.

If You Need to Roll Back to IE 6
If you have updated to IE 7, you can remove that version from your computer using these steps:

1. Click Start, and then select the Control Panel.
2. Click Add or Remove Programs.
3. Scroll down to Windows Internet Explorer 7, click it, and then click Change/Remove.
4. Follow prompts to remove Windows Internet Explorer 7.

After you uninstall IE 7, your computer will automatically roll back to IE 6…assuming you had IE 6 installed and upgraded to IE 7.

Clarification Regarding Search Tool Date Ranges

When searching for items within a course (such as student contributions or postings) you can search by a date range using the Search Tool.

When you search by a date range, you’re prompted for a Start and End date (there’s no option to specify the time of day). When you enter a date, Blackboard assumes you want an item that is date stamped 12:01 a.m. or after on the date specified. So if you enter a date range of August 15 to August 15, you’ll retrieve no listings since no items would be date stamped between 12:01 a.m. and 12:01 a.m. on the specified date.

In order to successfully search for activity on a given date (e.g. August 15, 2006), use the desired date as the Start date and the next day (e.g. August 16, 2006) as the End date.

Character Limit for a Grade Book Formula

When you enter a formula for a calculated column in the Blackboard CE 6 Grade Book, it’s limited to 1000 characters in length. We’ve submitted a feature enhancement request to address this limitation. In the meantime, the only work around is to:

• Shorten the column names that are used to compose the formula or
• Use two or more calculated columns (each used to calculate a range of column scores) and then use a final column that adds the “sub-total” column entries together.
  

Editing Questions: What You Can and Cannot Do

In order to avoid confusion when using an assessment (e.g. to not change the question or possible answers):

• You can edit and alter answers to a question in an assessment prior to any student activity (e.g. before any student has taken the test, survey or quiz).
• You cannot change a question or it’s list of possible answers after students begin taking the assessment because the change may potentially cause answers that were correct before the change to become incorrect.
• You can alter the score for a question if it is found to be partially or totally incorrect.

For instance, if a question is worded incorrectly or the answers are listed incorrectly you can throw it out (make the score/points zero). If the question has already been made available to students and they have taken it; to change the wording or correct an answer would not be fair. Blackboard CE prevents these changes by only granting a "Save as new" (question) option so you can use the corrected question in future assessments.

Note: If you have a question that is used in an assessment and that question has been taken and saved by any student, you can no longer edit the question. You can edit and save it using a new name, but you cannot edit and replace the existing question. This applies even if the question is used in multiple assessments and it has been taken by any student in any one of those assessments.

CE 6 Now Supports Personal Settings

By default Blackboard CE 6 displays 10 entries per page when using many tools, such as the Mail tool, Discussions tool, and Assignments tool. When the default number of entries is exceeded, students often think new messages are lost or missing (because they're not displayed). In each tool, you can click the Paging Preferences icon (looks like three small dog-eared pages and it’s located in the bottom right corner of the screen) and set the default as high as 999 entries per page. When you edit this setting, it applies only to the list of entries in the current tool. If you or your students want to change the setting globally, follow these steps.

1. From the My Blackboard screen select the My Settings link (upper right corner).
2. When the My Settings page appears, select the My Tool Options tab.
3. Scroll to the bottom of the page and change the Paging option to the number of entries you want displayed by default. We suggest using 999, the maximum, to minimize the need to “page” through postings and entries.
4. When finished, click the Save button.

On that screen (before clicking Save) you have several other options including the ability to:

• Forward Blackboard mail to an external email address.
• Show all or just unread messages in the Mail and Discussions tools by default.
• Show the oldest or most recent Discussions postings at the top of the screen.
• Start the HTML Creator in each course by default.
• And more….

Using the CE 6 Tabs Properly

When new mail messages, discussion postings, or assignment are submitted in Blackboard CE, a New Activity icon (white asterisk on a green background circle) appears. However, the New Activity icon is based on items you’ve viewed or new items received on each tab (Build, Teach and Student View). When you view the new activity on one tab, the New Activity icon disappears on that tab only (e.g. the corresonding New Activity icons are still visible on the other tabs).

Blackboard CE 6 has three tabs serving three specific purposes. The Build tab is used when building the course. The Student View tab is used 1) to see how the course displays to students and 2) for in-classroom use of Blackboard (so you don’t accidentally open up the Grade Book in class). Once the course is built one should teach the course using the Teach tab. By remaining on the Teach tab throughout the semester you will always know which items you’ve opened or not. If you switch back and forth between tabs when doing routine “Teach” activities, you’ll may find “new” items identified on each tab (Build, Teach and Student View) depending on what you’ve already opened on that tab! This can be confusing if you’re unaware of the pattern.

Of course one problem of using only the Teach tab all semester is the lack of access to the File Manager among the Teach tab tools—forcing you to use the Build tab for any file maintenance or uploading. Also, the Calendar tool on the Teach tab does not allow the instructor the option of creating a new calendar entry and linking it to a Learning Module. That option is found on the Build tab only. As a result, there are times when you will need to use the Build and Student View tabs. Generally, try to remember to return to the Teach tab before tackling postings in the Discussions tool and Mail tool so you can avoid opening items already viewed.

Students Timing Out While Working on Assignments

Our JCCC Blackboard CE 6 server has a timeout setting to prevent an inactive “log-in” from consuming system resources (this also helps avoid hacking by a malicious party). The timeout is set to 70 minutes. If students are working online using the HTML Creator or entering text in a text box (e.g. in Discussions, Mail or Assignments) and do not interact with Blackboard for 70 minutes, they’ll be logged off the system automatically. Switching to another tab or saving a message or a posting in draft form re-starts the 70 minute cycle. It’s just when the student types in a text box or in the HTML Creator without using any other Blackboard features, that Blackboard will consider the account as inactive.

To avoid this problem, an alternative is for your students to compose their assignments in Microsoft Word (or another word processor) and then copy and paste the text into Blackboard. If you have your students submit their assignment as an attachment the timeout is usually not an issue.

If the student’s account “times out” before they finish the assignment, they’ll lose their work.

By the way, if a student is taking an assessment, the 70 minute cycle restarts each time an answer is saved or if the student moves from one question to another.