Blackboard Campus Edition (CE) Annotations

Just for the Record...

2009-12-16T07:26:00.002-06:00

I've discontinued posting to this blog because we (JCCC, the college where I work) is within 3 months of ceasing to use Blackboard CE. We're almost finished with a migration to ANGEL (acquired by Blackboard Inc.). Anyway, I'm leaving the blog in place in case some of the existing content may be valuable to other users, but please don't expect further posts.

The Black Hole Grows

2009-05-07T05:32:00.003-05:00

An email message from Michael Chasen, President & CEO of Blackboard was sent on May 6, 2009. The text follows (see additional links at the end):

Chasen Message

I'm writing today to communicate the news that Blackboard has acquired ANGEL Learning and to share with you some of the thinking behind the combination.

Why put these two organizations together? This combination was about getting better. At Blackboard we're always trying to improve, both by focusing internally within our company and by looking externally to other organizations we admire, like ANGEL. We admire them not just for their story of entrepreneurial growth and impact on teaching and learning, but also for very specific strengths that we wanted to add to our story and deliver to our clients:

- The first is their customer support culture that has translated into consistently excellent experiences for ANGEL clients. We can learn from their skill in this area and add their know-how to the ever improving client support capability we're building here at Blackboard.

- The second is their history of innovation - especially in the areas of user experience, teaching and learning tools and course-based assessment. Independently our two offerings have led the way in a lot of areas. Now we have the opportunity to bring these strengths together for the benefit of learners in our Project NG vision for the future of the Blackboard platform.

From ANGEL's perspective, and especially in today's economic environment, joining these strengths with Blackboard's own innovation, industry leadership and financial stability also made a lot of sense.

At the ANGEL Users Conference in Chicago next week we'll be talking about how the solutions will come together and will send you an update after we get back. The short story is that ANGEL's latest release, ANGEL LMS 7.4 which launched last week, will continue as planned. In parallel we'll set about the work of bringing the product innovations of both companies to the new combined client community.

As we move forward and knit our organizations together, we’ll continue to be very focused on the client experience. That means drawing on what we’ve learned from previous integrations and minimizing distractions while weaving the best of ANGEL into the tangible value you get from working with us every day. More than anything, today’s news directly supports our top goal of continuing to bring clear added value to your investment in Blackboard.

You can learn more at www.blackboard.com/angel [http://www.blackboard.com/angel] , but please feel free to contact me (CEO@blackboard.com) or your Blackboard representative if you have any questions or comments.

In closing, thank you once again for your institution's partnership with us. We look forward to showing you the benefits of this latest step in our ongoing effort to be a stronger, more flexible and creative supporter of your teaching and learning goals for the near and long term.

Additional Links:

Press Release at http://tinyurl.com/covjjm
Reactions at http://tinyurl.com/co7axa

Blackboard Issues: Status Report

2008-08-18T09:00:00.004-05:00

It might be helpful for you to know the status of several Blackboard issues reported by JCCC staff over the past several months. This should alert you to the fact that most of these issues are not yet fully resolved. While some of these issues are supposed to be resolved in version 8 of Campus Edition, we're still on Version 6.2.3 and we have no plans to upgrade at this time.

Ticket #478596 - Get Files on Mac Cannot Upload Multiple Files & Overwrite Existing Files, Problem Description: When using the Get Files button to upload multiple files AND overwrite existing files already in the Class Files area, Blackboard does not give the option to "Replace Existing" files. Instead the filename appears as "Null" and Blackboard offers only these options: "Select another location," "Rename," and "Skip." Resolution: This issue is scheduled to be resolved with the release of Vista 8 SP1. This release date is scheduled for the early July timeframe.
Ticket #483277 - Cannot Save Email Attachment to Local Workstation. Resolution, per Blackboard Staff: This issue is resolved Vista 8. I have completed my testing within our Vista 8 test environment and was unable to reproduce the issue.

Note regarding version 8: The CE/Vista 8.0 product does not contain “new” functionality; instead it can be viewed more as Service Pack 4 for Application Pack 2, so essentially Vista 4.2.4/CE6.2.4. The main purpose of the CE/Vista 8.0 release is to align the numbering conventions of the Blackboard and CE/Vista product lines. The only change is that the Learning Environment Connector (providing CE/Vista clients with access to the Blackboard Community, Content and Outcomes Systems) is now built directly in to the product. However, if your institution does not chose to utilize these products then you will not notice any changes to the application only further stability and additional maintenance fixes for product defects.
Ticket #442776 - Moving Custom Icons Causes Edited Text Links to Revert to Original Names. Resolution: This issue has been slated for resolution in Vista 8.0 SP1. The release is scheduled for June/July timeframe. Once a final release date has been scheduled, I will either update the case notes or provide results from internal testings.
Ticket #443689 - Web Links Do Not Import When Importing a Learning Module. Resolution: I just completed testing this issue in our 4.2.3 and Vista 8.0 environment and it's still an issue. I will escalate this up to our developers and track the progress. Once we receive a resolution I will update the case.
Ticket #435137 - My Blackboard Course Listings not in Alpha Order. Resolution: This case has been escalated to our developers. Once a resolution has been released, we will update the case with any recommendations from our developers.
Ticket #467838 - Need Clarity in Naming Cross-Listed Courses. The default naming of cross-listed courses is confusing to instructors, designers and students. When a course is cross-listed the names of the original courses (child courses) do not appear as part of the new name (parent course shell). Instead the instructor and designer see a name like “Cross-Listed Group 599” on their My Blackboard screen. The student sees the same non-descript course name when they enter a cross-listed course. We use Respondus extensively to create an then publish assessments into Blackboard CE. The list of courses displayed by Respondus includes both the parent and the child course shell names. Since you can publish to a child course shell and NOT have it appear in the parent course, this just adds to the confusion. Resolution: None.
Ticket #458823 - Need Ability to Edit Assignment Drop Box Comments After They're Posted. When grading an Assignment in the Assignment Drop Box Comments text box, there's no access the HTML Creator (with a spellchecker) and once the comment is posted, there's no way to edit that comment (e.g. correct a spelling error). Resolution: Blackboard support staff submitted a feature request for this issue.
Ticket #458825 - Confirmation Needed Before File Attachment Deleted in Assignments Tool. An instructor accidentally deleted an attachment from an assignment in Blackboard by clicking the little icon next to the attachment. She thought it was an ActionLink icon. That icon deletes the attachment WITHOUT A CONFIRMATION BOX. We’ve duplicated the event. Worse, in this case the instructor did not have a copy of the file anywhere else. She assumed a copy was put into her Class Files area (accessible using the File Manager), but that is not the case (We confirmed that as well). Resolution: New feature request that assignment attachments be placed automatically in the Class Files area AND that a warning with an exit option appear before the attachment is permanently deleted.
Ticket #446216 - Teaching Assistant/Section Designers Cannot Add Public Calendar Entries. In versions prior to CE 6.1.1 staff who were enrolled in a course as both Section Designers and Teaching Assistants could add public calendar entries to the course calendar. That functionality has been reduced so individuals using that dual role can now only add private calendar entries. See attached screen capture which shows only one radio button under Entry Option. Resolution: Blackboard support wrote “I am going to submit this as an enhancement request. Let me know if you have any questions.”
Ticket #478596 - Get Files on Mac Cannot Upload Multiple Files & Overwrite Existing Files, Resolution: None yet.
Ticket #479817 - Answers not saving during quiz/test. Students are taking an online quiz/test and when clicking the "Save Answer" button the question is not saved. This appears to be a random event as sometimes the answers are saved and other times the server is slow or does not save the answer. Students taking a timed test are not able to complete the test/quiz in the allotted time due to this issue.Resolution: This issue is scheduled to be resolved with the release of Vista 8 SP1. This release date is scheduled for early July timeframe.
Ticket #448922 - When Saving Backup as File, Doesn't Default to Current Class Files Folder. If you don't carefully check where the file is being saved (when saving backup as a file), you may lose the backup file in a Class Files folder completely separate from the course you're in. Then, should you attempt to save a file to the course you are in, you may have a list of the bazillion courses to which you have access. Resolution: response from Blackboard support “Thank you for taking the time to submit an enhancement request to Blackboard Product Development. The suggestions we receive from you, your faculty members and students are extremely valuable, as they come from people who use our products on a daily basis. Your request has been thoroughly evaluated; at this time Blackboard does not have any plans to dedicate resources to develop this enhancement in a future release of our products. While this specific case will be closed, Blackboard is dedicated to working with you to leverage existing functionality for your needs. Our Building Block partners may be working on resolutions to your issue, and you can also work with the Blackboard Global Services team to request the development of a customization that would address your concerns. If you have any questions regarding these suggestions, please contact your Blackboard Account Manager. Again, thank you for your input. We may make statements regarding our product development initiatives, including the content of future product upgrades, updates or functionality in development. While such statements represent our current intentions, the product development initiatives may be modified, delayed or abandoned without prior notice and there is no assurance that such upgrades, updates or functionality will become available unless and until they have been made generally available through a commercial release.
Ticket #515267 - Assessments (Not Released to Students) Still Have Link to Results. Faculty member created practice quizzes and doesn’t want to release the grades to students. He set the assessment properties so the results would not be released to students. However, after taking the exam, students can go to the View All submissions page and while they “shouldn’t” be able to click to see submissions, it is a clickable link that goes to a screen that says “error: Sorry, this action cannot be executed.” If they try to view the submission by going to the already taken exam first then they can’t click on the title to see the submission, which is the way it should work. Resolution: Fixed in CE 6.2.2. JCCC testing indicates the problem has been corrected.
Ticket #458818 - Chat Invitation Window displays Incorrect Course Name. When you send an invitation in the Who’s online tool it shows the course that the person is in but the course title displays wrong. Resolution: This issue has been identified as a bug within our application. Our developers are currently investigating the source of this issue. Once I receive feedback as to a workaround or fix, I will update the case.

After Service Pack 3

2008-03-24T09:07:00.001-06:00

Official issues fixed with Service Pack 3 (SP3) include:

Installation issues to adopt Application Pack 2 have been resolved
Garbage collection has become more robust
Known issues in cross-listing have been eliminated
Assessment and question component have been stabilized
Installer related issues have been resolved
Safari 3.0 compatibility issue has been fixed
Issue with "new" messages feature of Discussion Board have been resolved
An important security issue has been fixed

In bold are the issues that directly affect students and instructors. We installed Service Pack 3 on the JCCC Blackboard production server on Monday, March 15.

Keep in mind that one bug still persists and may be important as you copy course content from Spring 2008 to Summer or Fall 2008 course shells. Courses with group sign-up sheets on the homepage cause the copy process to abort. After looking at this issue in detail it appears the only workaround is to delete all group sign-up sheets before copying course content (the problem persists even if you place the sign-up sheet in a folder ). After copying the course content, then go back and add the group sign-up sheets back into the course.

Online SoftChalk Version 4 Demos

2008-03-13T08:55:00.002-06:00

If interested, SoftChalk will demo their next version of SoftChalk LessonBuilder (which we license at JCCC) this afternoon (March 13) from 3-4 PM. Three additional sessions are scheduled in the next couple of weeks. See http://www.softchalk.com/webinar/ for details and to register. Register early if you’d like to see the next version of this product.

New features include:

New Style Builder tool – create your own styles
Internationalization – new language options for generating lesson content
Two new activities: Interactive TimeLine, Slide Show
Create internal bookmark links within a lesson
Ability to name pages in the Table of Contents
New online score tracking options
New CD-ROM packaging option
40 New pre-built style options
New Multi-page print option
Ability to integrate PodCasts and YouTube video as a media type
Ability to optimize image sizes and automatically convert image file types

Enhancements include:

Text wrapping around aligned images and image resizing in the editor window
Improved “list” handling, allowing nested lists and improved list editing
Equation Editor within activities
Increased image size provided in Hot Spot Image and Labeling activities
Option to increase text size in Flash Card activity
Crossword activity allows special and foreign characters
Improvements to table editing, including visible borders when the width is zero
Display of point values for quizpoppers and activities
New Keyboard shortcuts that match those in Microsoft Word
Page footers can now include links, text formatting and special characters, and images
New easier installation process
New software update process allows control of update by user

Springing Forward into DST

2008-03-04T11:47:00.000-06:00

Do you know that Daylight Savings Time (DST) starts earlier than usual? This Sunday, March 9, 2008 (in the U.S.) the change in DST will require that we reset our clocks. Our time will “spring forward” by an hour. So it’s time to remind you of a bug alert we originally posted back in December, 2007 (see http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/search/label/Daylight%20Savings%20Time).

If you try to set a time for an event (entry in calendar or assignment or assessment due date) on March 9, Blackboard changes the time to an hour later. Here’s an example: if you type in a time (like 11:00 PM) or use the drop down menu to choose a time, it may appear correct until you save it, then the time is set forward without warning to 12:00 AM (which would be on March 10). As far as we know now, this anomaly only occurs on March 9. If you don’t expect the behavior, you may be frustrated and waste a lot of time trying to figure it out.The work-around is to simply set the time for the due date an hour earlier than you really want.

In actuality, Blackboard has released a hotfix to Service Pack 3 that fixes the DST problem, however, we’re still testing Service Pack 3 and are not scheduled to install it until March 20 (during Spring break), so the hotfix is available to apply to a patch that we have yet to finish testing. Further, since the hotfix was just released we must test it before putting it into production.

Mac Safari and the Chat Tool

2008-02-25T06:08:00.001-06:00

On April 24, 2007, we reported to Blackboard support that the “Chat tool and Private Chat from Who's Online Fails with Safari 2.04.” We added the additional detail that: “Chat does not work on Safari 2.04 when testing 4 out of 5 Macs. When you click on the Chat tool's "go to chat room" link or try to use private chat from Who's Online, it fails to operate. Occasionally a small popup window shows up on the top of the screen, but it is empty. Other than that, nothing happens. In all cases we were using Safari 2.04. Three of the Macs used Intel processors, two were not. Only one of the non-Intel Macs would work.”

In December, 2007 we retested the problem with an upgraded version of Safari. We found that the Chat tool still didn’t work using Safari Version 3.0.4. The only change was that sometimes the Chat window appears but the user cannot type anything (a message) to the recipient, then it closes on its own. Other tests had varied results (everything worked okay on a MacBook running OS 10.4 and Safari V 3.0.4 but failed on a MacBook Pro running OS 10.5 and Safari V 3.0.4. We reported to Blackboard that “We cannot determine if the problem is fixed with Safari 2.04. We can't test that version since when the Mac OS is upgraded it automatically upgrades the browser and we no longer have anyone on Safari 2.04. So the basic issue remains, you can just upgrade the browser number that doesn't work to 3.0.4.”

On February 18, 2008, Blackboard support responded with: “As of right now, Safari 3.0 with Mac OS 10.4, on AP2SP3 (that is; CE 6.2.3, JCCC is on CE 6.2.2) is the only certified support browser for Mac configurations. As our QA department continue with their testing and validation of browsers, OS and Vista versions, we will update the Support Browsers page. This is found through the 'Check Browsers' link.”

Bottom line: If any of your students are using Macintosh computers and Safari, don’t rely on the Chat tool.

What's the Difference between a Discussion Board, Blog and Journal

2008-02-05T01:18:00.001-06:00

Tracy Newman has provided a short definition of the differences in Blackboard between these three similar tools:

Threaded Topic in Discussions Tool

Users post and reply to messages. Replies that are associated with the same post are grouped together, creating message threads that can be expanded and collapsed.

Blog Topic

Participants post a chronological series of entries on a particular topic. Participants can add comments to any blog entry. Newest entries come first in the list.

Here is the comments screen for the Second Post entry:
Journal Topic

A place for students to write. Journals can be kept private between the student and instructor or shared with the class.

Here is a screenshot of what the journal screen looks like for the instructor. In the left panel, you can choose which student to review. Clicking on a name gives you that student’s journal in the right panel. It looks like a blog except that oldest entries come first. You can add comments, just like a blog.

Any of the three tools can be added to any Blackboard CE 6 course.

SafeAssign Update

2008-02-01T12:23:00.000-06:00

Blackboard has indicated that the SafeAssign central service successfully updated the system and fixed some problems within the past couple of days.

The Blackboard CE issue resolved is as follow:

“On CE6/Vista, when Gradebook columns associated with a SafeAssign assignment were deleted, access to the SafeAssign assignment [is no longer] lost”

Blackboard further stated that “many SafeAssign users with open requests with Blackboard Support regarding SafeAssign should find that their issues are now resolved. We encourage users who have open SafeAssign issues to check whether or not they are still occurring and to update Blackboard Support on the results.”

CE 6.2.2 Bug Updates

2008-01-31T09:34:00.000-06:00

The following bugs were reported to Blackboard Support over the past several months and then were referred to the Blackboard Development staff. FYI, the case number, description and latest response from Blackboard support is listed below.

#479817 - Answers not saving during quiz/test.
Case Description: Students are taking an online quiz/test and when clicking the "Save Answer" button the question is not saved. This appears to be a random event as sometimes the answers are saved and other times the server is slow or does not save the answer. Students taking a timed test are not able to complete the test/quiz in the allotted time due to this issue.

Support Response: Our developers have deemed this to be a bug within the software. The fix for this issue is tentatively scheduled for Vista 8.0 SP1. If changes are made to the schedule, I will update the case.

JCCC Note: I have requested information on when Vista 8 SP1 will be released. We’re on Campus Edition 6.2.2 which is equal to Vista 4.2, so I’m not sure how their numbering system for future releases works.

#406008 - Course Tools Menu Automatically Collapses to Just Icons
Case Description: Based on release notes, the Course Tools menu bar should not collapse to just icons when opening the Mail tool or Learning Modules tool, but that’s not the case. The menu collapses when using the Mail, My Files, Grade Book, and File Manager tools.

Support Response: After reviewing the CR which was submitted for this issue, I noticed DEV actually rejected the Change Request. They have stated this issue will be addressed possibly in a future release. Which also can mean, it may get lost in obscurity. Let me know how you would like to proceed with this case.

#476514 - Calendar Changes After Upgrade to CE 6.2.1
Case Description: 1. It’s common for our faculty to copy a course from a previous course shell and then want to move the calendar entries to new dates in the new course. When you change the date for a Calendar entry (by simply modifying the date), the screen refreshes and brings you back to "today's date" (such as the 14th if today's the 14th of August) but in the month from which you came (e.g. the month in which the original date entry occurred before you edited it), but not on the specific date of the original entry you edited. So, if you’ve got three items on January 18th and you want to move them to August 16th (and today is August 14th), each time you change the date of an item on January 18th Blackboard “leaves“ you back on January 14, rather than on the 18th. If you’re moving an item from February 20 to September 25th, after the change you’ll end up on February 14th (if today is August 14th). This is a change in behavior since CE 6.1.1.2. New Calendar entries default to today’s date no matter what you do. If you move to a date in November and try to add a Calendar entry on November 2nd, the default date will be today’s date, not the date you selected in November. You can change it each time, but there’s no sense in navigating to the new month and date, since you’ll need to set the date each time you add an entry.3. If you try to set a time for an event (entry in calendar or assignment or assessment due date) after 10:59 PM on November 4, Blackboard changes the time to an hour earlier. This is the date that Daylight Savings time ends in the Fall of 2007. If you type in a time (like 11:00 PM) or use the drop down menu to choose a time, it may appear correct until you save it, then the time is set back without warning to 10:00 PM. This anomaly only occurs on November 4. If you don’t expect this, you can be frustrated and waste a lot of time trying to figure it out.

Support Response: Our developers have stated the calendar is functioning as designed. When adding a new entry, the start date will show the current day's date. You would have to change the date to required date for the event.

#478596 - Get Files on Mac Cannot Upload Multiple Files & Overwrite Existing Files
Case Description: When using the Get Files button to upload multiple files AND overwrite existing files already in the Class Files area, Blackboard does not give the option to "Replace Existing" files. Instead the filename appears as "Null" and Blackboard offers only these options: "Select another location," "Rename," and "Skip."

Support Response: This is issue is tentatively scheduled for resolution with the release of Vista 8.0 SP1. If any changes occur from our side, I will update the case.

JCCC Note: Subsequently we reported that this same problem happens with Windows users.

#478109 - Inconsistent Discussions Tool New Activity Icon Behavior
Case Description: New Activity icon appears when no postings occur and when a new topic is added (with a description of two words or more or when a period is added to the end of one word descriptions) even when the topic has no postings. This makes it very difficult for instructors and students to use the Discussions topic New Activity icon as an alert that new postings are present for the student to read.

Support Response: No updates have been posted by our developers. Once I receive feedback, I will update the case.

#479657 - No Web Folder option for Firefox
Case Description: When using Firefox 2 you no longer get the “Open as Web Folder” option from the File Manager ActionLink. See attached screen capture.

Support Response: As of right now, DEV has not provided any updates on this issue. Once I receive an additional information I will update the case notes.

Changing the Orientation of Multiple Choice Questions

2008-01-30T16:22:00.000-06:00

We've again had some cases where the orientation of multiple choice questions is horizontal by default rather than vertical. This sometimes occurs when questions are imported from publisher test banks. Unfortunately, if no orientation is indicated in the imported text bank, Blackboard defaults to a horizontal rather than the expected vertical orientation for the answers (detractors).

The layout of the answers to multiple-choice questions can be set or changed by the instructor, but this is accomplished on a question by question basis and not globally. What this means is that while the layout of the answers can be changed, it will have to be changed one question at a time.

The process includes these steps:

Select the Build tab.
Select the Assessments tool.
Click the link for an assessment.
Click the link for a specific question.
Scroll to the bottom of the page.
In the Settings section, next to Answer layout:, click the option labeled Vertical.
Click Save.
Repeat 4-7 as needed.

Thanks to Saul Epstein for this tip.

Assessments with Random Questions

2008-01-23T10:26:00.000-06:00

To create an assessment in Blackboard that randomly selects a number of questions to administer from a larger question pool, you must set up a Question Set. For instance, say you want each student to receive a different set of 20 questions, selected randomly from a pool of 50 questions. You might want to do this in order to make cheating more difficult, or you might want students to use this feature as a self-test option. Either way, the solution is to use a Question Set when you FIRST set up the assessment.

Begin with a blank assessment. Choose Add to Assessment > Question Set. Select the questions you would like to be in the question pool and click Add Selected at the bottom of the screen. Now choose how many questions you want to appear on the test using the Select drop-down box at the top of the screen. Fill in how many points each question will be worth. Scroll down to the bottom of the screen and click on the Update Total button. Be sure that the new total is correct. For instance, in our example you would choose 20 in the Select drop-down box. If you then chose 5 points for each question and clicked Update Total, the new total should be 100 points. If you want to add more questions to the pool later, use the Add Question Alternates button at the bottom of the screen.

If you already have questions in an assessment, you will need to remove them and then add them back using the Question Set feature.

Thanks to Tracy Newman for this tip.

Backing up your Blackboard Course

2008-01-22T15:31:00.000-06:00

Using Blackboard CE, you (the course instructor) can backup each of your courses and save the archive file to your local computer. Should you back up your courses? At JCCC, a full or incremental backup of the Blackboard production database is made daily. if you request it, you can also have your courses backed up daily by contacting the Help Desk with the CRN of each course. Still, many faculty like the assurance of having their own backup, especially if they are about to make major changes or additions to their online course materials or have just completing making changes. If you want the extra "insurance" we recommend that you archive your course before and after you make any major changes as well as at the end of the semester. The backup should then be downloaded to your local machine. Although faculty do not have access to restore a backup to the production server, the JCCC system administrator can do so; this is a precaution so that current student activity is not inadvertently overwritten by a someone restoring a course backup without first considering the effect on current student work and activity.

There is a tutorial movie that covers this process at Creating a Blackboard CE Course Backup Movie. The steps include:

From the Build or Teach tab in your Blackboard CE course select Manage Course.
Select Backup.
To create a new archive, select Back Up Course.
To save the backup as a file, use the ActionLink of the backup and select Save as File.
You will then be asked to choose where to save the file. You may save it in either My Files or Class Files. The default file name will include the full course title, as well as the date and time the backup was created. You may change this filename if you wish, but be sure to leave the file extension .bak at the end.
Once the Save as File action is complete, you should download the file to your computer.
From the Build tab in your course, choose File Manager.
In the File Manager, navigate to the location where you saved the backup file (My Files or Class Files). You will see the backup file that you created.
Use the file’s ActionLink and select the Download option. If prompted whether to Open or Save the file, choose Save to Disk. If prompted, decide where on your computer to save the file, and select Save or OK.

Thanks to Jeff Kosko for this tip.

Viewing Calendar Entries in the Student View

2008-01-17T16:23:00.000-06:00

In the Ed Tech Center (at JCCC) we sometimes hear from faculty that they can’t see any entries in the Calendar tool when using the Student View tab. When viewing the Calendar tool using the Student View tab, be sure the View setting (upper right hand corner of the Calendar screen) displays This Course Only and not Personal Only view. Once you change the setting, click the Go button (looks like a right pointing green arrowhead) to effect the change.

Use the Discussions Tool Topic Description for Your First Posting

2008-01-14T15:29:00.000-06:00

In Blackboard 6, the Discussions tool can include categories (such as Module 1, Module 2, Module 3, or Graded Discussions and Ungraded Discussions). Then under each category, you can create topics that separate the various issues/themes you want your students to discuss (such as “Global Warming” or “I Need Help!” or “Student Lounge” or “War on Terror”). In WebCT 4.1, you could create an initial posting to define the purpose of that area or topic of discussion. Each semester, you’d need to re-enter that initial posting.

With CE 6 you can now use the Topic’s Description (select the ActionLinks icon and then the Edit Properties option) as your initial posting. Then when you copy the course to the next semester, the description is copied and you don’t need to re-enter it each semester.

Microsoft Word's Not a Native Web Format

2008-01-11T05:53:00.000-06:00

While Microsoft Word is ubiquitous, it’s still not a native web format. In other words, it’s not a file format that is opened by a web browser without a plug-in or without having the application on the recipient’s computer. Further, Microsoft Word 2007 files are often misinterpreted by Blackboard (and other applications) as zip (or compressed) files. The moral of the story is when possible use “native” web formats in Learning Modules and elsewhere in Blackboard rather than using Microsoft Word files (.doc or .docx). The best options are to use .html files (web pages) and PDF (portable document format) files. For images use files saved in either the .gif (line art) or .jpeg/.jpg (photographic image) format.

You can convert Microsoft Word files to .html in several ways. The best options are to cut and paste into Blackboard’s HTML Creator tool or to use a product like SoftChalk.

Preparing for the New Semester Blackboard Caveats

2008-01-10T16:54:00.000-06:00

The following caveats may save you some grief as you make final preparations for Spring 2008. Please read on.

If you attempt to copy content into a course shell for the new semester and it fails, don’t bother trying again. Our experience is that once a course shell copy fails, and subsequent attempts will also fail.
JCCC uses Banner integration and we have had problems with incomplete course rosters (failure of the enrollment synchronization process) for cross-listed courses in the past. To assure that you’re not bitten by this “bug” do the following. If you’re teaching a cross-listed course, log-in to MyJCCC (JCCC's Luminus portal), select the My Courses tab and print the roster for each of the cross-listed course sections. Then log-in to Blackboard, locate the cross-listed course on the My Blackboard screen (it should have a non-descript name such as “Cross-Listed Group 999 – Cross-Listed Group.” Enter the course (the link points to the parent course shell that should include all students in all sections of the cross-listed “child” sections of the course). Check that all students on the rosters from MyJCCC are included in the course Grade Book.
Remember, courses cannot be cross-listed after any student activity exists or that activity will be inaccessible.
If you’re using the SafeAssign tool in Blackboard, do not delete the Grade Book column associated with a SafeAssign assignment. If you do, the SafeAssign data for the associated SafeAssign assignment will no longer be accessible to users. Blackboard is working on a fix targeted for late January 2008, but for now, please do not delete columns in the Grade Book associated with SafeAssign.

Using SafeAssign, Blackboard's Plagiarism Prevention Tool

2008-01-03T08:05:00.000-06:00

We’ve had problems using SafeAssign at JCCC since mid-September (e.g., the product was non-functional or exhibited very slow response times). Blackboard has since addressed the problems we’ve encountered and the Plagiarism Prevention “add-on” to Blackboard now appears to be working properly. For more details on SafeAssign, visit http://wiki.safeassign.com/display/SAFE/About+SafeAssign. If you want to try adding a SafeAssignment tool to your course, the following instructions will be useful.

Adding the Blackboard CE6 SafeAssign Tool to a Course

From the Build tab, click on the Add Content Link button on the Course Content Home page.
From the drop-down list select SafeAssign, then click on the Create SafeAssign button.
You then are given a blank window to name your link to the SafeAssign tool, such as "SafeAssign Assignments."
You then click on the Configure button to save the link to your Course Content Home page or Cancel to quit.

Creating SafeAssignment(s) in Blackboard CE6

From the Teach tab, click on the new link to SafeAssign on the Course Content Home page.
Click on the Create SafeAssignment button and fill in the Assignment specific information:
a. Title: such as Writing Assignment 1
b. Description: description of the assignment and optional instructions if needed.
c. Due date: Submissions are accepted after this date
d. Draft: Do you want to allow students to submit drafts. These drafts are not sent to your institution’s search database.
e. Student Viewable: Let students view SafeAssignment reports on their papers only.
f. Urgent Checking: To process urgently or not. There is a normal 2-3 minute or greater response time.
g. Grading: Select numeric or Alphanumeric grading, this will create a column in the Blackboard CE Gradebook.
h. Click Save at the bottom of the page to save this assignment or Cancel to quit.
Repeat Step 2 above for any additional SafeAssignments you wish to create.

How Students Use SafeAssign

The students are told to click on the SafeAssign tool link on the home page to submit their assignments for plagiarism checking.
They select which SafeAssignment they want to submit by clicking on the link to it under the Available Assignments area.
They click on the Browse button and find their paper on their local machine and click Open to upload it.
SafeAssign accepts Microsoft Word (.doc only), TXT, RTF, HTML, and PDF formats only. Word 2007 format documents are not yet supported.
Once submitted they can go back and check the SafeAssign report if you allow them to in Step 2e above.

Thanks to Jeff Kosko and Tracy Newman for composing this tip.

Student View Tab Problems

2008-01-02T08:51:00.000-06:00

JCCC currently has Blackboard CE (Campus Edition) 6.2.2 installed. With this version, there are problems with the Student View tab, which exist when student access to the course has yet to be enabled. By default, unless you request otherwise, all Blackboard hosted online courses are not available to students until the first day of the semester (e.g., January 16, 2008). Therefore, until student access is enabled on January 16th, the following “issues” exist with using the Student View tab. These problems go away when student access is enabled. Blackboard has indicated that these issues are resolved in Service Pack 3 (e.g., CE 6.2.3) which JCCC has access to, but has not tested yet (it was released in late December 2007).

Despite the Release Criteria (selective release) settings for an item (e.g., Learning Module or other course element) items will show up on the Student View tab even though the selective release criteria has not yet been met.
Other schools have reported that the Group Sign up buttons do not appear (the Sign Up for Group column is not present). I do not have access to a course that uses this feature, but we assume this report is accurate since it’s been reported by several other Blackboard schools.
An “unexpected system exception error” will appear if a course has either assignments or assessments and the Assignments and Assessment tools (respectively) are selected from the Student View tab. The problem disappears when the course is made accessible to students.
Calendar entries are not visible on the Student View tab when the course is inaccessible to students. The entries do become visible once student access to the course is enabled.
In the Discussions tool, when the “Students can reply to messages but cannot post messages” setting is selected and you open a message (posted by the instructor) using the Student View tab, the Reply option (button) does not display as long as student access to the course has not been enabled. As soon as the section is open to students, the Reply option is available on both the Student View tab and when a student logs in.
An “unexpected system exception error” will appear when attempting to access the Who’s Online tool from the Student View tab if student access to the course has not yet been enabled. The problem disappears when the course is made accessible to students.
Some tools, e.g., Discussions, Chat and Announcements, display options on the Student View tab that are not visible to true students. For example, the Discussions tool displays options for creating topics and categories as well as the ability to reorder those elements. The Chat tool includes the Create Chat or Whiteboard Room button. The Announcements tool contains the Create Announcement button.

ADA Compliance

2007-12-14T16:25:00.000-06:00

As you work on creating or modifying an online course, be sure your course acknowledges the importance of and compliance with ADA requirements. Here are some suggestions:

Introductory text within the course should indicate your willingness to assist the student and work with campus support services to provide the necessary accommodations to meet the special needs of the student.
The course should include a statement that tells students how to gain access to ADA services (Access Services at JCCC).
The course should provide information on JCCC’s support services (Counseling Center, Library, Help Desk, Access Services, and so on) and provide links and information to enable easy access to institutional resources that provide student support.

Other course design tips are available at http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/search/label/Course%20Design. This tip is based on the Quality REACHE rubric (see http://cite.nwmissouri.edu/QualityReache/).

Online or Network Etiquette

2007-12-13T09:52:00.000-06:00

As you work on creating or modifying an online course, share with your students your expectations regarding online etiquette (netiquette or network etiquette), specifically with regard to discussions and email communication. There are many sites that you can use to learn about netiquette and many that you can link to as an introduction to netiquette for your students. Review the following for background information:

http://web.jccc.edu/edtech/notes/store/30/Netiquette.htm
http://www.albion.com/netiquette/
http://edition.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/07/21/netiquette.tools/

Two links you might want to include in your course for student use are:

http://www.albion.com/netiquette/corerules.html
http://www.studygs.net/netiquette.htm

Other course design tips are available at http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/search/label/Course%20Design. This basic guideline of this tip is derived from the Quality REACHE rubric (see http://cite.nwmissouri.edu/QualityReache/).

Instructor Response and Availability Standards

2007-12-12T08:59:00.000-06:00

As you work on creating or modifying an online course, be sure to share with your students standards for your response and availability. Here are some suggestions:

Share with your students your availability by indicating turn-around times for grading various assessments, assignments and responding to discussion board postings and email messages.
Be sure information on response times and availability is indicated in the course syllabus or a “Read Me First” module so students know what to expect regarding instructor responses and grading.
Indicate for students your availability regarding the degree of participation in discussions (e.g., will you be active, an observer only, or respond only late in the discussion after students have interacted).
Indicate your availability using other media (phone, in-person, online chat), if applicable.

Other course design tips are available at http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/search/label/Course%20Design. This information is derived from the Quality REACHE rubric (see http://cite.nwmissouri.edu/QualityReache/).

Daylight Savings Time in March

2007-12-11T05:47:00.000-06:00

It may seem early to plan for Daylight Savings Time (it doesn't start again until March 9, 2008 in the U.S.) but we've already had a faculty member try to set a due date (for a Spring course) on March 9, 2008. When saved the hour the assignment is due automatically increments by an hour. The last notice from Blackboard indicated they're working on the bug, but no fix yet.

So, if you try to set a time for an event (entry in calendar or assignment or assessment due date) on March 9, Blackboard changes the time to an hour later. Here’s an example: if you type in a time (like 11:00 PM) or use the drop down menu to choose a time, it may appear correct until you save it, then the time is set forward without warning to 12:00 AM (which would be on March 10). As far as we know now, this anomaly only occurs on March 9. If you don’t expect the behavior, you may be frustrated and waste a lot of time trying to figure it out.

The work-around is to simply set the time for the due date an hour earlier than you really want. That’ll work until Blackboard fixes the problem. J

Easy to Understand Grading System

2007-12-11T05:32:00.000-06:00

The course design tips that have been shared over the past several days are all derived from the Quality Matters or Quality REACHE rubric, which has been shared with JCCC faculty enrolled in the iTeach Online Workshop (and its predecessor WebCeTera) since the Fall of 2005 (when we were still using WebCT 4.1). Here’s another “tip.”

As you work on creating or modifying an online course, the Quality REACHE rubric (based on the University of Maryland FISE Grant funded Quality Matters rubric, http://www.qualitymatters.org/Rubric.htm) suggests that a course’s grading policy should be transparent and easy to understand. Such a guideline can be accomplished in several ways:

The grading policy should list all graded course activities (assessments, assignments, projects, group work, discussion postings and other interactivity with other students and the instructor) and should clearly identify the points/overall value of each activity and how it contributes to the final grade.
The grading policy should be established and available to the student at the beginning of the class.
The course should include a rubric that clearly describes what the student needs to do, what each activity, assignment and assessment is “worth,” and how points, grades or percentages earned for each activity equate to a final course grade.

Other course design tips are available at http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/search/label/Course%20Design. The Quality REACHE (QR) rubric and other information about QR is available at http://cite.nwmissouri.edu/QualityReache/.

Are Instructional Materials in an Appropriate Form for Online Access?

2007-12-07T09:48:00.000-06:00

As you work on creating or modifying an online course, the Quality REACHE rubric (based on the University of Maryland FISE Grant funded Quality Matters rubric) suggests that instructional materials should be presented in a format appropriate to the online environment and that all materials should be easily accessible to and usable by the student. Suggested ways in which this recommendation can be approached include:

All instructional materials should be easily accessible and available in alternative formats if not readily viewed by a standard web browser (e.g. current versions of Internet Explorer, Safari, Firefox). If the course uses files (like Microsoft Word or Adobe Acrobat) that are not in a “native web format” (i.e., HTML, JPEG, PNG) then students should be provided with information on how to access the files if they do not already have the necessary programs or plug-ins installed. Suggestion: always provide the content in a file format that can be easily accessed using a web browser.
If course resources (e.g. outside readings, CD/DVD-based content, supplemental web sites) are not housed within the LMS, links to or information on how the student can access the resources should be easy for students to locate within the course.
If software plug-ins are required to access course content, then the plug-ins required should be listed within the course, along with instructions on how to obtain and install them.
Large text files and learning modules should be broken into smaller “chucks” and presented with a table of contents or other navigation system to enable easy access and reference.

Learning Objectives that Are Measurable

2007-12-07T05:30:00.000-06:00

When designing a new online course or modifying an existing one, be sure the learning objectives of the course describe outcomes that are measurable. This is best accomplished using the following guidelines:

First, be sure that you have listed measurable learning objectives in an obvious location (usually they’re identified in the course syllabus and/or at the beginning of each learning module).
Second, be sure to precisely describe what students are to gain from the content/instruction and “what” will guide you in accurately assessing your students’ accomplishments. Appropriate terms should be used such as “identify,” “define,” “develop,” “perform,” “explain” and “select” as opposed to less measurable terms such as “understand,” “appreciate,” “be aware of,” and “know.”
Second, objectives should describe student performance in specific, observable terms. If this is not possible, (e.g., internal cognition, affective changes), there should be other clear indications that the learning objective can be meaningfully assessed.

Helping Students Understand the Structure of Your Course

2007-12-03T06:42:00.000-06:00

As you create or update your online course for the next semester, don’t forget to include a statement that introduces the student to the course and to the structure of the student’ learning activities within the course.

One or more of the following methods may be used to accomplished this goal such as:

Include a course Syllabus, that identifies the types of activities the student will be required to complete (written assignments, online self-tests, participation in the discussion board, group work, etc.).
Include a schedule or calendar that identifies the structure and pace of student learning; e.g., assignment and test due dates, due dates for required discussion postings, if applicable, and so on.
Early in the course clearly indicate if the course is self-paced or follows a schedule of due dates for expected activities and assignments.
Sequence the course so it is clear to the student which tasks are expected first, which are expected in week 1, week 2 and so on.
If there is a linear structure to the course , make it clear. If learning activities can be accomplished in a random order be sure to provide instruction and guidance at key points during the learning process. Either way, be sure the purpose of each activity and any required activity is clearly defined.
Identify the preferred mode of communication with you, the instructor (e.g., email, discussion board, etc.), and the preferred mode of communication with other students (i.e., “I Need Help!,” “Student Lounge” topic in the discussions area, etc.).
Identify testing procedures (e.g., are all assessments online, may assessments be taken under the supervision of a proctor, are some on-campus assessments required, etc.).
Be sure the procedure for submission of electronic assignments is clearly defined and explained.

If you missed the last course design tip, check out “Where to Start” at http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/2007/11/where-to-start.html.

Where to Start

2007-11-29T15:29:00.000-06:00

As you revise your online courses, be sure to include navigational instructions that make the organization of the course easy for your students to understand. Some suggested ways to address this issue:

Be sure your course includes a “welcome” statement that identifies the course, how the student should get started, and which content elements the student should begin reading/viewing. The inclusion of a syllabus link on the “homepage” is seldom sufficient. Provide additional ways (beyond the syllabus) for your students to “orient” themselves to the course on their “first entry” or

Include a “Start Here” button, link or icon that leads the student to a module with introductory information, or a “Getting Started” paragraph tells the student what to do first and offers a course overview or

Provide a “course tour” with a course overview, guide to exploring the course’s web site/course shell, and an indication of what to do first or

Offer a “Scavenger hunt” assignment that leads students through an exploration of the different course tools and an introductory (Read Me First-type) module and

You can always offer a “Read Me First” quiz (worth a few points) that covers the information you think is essential for the new student to know about your course, if they are to succeed.

Java

2007-11-09T08:04:00.000-06:00

Problems still occur when Blackboard users have more than one version of Java installed. The best solution for most Java problems is to be sure only one version is installed. Our testing indicates that Blackboard is now compliant with the newest version of Java, e.g., Java 1.6.0_03. We still recommend to all users of Blackboard that if you have more than one version installed, you remove ALL versions of Java, go to http://www.java.com/ and install the latest.

We also recommend that once you have a single version of Java installed, you turn off the Java auto updates. Sun Java doesn't "update" when a new version is released, instead it installs a completely new version which is how Blackboard users end up with multiple versions installed…which cause various features in Blackboard to malfunction.

If You Need to Uninstall Multiple Versions of Java

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 go to http://www.java.com/ and install the latest version of Java.

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.

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

If Students Report Assignment or Assessment Time Changes

2007-11-08T22:00:00.000-06:00

The following is (partially) old news, but it may impact assignments and assessments submitted recently by your students IF the start date, end date, due date or cutoff date was on Sunday, November 4, 2007 AND you modified the assessment or assignment in any way. Just FYI, from Blackboard Support:

Blackboard has identified an issue which causes the start and end dates of assessments and the due and cutoff dates of assignments to count back one hour each time a Section Designer adjusts any settings in that assessment or assignment. This issue only affects assessments and assignments that have a start, end, due date or cutoff date of Sunday, November 4, 2007. For instance, if the assessment (or assignment) is set to end at 8:03 PM and the Section Designer makes any adjustments resulting in pressing the "save" button, the new end time for the assessment will roll back to 7:03 PM. Saving the same assessment one more time will result in the end time changing again to 6:03 PM. In rare instances, the date may also flip back.

This affects all systems using CE 6.2, CE 6.2.1, CE 6.2.2, Vista 4.2, Vista 4.2.1 and Vista 4.2.2 with a Time Zone setting inside the United States, including Indiana (East). This only affects Sections with an assessment or assignment using the date of November 04, 2007, March 9, 2008, and November 2, 2008 (or any date where the time changes due to DST). Times in March will roll forward one hour with each save. Times in November will roll back one hour with each save. This issue does not affect any other dates.

Blackboard is currently investigating this issue. A fix for this issue will be included in a future release and we hope to have this available prior to March 9, 2008, the next scheduled occurrence of Daylight Savings Time. In the meantime, we suggest that Blackboard system administrators inform their users of this issue and, in the event an assessment or assignment needs to be edited, the user increment the time for the November 04, 2007 element by one hour before saving so that the desired time is reflected when it is saved. If you have further questions or concerns please contact Blackboard Client Support.

Changes After Service Pack 2 installed

2007-10-30T04:34:00.000-06:00

JCCC installed Service Pack 2 recently (Mid-October) and here is a summary of some findings:

The icons on the My Blackboard screen meant to alert the student/faculty member when there is something “new” do not consistently work in Service Pack 2 (SP2). Within the course itself, New Activity icons (the green asterisk) do not consistently identify when new postings appear. For instance, if you copy content from one course shell to another and then check the Discussions and Assignments tools, both with be marked with the New Activity icon even before any students enter the course. In Discussions the icon seems to appear if the instructor has used the topic description even if initial postings have not been entered. The only way to get rid of the New Activity icon is to open each discussion topic (even if nothing is posted) and then click the Teach tab (or Student View tab), which refreshes the screen. The same erroneous New Activity icons appear in the Assignments tool.
Descriptions for the Course Content Home Page icons that use special characters (semi-colons, ampersands, colons and pound signs) now display properly (text following any of the special characters is no longer truncated).
Descriptions for Learning Modules can now include special characters (semi-colons, ampersands, colons and pound signs) in their descriptions and the text displays properly (text following any of the special characters is no longer truncated).
SP2 fixed the problem generated when an instructor/designer accessed the Student View in Blackboard which generated an "unexpected system exception error" if student access to the course had not yet been enabled.
However, when instructors/designers access the Student View, they may see instructor/designer tools and not just student tools and options. Further, the Assignments, Who’s Online and Assessments tools when accessed on the Student View tab, may display an “unexpected system exception error.”
Icon descriptions on the Course Content Home Page (Build tab) when using Internet Explorer are no longer rendered one word per line.

When the Blackboard Assessment Window Freezes

2007-10-25T16:00:00.000-05:00

We’ve had several instances where students have reported that in the middle of taking an assessment, the Assessment tool freezes. When this occurs, the Blackboard screen blanks out or the student clicks the Save button (to save an answer) but the Question Status doesn’t changed to Answered or the assessment just freezes. While we’ve reported this to Blackboard, it’s extremely difficult to replicate. One suggestion is to alert your students that if this behavior occurs, they can right-click in the Assessment window (the window that includes the question on the left and the question status on the right) and then select Refresh from the drop-down menu that appears. This may help so they can complete the assessment.

Campus Edition (CE) 6.2.2 & Office 2007 Files

2007-10-22T07:40:00.000-05:00

Since the introduction of Office 2007, files with x extension (e.g., .docx and so on) are treated as zip files by Blackboard CE. Service Pack 2 for CE 6.2 addressed this problem, but there may be some lingering problems. So please note the following:

If the Office 2007 files were already in your course prior to the upgrade to Service Pack 2, they’re still treated as zip files by Blackboard (they actually are zip files because that’s the new format for Office 2007 files—they’re compressed).
New files uploaded after the installation of Service Pack 2, will show the .docx extension and work fine.
One workaround for downloads (not files that you want to open in Blackboard) is to simply download the Office 2007 file with the zip extension and then rename it with the appropriate x extension: e.g., for a Word document change .zip to .docx.
If you’re trying to open the file within Blackboard (using a link), try this. First in Internet Explorer 7 go to Tools, Internet Options, select the Security tab, with the Internet icon selected select the Custom Level button. Scroll down to the setting that says "Open files based on content, not file extension". If this is set to "enable", then IE7 will treat the Office 2007 files as .zip files (what they really are). If this is set to "disable", then IE will look at the file type extension (like .docx) and do the appropriate action based on the extension (that is, open Word 2007). So, we recommend you set the setting to "disable" and click OK. When prompted “Are you sure you ant to change settings for this zone?” click Yes. Then click OK to close the Internet Options dialog box.
An even better option is to tell your students, if using Office 2007, to save the files they submit in Office 2003 format. When you post documents in your course, do the same thing. That way the file(s) can be opened with either Office 2003 or 2007 installed.

Bugs Reported & Response

2007-10-15T19:44:00.000-05:00

Periodically, we’ll alert you to issues with Blackboard CE and discuss their current status. We do this so you don’t “bang your head against the wall” trying to accomplish a task that is broken.

Problem: Once an announcement is posted, it cannot be edited. The instructor and/or designer can delete and recreate but not edit an existing announcement. Further, there is no control over the order in which announcements are displayed. Many of our faculty members have commented that the listing of announcements should be in reverse chronological order, e.g. most recent announcements at the top of the list and the oldest at the bottom. At minimum, it would be nice to give the instructor the option to select chronological or reverse chronological order.

Blackboard Support Response: This is a known issue which has been reported to our developers. Currently this issue is slated for a Future Release fix. We don't have a set date as to when this issue will be fix, however when a resolution has been made available it will be published in the release notes.

Problem: When creating a WebLink, the Description text box does not allow HTML—unlike the Description boxes in all other tools. Further, you cannot, as an alternative, invoke the HTML Creator.

Blackboard Support Response: I believe the function to add HTML into the description for weblinks was disabled after Vista 3.0.7. There were a few issues with the HTML function in the description field for weblinks. This feature is function as design.

JCCC’s Response: This may be functioning as designed, but it's inconsistent with capabilities in other areas of Blackboard where Description fields may invoke the HTML Creator. Please submit as a feature enhancement. Thank you.

Problem: In previous versions of CE 6, you could click the “New” link next to a topic, view all those new postings in a single window, reply to any of the messages and after posting you'd return to the window with all the new postings displayed. That's no longer the case and it makes it impossible to effectively use this feature, because the minute you reply to any message, the window of new postings closes and you can no longer tell which messages are “new.”

Steps to Replicate:

Enter a course's Discussions tool.
Select a Topic with the New messages displayed.
Click on the New link and the new messages are displayed in a window.
Read through some of the messages and reply to one of the messages (before completing the review of all the messages).
Once you post the reply, a screen appears that offers only an option to close the window (not to return to the window with all the new messages displayed).
You no longer can determine which Discussion postings are unread.

Blackboard Support Response: I have escalated this case up to our developers. Once they provide a resolution timeline, I will update the case notes. If you have any further information or questions, please let me know.

Problem: When a student sends an email message with an attachment and the instructor attempts to save the attachment (file) to their local workstation, the process does not work and a message is displayed that “This page is not intended for display.”

Steps to Replicate:

Go to Mail.
If you don’t have an email with an attachment you can open, send one to yourself
Open the email
Click on the View Attachments link
Select the checkbox in front of the attachment and click on the Save to Folder button
Click on the My Computer icon
Receive error message: “This page is not intended for display.”

Blackboard Support Response: This is a known issue, in which our Developers have identified. It is scheduled to be fixed possibly in the next service pack. Once I've verified the fix release, I'll update the case.

Mail Tool and the Demo Student

2007-09-27T15:55:00.000-05:00

We logged a case with Blackboard and indicated to them that “when sending mail to all students; the demo student does not receive the message.” The response from Blackboard Support was:

“This is actually functioning as designed. To have the mail sent to the Demo student, check the box next to the Demo Student's name so that [the] mail will show up in the Demo Student's [mail] box as well. This is not quite as convenient as simply checking the box for all students, but it does send the mail to the Demo student. Let me know if you need anything else.”

The Difference Between New and Unread Messages

2007-09-26T21:14:00.000-05:00

After reporting problems with the “New” and “Unread” numbers of postings (in Discussions) and messages (in Mail) not reflecting the actual totals of new and unread postings and messages, Blackboard Support responded with the following explanation of the difference between the two concepts in Blackboard. Since it’s “right from the horse’s mouth” I’m repeating their responses verbatim (but with a few grammatical corrections):

This issue has been reported to our developers by a few institutions. According to them the discussion tool is functioning as design[ed]. Here is the explanation on New, Read and UnRead:

New and Unread are different concepts.

"Unread" only is used to indicate there are messages never read before. The number before "unread" represents how many messages have not been read in this thread.

There are two different kind[s] of meaning[s] [for] "New":

#1. "New" after the discussion topic is used to [indicate] if there [were] messages posted after this user accessed this topic last time or not. The number before "new" represent[s] the number of messages posted after this user accessed this topic last time.

#2. "New” after the message subject is used to [indicate] this message has never been read before.

The number of "unread" messages under the topic does not have to [be] equal to the number of "new" (#1 [above]) messages for this topic because it is possible and reasonable for [the] user to read the messages which they have interest in only and leave some messages unread, [so for] this topic for him/her, it is not "new" any more.

In other words, “New” refers to new messages or postings and any posting or message can be “New” only once. If you fail to read a “New” message, it is not “New” the next time you access the thread but may still be “Unread.”

SoftChalk and Setting Column Widths

2007-09-21T21:08:00.000-05:00

If you use SoftChalk LessonBuilder to create Learning Modules, you may find that including tables enables you to better layout data (place text and images). By default, when you create a new table the column widths are uniform in width. You can modify column widths (to create varying width columns) in 4 easy steps.

To set the width of a table column:

Click anywhere in the column,
Select the Table command on the menu bar,
Roll over the Column option, and
Choose the Set column width option.

Keep in mind that only the most recent version of SoftChalk (Version 3.03.07) has this option. If you don’t see it, open SoftChalk and if your computer has Internet access, the application will automatically upgrade itself.

Printing from a SoftChalk-created Learning Module Page

2007-09-12T22:26:00.000-05:00

Faculty members using SoftChalk to create Learning Modules for use in Blackboard have found that when the student uses the Blackboard Learning Module Print function, the top of each printed page repeats the table of contents (TOC). Here’s the response from SoftChalk regarding this problem.

"What is happening is that when you print a page using the WebCT/Blackboard print function, Blackboard is just grabbing the "text" of the html page. When you created your lesson pages, you included the page navigation at the top of the page and the "drop-down" Table of Contents link in the sidebar. Normally when the student views the page, this information is formatted as the navigation bar across the top of the page and also as the drop-down TOC link in the sidebar. The navigation bar displays as it does because of the CSS (Cascading Style Sheet) that is "behind-the-scenes". But when WebCT/Blackboard displays the page for printing, it doesn't reference the CSS, so all of the text for the navigation bar and the TOC sidebar link appear as a list of items at the top of each printed page.

"You could easily get rid of the TOC appearing on the printed page by just removing the TOC drop-down link in the sidebar of your lesson. You will have to decide if it is more important to have the TOC as a drop-down link in the sidebar, or have the TOC info print when the student uses the Blackboard print function.

"In our next version of LessonBuilder, we plan to include a new "print all pages" option that will appear on each lesson page. Then, your student could click that link and it would print all of the lesson pages with the correct formatting. But until then, I would suggest that you might want to remove the sidebar TOC drop-down menu."

The Uploading Multiple Files Bug

2007-09-11T19:54:00.000-05:00

Faculty members have reported a bug that does not enable the Get Files button (in the File Manager) to upload and overwrite multiple files in one action. The radio button that normally would appear to enable you to “replace the existing file” is not displayed and a “Null” option appears instead.

Blackboard Support have indicated that “This is a known issue. Our developers are working on a fix for this issue, which will be due out sometime in November possibly.”

In the meantime, you can still upload and overwrite files, but must do so one file at a time.

Fixes in Service Pack 1

2007-09-11T15:27:00.000-05:00

Blackboard’s Service Pack 1 (SP1), which was installed on JCCC’s production server (according to Blackboard) “resolves several Assignment (tool) related issues and lists 33 issues in total on the resolve(d) issues report.”

The following issues specifically related to the Assignments tool were resolved in SP1 and these situations should no longer occur:

An Instructor would receive an error when trying to access an Assignment Dropbox in which Assignments had been deleted or a Dropbox for a course in which a student, who had submitted assignments, had them graded.
There are no longer exception errors occurring when attempting to create or edit the Cutoff Date for an Assignment or when leaving blank the Cutoff Date for an assignment.
If un-enrolling a user and then re-enrolling the same user, the data previously entered, such as grades, are retained as well as the Assignments (which prior to the upgrade were marked as Missing Attachments). Further previous Comments are now displayed.
When the Instructor goes to the Assignment Dropbox, selects the All tab, and tries to sort the list by the "Assigned to" column, it will now sort “the list properly.” For example, clicking the “Assigned to” link in the Assignment Dropbox does now sort the Student list in alphabetical order. Note: testing at JCCC has found that the sort does now work, but it’s in alphabetical order by the first name not the last name. So it still is not useful or efficient for the instructor. We’ve reported this as a new bug.
If an Assignment has already been created and marked gradable (numeric), if the Instructor or Designer attempts to change the Setting to Grading Form, that is now an option (we have not yet tested this at JCCC but it’s indicated as a fix in the Blackboard docs).
Students are now able to attach files with ampersands (&) in the filename to an assignment submission. Previously, If they tried the action would not complete and an exception error was displayed.

Additional bug fixes in SP1 include:

Accessing a student Assessment Submission for an Assessment with calculated questions no longer generates an exception error.
Students who have been un-enrolled from a cross-listed Child Section of a Course, but not from the Parent Section, or who have been un-enrolled from both, but not from a Group within the Parent Section, were unable to view their Courses on the My Blackboard page.
When the Course Menu is expanded or collapsed, most icons displayed a pop-up label of "course tool" rather than the tool name (e.g. “Mail”). This was problematic for students using JAWS or other assistive technology. Further, it made it hard for all users when the menu was collapsed to determine which icon represented which tool. (reported by JCCC).
The newest version of Java (JRE 1.6.0_01) was not supported properly by the browser checker; therefore, there were multiple warnings throughout the Blackboard when attempting to login or when attempting to use Blackboard Java applets.
When using the newest version of Java (JRE 1.6.0_01), when accessing the Chat tool a message indicated that the user could start a second Chat Session, even though the user had not yet started a Chat session.
Following a SP2/HF1 upgrade (to CE 6.2 hotfix 1), invitations to Chat were not received. On loading the chat applet, the participant list was empty and messages were not processed.
With Java 1.5.0_07 installed or higher, on a hyper-threaded machine, attempting to use the My Computer applet to upload a file using the Content Manager resulted in a system lock up.
After selecting the Reviews icon to view a peer's review, the student was able to see the reviewers' username even when peer reviews for a Journal type Discussion topic were supposed to be anonymous.
When using Grading forms, if the comments exceeded 1000 characters an exception error was displayed.
With Internet Explorer 6 and 7, and Java 1.6.0_01, in a Discussion forum and when using the Content Manager, it was not possible to upload files using the My Computer applet.
After updating from CE 4.1 to CE 6.0, the glossary terms no longer would hold apostrophes.
Learning Modules containing the character # in the title or filename did not display on the Teach and Student View tabs.
If the sender had mail forwarding turned Off in the My Tools tab options (accessed from the My Blackboard by selecting the Settings link), the email would not be forwarded to the recipient's email address regardless of whether the recipient had mail forwarding set to on/off. If the sender had mail forwarding turned On using the My Tools tab options, the email would be able to forward to the recipient's email address regardless of whether the recipient had mail forwarding set to On or Off.
After upgrading to Application Pack 1, Service Pack 1 (CE 6.1.1), there were performance problems. It would often take 20-30 seconds to load a page. This would occur for users in courses that had a high number of Groups and Assignments.
When using Internet Explorer 7, the Open in WebDAV Folder feature did not work.

We have tested only some of these bug fixes at JCCC.

Returned Email from Blackboard

2007-09-05T06:25:00.000-05:00

In Blackboard, an instructor or student can have mail (received using the Mail tool) automatically forwarded to an external email client, such as Hotmail, gMail or Outlook. The net result is that when a message is received by the student or instructor (in Blackboard), a copy of the message is sent to the external email client’s inbox. This is a helpful way for the student or instructor to be alerted that a new message is waiting inside Blackboard. The copy sent to the external mail client includes the complete text of the message, so you can even read the message before logging into Blackboard.

The problem occurs, when you try to reply to the message using Outlook (or any external mail client). If you try, you’ll receive a returned mail message from Blackboard. This is functioning as designed. Blackboard allows for email to be forwarded externally but does not allow for external email to enter the Blackboard Mail system. As email is forwarded from the system it is stamped with a generic reply address from the Blackboard server. Attempts to reply to this generic address will result in a bounced email message. Blackboard’s Mail tool is completely self-contained. To send a message to any recipient in Blackboard, you must log into Blackboard and use the Mail tool.

To autoforward your email from Blackboard to an external mail client, complete these steps:

Log into Blackboard.
On the My Blackboard screen select the My Settings link (upper right corner of the screen).
Select the Edit Profile button (bottom left of screen).
In the E-mail field type the email address to which you want your Blackboard mail forwarded.
Next select the My Tools Option tab (top of the screen).
Scroll down under the Mail heading and select the checkbox in front of the Forward all mail messages to the e-mail address in my profile option.
Click the Save button at the bottom of the screen and you’re all set.

Files that Won't Open and Pop-up Blockers

2007-09-04T06:07:00.000-05:00

Have you encountered a file in Blackboard that won’t open? If so, check for a pop-up blocker that’s preventing access to the file or for Internet Explorer’s yellow bar at the top of the screen (which indicates the window has been blocked). Typically, if you have speakers and the sound is not muted, you’ll hear a beep when your computer encounters these situations.

For more on pop-up blockers, check out:

Trusting pop-ups in Blackboard at http://web.jccc.edu/edtech/notes/get.asp?DocumentID=126 (either a PDF or Flash version),
Popup Blocking in IE (Internet Explorer) at http://www.jccc.net/home/download/9644/popup-blocking-ie.swf (Flash movie) and
Allowing pop-up windows for JCCC web applications (Word Document) at http://www.jccc.net/home/download/9643/pop-up-blocking.doc.

Accessing Microsoft Office 2007 Files

2007-09-01T21:36:00.000-05:00

In case you missed the earlier posting on Microsoft Office 2007 files and how to access them (if you’re using Office 2003), check out:
http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/2007/02/opening-office-2007-files-from-students.html

Blackboard Client Support Services shared the following information recently on a WebCT user list:

“In Microsoft Office 2007, Microsoft added new Open XML formats to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007. Files that are created in the Open XML format are not readable by earlier versions of Microsoft Office (such as Microsoft Office 2003, or Microsoft Office 2000). In order to view and manage files created by Microsoft Office 2007 you will need to install the following compatibility pack. This download will enable users on earlier versions of Microsoft Office to open, edit, save, and create files in the new Open XML format.

“The download is available on the Microsoft website and it can be found here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=941b3470-3ae9-4aee-8f43-c6bb74cd1466&DisplayLang=en

“Microsoft has created a knowledge base article that discusses required updates, issues that may be encountered, and changes that are made to the Office programs when the compatibility pack has the installation is complete. The article can be viewed here: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/924074

Resetting an Assessment for a Student

2007-08-30T22:25:00.000-05:00

If you need to reset an assessment for a student (for whatever reason), here are the steps to follow:

Open the course, go to the Teach tab and select the Assessment Manager tool.
Select the Not Submitted tab or All tab (not the Graded or Not Graded tab).
Select the assessment link you want to reset.
Scroll down to find the student’s name.
Click the ActionLink that follows the name and from the pop-up menu select the Reset Entire Submission option.
When prompted to “Reset this submission?” click OK. Your student can now re-take the assessment (so long as it is still during the time period when students have access to the assessment—based on settings you established for the test).

Copyright Notices

2007-08-30T22:20:00.000-05:00

Just a reminder that you should include a copyright notice in your online course somewhere if you are using any copyright materials. The following language may be used. It is borrowed from the University of North Carolina site on the TEACH Act at http://www.lib.ncsu.edu/scc/legislative/teachkit/notice.html.

“The materials on this course web site are only for the use of students enrolled in this course for purposes associated with this course and may not be retained or further disseminated.”

Michael Robertson (JCCC's DL Mentor) suggested an easy way to add the statement to your Course Content Home page as a footer. If you wish to do this:

Open up the course and click on the Build tab.
Select the Page Options button in the upper-right of the course content area.
Click the pull-down menu and select Edit Footer.
In the html edit box paste the following:
“The materials on this course web site are only for the use of students enrolled in this course for purposes associated with this course and may not be retained or further disseminated.”
Then click the Save button.

Further, anytime you use a copyright work (after seeking permission, based on fair use or the TEACH Act), be sure to include a copyright notice following the format:

Copyright © 2007 by Harry Potter Rowling. Used by permission, all rights reserved.

Media Files and SSL

2007-08-28T06:18:00.000-05:00

In an earlier posting, we mentioned that for security reasons, we have turned on the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) which prevents Windows Media Player from playing some types of media files (MPEG primarily) that are embedded in Blackboard. This problem was discovered after our initial switch to Blackboard CE 6 over 2 years ago. We reported the problem to Blackboard but it’s really an issue that Microsoft must address and we doubt there’ll be a solution anytime soon.

The only work around techniques available at present include:

Have your students download, install and use Apple’s QuickTime rather than Windows Media Player for playback or
Include instructions for the student to right-mouse click and download the video to their desktop and then play it from there.

Some Work Around Techniques You Should Know

2007-08-27T06:14:00.000-05:00

Hiding Courses
You can hide courses you do not want shown on your My Blackboard screen. To do so:

Log into Blackboard and on the My Blackboard screen select the Edit Course List icon (looks like a pencil in the upper right corner of the Course List panel).
Find the course name (see note below) and click the Hide Link button that follows the name. If you want to hide several courses at once, select the checkbox that precedes each course name, scroll to the bottom of the screen and click the Hide button.
When finished, click the My Blackboard tab to refresh back to your My Blackboard screen.

Note: as you search for the course(s) you want to hide, you’ll see that the course names are truncated at about 30 characters. Move your mouse pointer over a title, let it rest there and you’ll see the entire course name displayed. For some additional notes about why your course listing may not be in alphabetical order, check out http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/2007/05/when-my-blackboard-courses-are-not-in.html.

Grade Book Columns
By default every Grade Book in Blackboard includes two columns that cannot be deleted: Midterm and Final. So don’t waste energy trying to remove them.

Calendar Entries
You can create three types of calendar entries: Personal, Private and Public. Private calendar entries cannot be copied from one course to another. Personal and Public entries can be copied. If you want to make notes to yourself about activities you need to perform at specific times during each semester and you want to copy them to a new semester, make the entries Personal and not Private.

Once you copy content to a new course shell (including calendar entries) you can use the Manage Course --> Date Rollover feature to adjust calendar entries from the old dates (probably last semester’s dates if you’re copying content from the previous semester) to dates appropriate for this semester’s course. However, this feature only adjusts dates that are linked to assessments and assignments. It does not adjust dates that are used in selective release or stand alone dates in your Calendar.

By the way, the Date Rollover really works best if you first CLEAR all calendar entries except one semester’s worth, e.g. you only have last semester’s dates in the course shell when you rollover dates to the new semester. You do have an option to clear a range of dates from your Calendar (go to the Calendar tool, select the Delete a Range button and set the range you want to delete).

You can adjust those dates manually using the Adjust Individual Dates button, which is available once you select the Manage Course --> Date Rollover feature.

For additional “strange calendar behaviors” check out http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/2007/08/strange-calendar-behaviors.html.

Learning Modules, Folders, and Course Design

2007-08-22T11:35:00.000-05:00

The heart of any online course is the content and the interaction between students and their instructor. We’ve frequently found cases where the layout and design of the course make it more difficult for the student to learn and the instructor to manage, so here are a few suggestions.

The Learning Module tool is the most efficient way to deliver most content. If you create folders on the Course Content Home page (rather than using the Learning Module tool) you may encounter more potential problems (bugs) while managing the course and your students don’t have the benefit of the built-in navigation available when you use a Learning Module.
Never have more than 6-8 icons on your Course Content Home Page, it adds confusion for the student (they will be overwhelmed by choices) plus it will require the student to scroll to see all the icons. Using folders rather than Learning Modules probably will force you to exceed this limit, so try use the Learning Module tool instead.
Whether you choose to use folders on the Course Content Home page or Learning Modules, you REALLY should set up a folder structure (under Class Files) where all files associated each learning Module (or home page folder) are in a separate file folder. Organizing content by module, chapter or week into separate folders means you’ll be able to find and update files easier. You should never leave all files for the entire course in a single folder.

Strange Calendar Behaviors

2007-08-14T05:16:00.000-05:00

Please be aware of the following changes in behavior in the Calendar tool subsequent to the upgrade to CE 6.2.1 (App Pak 2 with Hotfix 1 applied):

It’s common to copy a course from a previous course shell and then want to move the calendar entries to new dates in the new course. When you change the date for a Calendar entry (by simply modifying the date), the screen refreshes and brings you back to "today's date" (such as the 14th if today's the 14th of August) but in the month from which you came (e.g. the original month in which the date occurred before you edited it), but not on the specific date of the original entry you edited. So, if you’ve got three items on January 18th and you want to move them to August 16th (and today is August 14th), each time you change the date of an item on January 18th Blackboard “leaves“ you back on January 14, rather than on the 18th. If you’re moving an item from February 20 to September 25th, after the change you’ll end up on February 14th.
Some faculty have reported not being able to edit calendar entries after a course copy. No underlying cause has been found yet.
New Calendar entries default to today’s date no matter what you do. If you move to a date in November and try to add a Calendar entry on November 2nd, the default date will be today’s date, not the date you selected in November. You can change it each time, but there’s no sense in navigating to the new month and date, since you’ll need to set the date each time you add an entry.
If you try to set a time for an event (entry in calendar or assignment or assessment due date) after 10:59 PM on November 4, Blackboard changes the time to an hour earlier. This is the date that Daylight Savings time ends in the Fall of 2007. If you type in a time (like 11:00 PM) or use the drop down menu to choose a time, it may appear correct until you save it, then the time is set back without warning to 10:00 PM. This anomaly only occurs on November 4. If you don’t expect this, you can be frustrated and waste a lot of time trying to figure it out.
If you create calendar entries (not linked to anything like an assessment or assignment) and copy the course to a new course shell, Public entries and Personal entries will copy to the new course shell. Private entries do not copy over. They are not visible even if the “This Course + Personal” view is selected.

Blackboard CE 6.2 Bug Report

2007-08-07T22:11:00.000-05:00

(Updated 8/12/2007) In an effort to alert faculty to potential problems as they prepare for the Fall 2007 semester, here’s a list of bugs we’ve encountered with Blackboard after the upgrade to CE 6.2:

When using the “&” character as a folder description or in the description of an icon (e.g. using the Edit Properties option from the icon’s ActionLinks) the “&” disappears and (sometimes) all characters following the “&.” Blackboard is aware of this problem. A similar problem occurs when including the “#” sign, semi-colon and colon. This “bug” can cause items to disappear, such as a folder or icon description, an icon. a Learning Modules or pages within a Learning Module.
At least one faculty member has reported problems with double quotes so that “quoted materials” appears as â€œquoted materialsâ€?
Faculty members are reporting “Unexpected system exception errors” whenever they try to access the Student View tab. We now believe this is related to courses being set as inaccessible to students until the first day of classes (August 16). When the release date has not yet arrived, the Student View generates an unexpected system exception error. When the release date has passed, no error is generated. This situation did not occur with earlier versions of Blackboard CE 6.
For JCCC faculty, if you need to see the student view for your classes (using the Student View tab) prior to Blackboard fixing the System Exception Error problem, here’s the only work-around that comes to mind. Go into your course and hide all menu items (Build tab, Manage Course and then select Course Menu). Next hide all icons (use the Hide option on the ActionLinks icon) on your course ‘s Home Page. When finished, email the Help Desk and ask them to open your course to student access. This way you can use the Student View tab, your student cannot see the hidden materials, and you can also add a page header to the course’s Home Page with a message to your students (to do so go to Build Tab, select Page Options and then Edit Header).
We have three instances where course content will not copy. Cause still unknown.
For security reasons, we needed to turn on the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) which after initial testing appears to prevent the Windows Media Player from playing MPEG files (and some other media files) embedded in Blackboard. This problem was discovered after our initial switch to Bb CE 6 over 2 years ago, so at that time we turned SSL off. However, for security and copyright (Fair Use) reasons, SSL must be turned “on.” We’re working on a work-around.
On the Build Tab you may find that icon or folder descriptions are displayed one word per line. The text displays properly on the Teach tab. This is a new bug with CE 6.2 that was not present in CE 6.1.1. We have reported it to Blackboard (Bb) support. Our testing seems to confirm that the student will see the description with proper formatting.
JCCC staff in the Academic Technology Support (ATS) group had set student access dates for each course section-by-section prior to the upgrade to CE 6.2. However, with the upgrade, Blackboard retained the section-by-section settings and then added a new “term” related setting that superseded them. The new CE 6.2 “term feature” establishes dates for each term and those dates (by default) over-ride the section start and end dates. While Bb announced the “support” for terms (which still does not display on the My Blackboard screen, where it’s needed), only upon careful reading of the admin manual did ATS discover that "term support" means the start and end dates for the term effects all sections of all courses in that term. ATS has since set the system to default back to access dates based on each section rather than the term settings. This correction (at JCCC) was made at 6:41 PM on Friday, August 3, so you may have students who accessed your course between the upgrade on August 1st and the correction on the 3rd. If you reset your course materials (assessments or assignments) and eliminate student activity, be sure to advise your students, otherwise you may have students who completed work between August 1-3, 2007 and now wonder why that work has disappeared and doesn’t count.
After the upgrade to CE 6.2 hotfix 1, the Blackboard Server had to be rebooted daily. Background jobs (indexing, garbage collection, and so on) were writing error logs to the server and filling up disk space to the point where response time came to a standstill. There are six background jobs that are run by the Blackboard system and four of them are new with the App Pak 2/Hotfix 1 upgrade. Since we did not have this problem before the upgrade, we assumed one or more of the four new background jobs were causing the problem. These new jobs we set to kick off automatically at Midnight, so ATS shut down the Blackboard server every evening around 1 AM and then restarting it, to avoid the slowdown caused by the buildup of log files. Ultimately, we discovered that by staggering the start times of the jobs, the problem appears to be fixed.
There are some strange behaviors taking place when entering new Calendar entries. We’re receiving reports from faculty on the following:

a. After entering a new calendar entry, the screen refreshes and brings you back to the first day of the month from which you came, but NOT on the specific date from which you came. So, if you’ve got three items on January 18th to move to August 16th, each time you change the date of an item on January 18th Blackboard “leaves“ you back on January 1, rather than the 18th. If you’re moving an item from February 20 to September, after the change you’ll end up on February 1.

b. Some faculty members have reported not being able to edit calendar entries after a course copy.

What is WebDAV?

2007-07-30T08:34:00.000-05:00

In essence: WebDAV stands for "Web-based Distributed Authoring and Versioning". It is a set of extensions to the HTTP protocol which allows users to collaboratively edit and manage files on remote web servers. " (from http://www.webdav.org/)

What that means is you can create a "network folder" on your Windows or Macintosh desktop that points to the file storage area for your Blackboard CE courses. This area is accessed using the File Manager or Content Manager. With a WebDAV-enabled folder, you can drag-n-drop mulitple files and folders between your computer and the Blackboard My Files or Class Files storage space without having to zip up all your files into one big file as was required with older versions of WebCT.

If using Dreamweaver 9, part of Adobe Creative Suite 3 (CS3), WebDAV no longer works automatically with Blackboard CE 6. However, Adobe has provided a fix, you just need to download and install it. The staff of the Ed Tech Center have verified that it works. For information check out Adobe’s site at http://www.adobe.com/go/kb402079

For additional information on WebDAV, check out Blackboard CE 6’s online help and the Wikipedia entry at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WebDAV

Space Usage and File Uploads

2007-07-10T22:10:00.000-05:00

Based on usage and capacity, JCCC has set the upper limit for file storage space on the Blackboard server. For Blackboard designers/instructors at JCCC the limit is set at 2 gigabytes. For students the limit is set at 200 megabytes.

If you attempt to upload a file and the upload fails, students and instructors can log-in to Blackboard CE (https://owa.jccc.edu/exchweb/bin/redir.asp?URL=http://online.jccc.edu), select the Content Manager tab on the My Blackboard screen, and then check the "Space Usage" progress bar in the upper right-hand corner of the screen.

If your screen shows you at 100%, it’s time to clean house. These settings can be increased, of course, but they're set to assure that the combined total of all users does not exceed the maximum storage space on the Blackboard server.

Current List of Blackboard CE 6.1.1 Bugs

2007-06-08T09:51:00.000-05:00

Periodically I try to alert you to problems we’ve encountered with Blackboard CE so you’ll know it’s the system and not user error. This list is not complete but at least covers most of the more common and problematic issues we have open with Blackboard Support. By the way, for JCCC faculty members, if you have major issues not listed here, please alert your Ed Tech Center Designer.

We have experienced:

Cases where course content from one semester fails to copy successfully to the next semester’s course shell.
Unexpected System Exception errors that occur for a variety of reasons (opening a course, switching between tabs, and so on), none of which are clearly indicated in the server logs or displayed on the screen for the user’s benefit.
Problems for end users with:
a. multiple versions of Java installed,
b. recent versions of Java installed (you should be using version 1.5 with updates 6 or 7 installed, but not Java 1.6)
c. Internet Explorer 7 or latest version of Mac Safari installed
d. Windows Vista installed.
Search tool failures with incorrect or no results reported.
Failure of the Banner XML file to import Summer Non-Credit Courses.
Failure of the garbage collection routines to work so the database gets more and more bloated, which we believe contributes to slower access times.
Failure of the Media Library/Glossary tool if a single image is attached to an entry in one of the tool’s collections.
Crash with an exception error if a Learning Module has more than 20 headings or entries included.
Lose of embedded images in assessments when the assessment is exported and then imported into another course shell.
Calendar tool entries entered by an instructor for a specific course being displayed as institutional entries in all courses; which is very confusing for students.
A limit on the number of characters allowed (1333) when an instructor grades and adds comments to an assignment.
Failure of the mail forwarding feature to work when a student or an instructor wants email received in Blackboard CE to be forwarded to their external email accounts.
Confusion when the Submitted and Not Submitted tabs in the Assignment tool show the reverse information.
WebLinks that do not import when a Learning Module is exported and then imported into another course shell.
Course names that are truncated (so as to be indecipherable) or are not in alphabetical order throughout the application (e.g. when setting calendar dates, publishing content from Respondus, importing or copying content from another course and when setting the order of courses displayed or hidden on the My Blackboard screen).
No ability for the instructor to edit Assignment Drop Box comments posted for students after they are posted.

We know there are many more bugs, we currently have about 70 cases open with Blackboard support, but these seem to be the major items that effect students and instructors.

Preparing for Change

2007-06-04T08:23:00.000-05:00

If you’re concerned about the possibility of a change in your LMS (from one version to the next or from one vendor to another), here's what I would suggest. As you create or modify your course materials, use SoftChalk (content pages, inline quizzes, pop-up glossary/definitions, sidebars, crossword puzzles and more), Respondus (assessments), or StudyMate (educational games). Each of these applications enable you to easily import content into any of the more common LMS products.

As an example, SoftChalk is an easy to use web page authoring system (operates very much like Microsoft Word). It enables you to "package" content (e.g. multiple web/html pages) which can then be imported into Blackboard CE or Angel or Desire2Learn. Once imported, you can unzip the packages file and organize the pages to offer course content. SoftChalk enables you to add features to a web page that you normally could not include without programming skills. SoftChalk requires no programming skills.

There's online training available for SoftChalk (http://www.softchalk.com/lb_demo.html) and JCCC has a site license which enables our faculty to install the software on any home or office computer as long as you're employed by the college (available at https://acsdb.jccc.net/softwaretracker/ with your JCCC log-in, the same site that gives JCCC faculty access to Respondus and StudyMate). Further, your ETC Designer (JCCC faculty members only) can assist you as needed.

So, if you’re concerned about LMS changes in the future, move your content to SoftChalk, Respondus and StudyMate. You’ll be able to easily improve the design of your course materials and prepare for any eventuality.

Course Specific Calendar Entries Showing Up as Institutional Entries

2007-06-02T05:46:00.000-05:00

As some faculty members add course specific Calendar entries in Blackboard CE 6.1.1, those entries are showing up as institutional entries that appear on everyone’s Calendar. According to Blackboard Support, the fix for this problem is in Application Pack 2 (CE 6.2), which has not been released so it has not been tested yet by JCCC’s technical support staff. Until the fix is released and tested, we’ll need to periodically run a script provided by Blackboard that deletes these "fake" institutional entries, but the actual cure won’t be in place until Fall semester (at the earliest) when we install AP 2.

If you see institutional entries that are confusing to your students (JCCC issues no institutional entries at this point), let me know and we’ll schedule the script to be run again to clear those entries.

Calendar Entry Bug

2007-06-01T15:03:00.000-05:00

If you open the Calendar tool, change the month to June, click on any date in June, then click on Add Entry, the "Start Date" defaults to that particular numeric day, but the month is set to July, not June. The strange part is if you go to any other month, say September and try to make an entry for that month, the default date shows up correctly.

Also if you're on a day of the month that the next month doesn't include (i.e. January 30, 31; March 31; May 31; and so on) and you go to the next month, it will skip ahead to the next month that includes that numeric date.

It’s a known bug and has been reported by other schools to Blackboard.

Deleted Students Break Grade Book & Assignment Drop Box

2007-05-19T09:41:00.000-05:00

Simon Fraser University reports: “If a student who had an assignment submission is un-enrolled from a section, then the Assignment Dropbox will produce an Exception error. Re-enrolling the student and denying access should temporarily resolve this until Blackboard provides a fix.”

Note that the following information has been reported regarding Blackboard Vista 4.1.1 which has the same code base as Blackboard CE 6.1.1 which we use at JCCC.

The following information is a response from Blackboard Support: “The confusing part [of this bug report] is that an instructor won't necessarily know what has caused the problem (individual user unenrollment or group deletion) - they will just know that they can't access the Assignment Dropbox.”

“Back in March [Blackboard Support] put out a “Known Issues from the Field” update regarding the issue [e.g. a student has submitted assignment data in a section, is subsequently unenrolled from that section, and then receives an Exception error]. [Recently] a new Support Bulletin giving a brief explanation of [a] second issue [was released]: If a group is created using Group Manager, and the group submits a group assignment, and the group is then deleted, it will break the entire Assignment Dropbox (for both students and instructors)."

“The problem is slightly bigger than this. If the instructor goes to try to access the assignment in the Grade Book they should also get an Exception error there as well, although it is far less likely for the instructor to try to access the assignment via the Grade Book than the Assignment Dropbox. So this aspect has not been as highly reported.”

“We know this is a big problem and are currently pushing to get this included in an upcoming release (can't make any promises, of course). We keep an informal list of our highest priority issues within development and this is one of them. As soon as I have an update, even if it's a workaround or a script, I'll be sure to let everyone know.”

This bug should be very rare at JCCC because with Banner integration, students who drop a course after the semester starts are marked as access denied not unenrolled. I’m sharing it with you to assure that we don’t act on any faculty requests to remove students from a course.

When My Blackboard Courses Are Not in Alpha Order

2007-05-19T09:36:00.000-05:00

Here’s a problem you may encounter using Blackboard CE 6.1.1 and the explanation. First, JCCC’s installation of Blackboard operates in an integrated environment with SunGard Banner and Luminus.

When we initially import all courses into Blackboard from an XML export from SunGard Banner (as occurrs for each new semester), the courses are initially listed in alphabetical order on the My Blackboard screen. However, as new courses are added in Banner and those transactions are sent to Blackboard; new course shells are added to the appropriate instructor’s My Blackboard screen. Those new additions are then appended to the end of the list...not in the alpha sequence. We reported this problem to Blackboard and their response was:

“[The courses] are not in alphabetical order because you are allowing students to order the courses how they want to. I tested switching this [setting] to false and the courses go back [in]to alphabetical order.”

In essence, if you enable the ability to Hide courses on the My Blackboard screen (this is a server wide setting), that feature is coupled with the ability to enable the user to reorder courses on the My Blackboard screen. In Blackboard’s “eyes” the two are linked.

We’ve submitted a feature enhancement request that students and faculty be enabled to hide courses but still automatically order the courses on the My Blackboard screen in alpha order.

In the meantime, here is a work-around: Once you select the pencil icon in the upper right corner of the My Blackboard screen (which displays the screen where you can hide and re-order courses in your list), you can scroll to the bottom of the page and locate a "Restore Default" button. If you select that button, Blackboard will automatically re-sort the entire list into alphabetical order. The new additions added at the bottom will show up in proper alphabetical order again.

However, using the “Restore Default” button also causes any hidden courses to become unhidden. If the user wishes to hide them again, they must repeat the "hide" process, but at least all courses are again in alpha order.

Beware of Deleting Your Attachments to an Assignment

2007-05-03T18:28:00.000-05:00

Recently an instructor accidentally deleted an attachment from an assignment in Blackboard by clicking the little icon next to the attachment. She thought it was an ActionLink icon. That icon deletes the attachment without a confirmation box. We’ve duplicated the event. Worse, in this case the instructor did not have a copy of the file anywhere else. She assumed a copy was put into her Class Files area (accessible using the File Manager), but that is not the case (We confirmed that as well).

We’ve requested that assignment attachments be placed automatically in the Class Files area and that a warning with an exit option appear before the attachment is permanently deleted. Blackboard considers this a “feature enhancement” so we’ll need to wait on a future release, if they decide to include these changes. In the meantime, be forewarned! Keep a backup of all attachments you use in assignments.

Blackboard Bug Update: Broken Discussions Tool Navigation in a Course

2007-04-18T09:47:00.000-05:00

We reported to Blackboard support a course with broken navigation in the Discussions tool on February 20, 2006. The symptoms were that students could not access the navigation required within the Discussions (either from course content links or from the course content menu) in order to select a topic or open a discussions thread. The instructor or designer could navigate using the Build and Teach tabs. Many of the Discussion topics had date criteria set, but within the date range the topics were still not accessible.

As of yesterday (April 17, 2007), Blackboard Support indicated that there is data corruption within the selective release in this course shell. They indicated the specific topic to open and delete all Date Range criteria. When selecting Selective Release, there appeared to be two identical date range entries. When both were deleted, the course functioned properly.

When asked what caused the problem and how to avoid it, Blackboard Support indicated: “This is another issue in the code. A CR was opened to change the code to prevent the issue from occurring. Unfortunately, there is no way to avoid this from an end user perspective.”

How To Cross-Listed Course Shells

2007-04-16T09:43:00.000-05:00

Blackboard CE includes a cross-listing feature where content and student activity from two or more course shells can be combined. Once a course is cross-listed, for all practical purposes, the individual course shells are not used and in essence cease to exist for the student and instructor. You should only cross-list courses when you want them to be treated as a single section.

Cautions
Just a few cautions about cross-listing courses:

You cannot cross-list a course once student activity has occurred in the course shell.
You cannot un-cross-list a course once it has been cross-listed without serious problems as far as content and student activity.
You’ll want to add content to a cross-listed course after it is cross-listed. The “parent” course shell (created when two or more courses are cross-listed) is different from any of the “child” course shells that are cross-listed, e.g. it is a “new” course shell, and it will not include content from any of the “child” courses. Note: since the “parent” course shell is new, you can copy content into it from any other existing course shell.

How To Cross-List
Typically, only credit course sections are cross-listed but you can cross-list credit and non-credit courses together. Here’s the process for cross-listing two or more courses.

Course shells in Blackboard are based on courses entered in Banner so that’s the first step. An Integration Partner value must exist on the course sections (SSASECT form) in Banner for Blackboard course shells to get created.
All course shells to be cross-listed (for non-credit and credit semester in which the cross-listing will occur) need to be created before the cross-listing can occur. This is handled by Information Services using an XML Course and Faculty Assignment Extract from Banner and faculty are alerted when the course shells for a new semester are created using the jccconline.jccc.edu list.
If two credit courses are to be cross-listed, no further action is required. If one or more credit and non-credit courses are to be cross-listed together, the instructor of the courses to be cross-listed (or the appropriate administrative assistant for the program area) must email the Help Desk with the complete name (including CRN, course number and title) of each course that is to be cross-listed. Be sure to indicate that this request needs to go to the attention of Jeff Morgan and/or Philip Mein (in Academic Computing Services), not the Ed Tech Center staff.

It is important that it be very clear which courses are to be cross-listed together because if course ABC and DEF and HIJ are listed together, then students in any one of those courses will have access to all course materials in the “parent” course that is created by the cross-listing.
Once Academic Computing Services staff cross-list the course, they will notify the instructor.
Once notification is received by the instructor, course content may be added to the parent course shell. The instructor’s Ed Tech Center Designer can assist with the process as needed.

What Students and Instructors See
If cross-listing operates as “designed,” students will see only the name of the course in which they are enrolled but upon entering the course, they may see a non-descript title such as “Cross Listed - Group 555 – Cross Listed.” That is what the instructor will see on her My Blackboard screen, e.g. the non-descript title.

Restricting Student Posts in the Discussions Tool

2007-03-25T06:50:00.000-06:00

Students often don’t “catch on” at first about how to post their response to a discussion board message within the appropriate thread of messages. They’ll often create a new thread rather than responding within the thread (e.g. to post within a given discussion thread, the responder must have the message to which they’re responding open and then press Reply. The instructor can take control of this situation and only allow student replies (within a given Discussions tool topic) to the messages the instructor posts. Here’s how. When editing a Discussions tool Topic on the Teach tab, scroll down to Topic Behavior Options. There are now three options to choose from:

· Students can post messages and reply to messages
· Students can reply to messages but cannot post messages
· Students can post messages but cannot reply to messages

To restrict students from originating a new thread, the second option is beneficial though the wording is inaccurate. It should read “Students can reply to messages but cannot create a new thread under this topic.”

Thanks to Michael Robertson for this tip.

Italic Scores in the Grade Book

2007-03-13T14:32:00.000-06:00

When using Blackboard CE 6 do you ever wonder why midterm and final grade columns sometimes show numbers in italics and parenthesis, such as (225), and others are not, such as (239), e.g, no parenthesis, and no italics?

When a score is in italics it means that some of the column scores (used in the formula to determine the value in the calculated column) have not been posted yet. Once all columns have a score (number) posted, the calculated score changes to non-italicized.

Italics within parentheses indicate that some of the grades being used as input for the calculation in the column are missing, so the calculation is incomplete.

Public Domain & Copyright Free Images

2007-03-06T05:37:00.000-06:00

Using copyrighted music or images without permission with few exceptions (which we’ll cover in future postings) is a violation of copyright law and a good way to end up in legal trouble. Here are some sources to find multimedia you can use. Be sure to check the specific requirements on each website to make sure the images are free for use for your particular project.

1) US Government Graphics and Photos
This is a government created directory of government graphics and photos. Most of the links are to sites with images in the public domain. A few are not, however, so read carefully to find their copyright and usage guidelines.

My personal favorite source on this list is NASA. Most NASA images are not copyrighted, but they do have some restrictions on commercial use. NASA usage guidelines are found here. http://www.nasa.gov/audience/formedia/features/MP_Photo_Guidelines.html
http://www.firstgov.gov/Topics/Graphics.shtml

2) Creative Commons
Creative Commons provides an interesting way of making very clear what rights are granted with each work displayed. Read their documentation for more precise information on what each license grants.

They also list a very informative legal guide for podcasters , which explains the Creative Commons licensing and other legal concerns for podcasters.
http://creativecommons.org/

3) Morgue file
The Morguefile is a source for free-to-use images that can be used for both commercial and noncommercial applications. They ask that the photographer be credited, wherever possible, and you are not free to sell prints or credit the work as your own.
http://morguefile.com/

4) Yotophoto
Yotophoto is a search engine for copyright friendly images. Image searches show a thumbnail, which lists the image source and the copyright restrictions, if any. This is easy to use and a great tool to find specific images.
http://yotophoto.com/

5) Wikimedia Commons
Wikimedia Commons is an offshoot of Wikipedia. Like Wikipedia, anyone can contribute content, and anyone can edit it. The images listed are theoretically free of copyright restriction, but it is possible someone uploaded an image that they did not create.
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Commons:Welcome

Thanks to Marziah Karch for gathering this information.

Security Settings and Opening PowerPoint or Other Files

2007-03-05T09:28:00.000-06:00

Sometimes when students indicate they cannot see a PowerPoint presentation (meaning they click the links in your course and the presentation doesn’t open) it may be due to the security settings in their browser. When using Internet Explorer, the user may get a notice from IE that a download has been prevented because of potential risks. The cue is a yellow strip with warning text that appears at the top of the browser window. If this occurs the user can click the yellow strip and choose the option to proceed with the download. At times this action will kick the user out of the course but when they log back in they’ll be able to open the presentation. If the student holds the Ctrl key (Windows users) while clicking the link to the presentation, it should open without the yellow warning strip. Holding the Ctrl key while clicking a link is a way of telling the browser “I’m aware of the risks associated with this type of action but want to open this file anyway”.

Thanks to Davy Jones for the tip.

When Image Counts

2007-03-02T10:07:00.000-06:00

Online instruction doesn’t need to be faceless. Blackboard CE includes a feature (My Profile) that can include a photograph, a nickname, your non-Blackboard email address. This information can be entered once and then available in all the courses in which you are enrolled as an instructor or student—so long as the course has the Roster tool added. To enter or update your personal profile in Blackboard CE follow these steps:

Go to the My Blackboard screen.
Select the My Settings link at the top right of the screen.
Be sure the My Profile tab (top left) is selected.
Click the Edit Profile button.
If you go by a nickname (such as “Davy” rather than “David”), you can enter your nickname in the First Name field (it’ll be used in all courses in which you are enrolled rather than your legal first name).
You can also enter an external e-mail address (in the E-mail field) to which you can forward your Blackboard Mail tool e-mail.
To add an image to your profile, select the Browse… button.
Select the My Computer icon to navigate to a location (on your computer) where you have an image (.gif or .jpg) of yourself stored. The recommended image size is 320 x 240 pixels. If the image is larger, it’ll be resized by Blackboard.
Once you locate the image’s filename, double-click it and the image will be uploaded.
Be sure the Public check box above the image is selected if you want the image visible to others.
Click the Save button to save the changes you’ve made.
Next click the Done button to return to the My Blackboard screen.

Your profile will be visible in any course that includes the Roster tool.

When the My Computer (Get Files) Applet Fails

2007-02-28T18:48:00.000-06:00

Students and faculty have reported difficulty in uploading files into Blackboard CE (such as when a student tries to submit an assignment in the Assignment Drop Box or attach a file to a Discussion posting or to an email message using the Mail tool. Often the Get Files button works once and then subsequently fails or just doesn’t work at all. In other cases the My Computer Applet (in the Content Manager and the File Manager) freezes when instructors try to upload files. In each of these cases, we’ve found the “culprit” to be a version of Java higher than Update 7 or the installation of multiple versions of Java (e.g. upgrade 6 and 10 installed on the same computer – because the Java installer doesn’t automatically delete the earlier version).

The problem typically happens only with the My Computer applet when using Internet Explorer. Most frequently the user is not able to continue using Blackboard CE until they close the browser and log back in.

According to a Blackboard Support Bulletin, from a technical stand point, the clients affected seem to be those using a Windows XP system with hyper-threading turned on while browsing the site using Internet Explorer and running Java 1.5.0_07 (called Upgrade 7) or higher. That’s why we’ve suggested to JCCC faculty, staff and students that they stay with upgrade 6 and not upgrade Java further, but this also means turning off the automatic upgrade feature…yet another hurdle for users to jump.

According to Blackboard, they are “currently working to identify a resolution for this problem. Microsoft has released a Knowledge Base article describing the problem. For more information regarding the underlying cause of the problem please reference this bulletin (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/327809/en-us).”

Blackboard suggests as a workaround that users either:

Turn off hyper-threading on their system (not recommended by JCCC due to its complexity) or
Change the Windows “view” from Windows XP to “classic”

The second option is quick and requires less technical knowledge. It appears to resolve the issues listed above, even on hyperthreaded/dual-core machines running Java update 10 or 11.

To switch the Windows “view” from Windows XP to “classic” you would:

Right click on the desktop
Select Properties
In the Themes tab, select "Windows Classic" in the theme dropdown
Click Apply

If you have students who experience problems uploading or attaching files, you may want to suggest they try these steps.

Opening Office 2007 Files from Students

2007-02-27T05:28:00.000-06:00

Sooner or later, your students are going to start submitting files created using Office 2007 rather than Office 2003 (the current version supported on campus). If you do not have access to Office 2007 (like most computers on campus), you can still open Office 2007 documents if you first install a Compatibility Pack from Microsoft.

You can download it from: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=941B3470-3AE9-4AEE-8F43-C6BB74CD1466&displaylang=en

If you’re a user of Microsoft Office XP or Office 2003 programs (Word, Excel, or PowerPoint), you’ll need to install all high-priority updates from Microsoft Update before downloading and installing the Compatibility Pack.

After installing the upgrade you’ll be able to open, edit, and save files using the file formats new to Word, Excel, and PowerPoint 2007. The Compatibility Pack can also be used in conjunction with the Microsoft Office Word Viewer 2003, Excel Viewer 2003, and PowerPoint Viewer 2003 to view files saved in those new formats.

Blackboard and Windows Vista

2007-02-26T21:05:00.000-06:00

Many computer manufacturers are now delivering new computer systems with Windows Vista pre-installed, so you may be wondering if Blackboard CE is compatible with Windows Vista. Here’s what Blackboard support has indicated:

Blackboard has been conducting ongoing tests with Beta versions of the MS Vista product as part of the MS Beta program for some time now. However, there are often substantial differences between Beta software packages from Microsoft and their final versions. ...Microsoft's own early certification program kicked off only 3 weeks ago with the intention of getting their partners (Blackboard included) certified within 90 days of the release of Vista. Bb is not alone in this program as Apple, Adobe, SAP, and other vendors are all still working to certify and update their applications to accommodate the Vista OS.

So until we can complete certification by going through a full QA test cycle with the final version of MS Vista we can’t say that MS Vista is certified or compatible to use when running any version of Blackboard Academic Suite. Once Bb has certified this new operating system, a Support Bulletin will be issued on Behind the Blackboard and the associated end user documentation will be updated.

In some preliminary testing by Ed Tech Center staff, we found the following problems when using Windows Vista and Blackboard CE 6. We suspect there will be additional issues discovered as we test further.

For the testing we used Windows Vista Enterprise with Aero scheme, both Internet Explorer 7 with Java 1.5.0_06 and Firefox 2.0.0.1 with Java 1.5.0._06.

The following is a summary and each item and with the exception of number 6, the issues should be obvious and reproducible. Overall, we didn’t experience problems doing typical “user” activities, such as using the Mail tool, the Calendar tool, viewing content, and so on.

WebDAV does not work.
Webfolders do not work.
Get Files (to upload files) displays only one line of files in IE7 with Java 1.5.0_06. However, it works when using Firefox.
The Windows Vista Aero screen mode changes to Vista Basic View after logging in to Blackboard CE.
PowerPoint slideshows display in PowerPoint 2007 (when installed) but not within the Blackboard browser window.
There are intermittent buggy screen displays such as when the left menu completely covers the screen from left to right.

more information becomes available, we’ll pass it on.

Backing Up and Deleting Courses

2007-02-24T08:17:00.000-06:00

In case you’re wondering about standard operating procedure regarding when courses are deleted off the JCCC Blackboard CE server:

Production “credit” course shells will be removed from the server about 1 month into the next subsequent semester, however, spring courses will not be removed until 1 month into the following fall semester.
Each semester the academic director of the Educational Technology Center will alert faculty members about 2 weeks into the semester that courses will be deleted unless they request otherwise, e.g. to accommodate contract incomplete grades, self-paced courses, etc.
Self-paced courses (950 sections) are the exception, they’ll stay online for a full year and a month after the start date, and then they’ll be removed.
Before any course is removed a backup will be made by Academic Computing Services and stored. If backups are needed in the future, IS will retrieve the backups as needed.
As an added precaution, faculty members are encouraged to backup their own courses after the end of each semester or after they make any significant changes to the course (e.g. add an epack, add a new module, make a significant revision, and so on). The backup made by faculty members should not be stored only in the course shell, but should be downloaded to the instructor’s workstation and then copied to media such as a CD or DVD. The instructor’s Ed Tech Center Designer can assist you with this process if needed.
“Z - Dev courses” (those used for course development, will not be automatically deleted. Faculty members should periodically review their list of “Z – Dev Courses” (to determine if the development course shell is still needed) and when appropriate, request that the course data be backed up and deleted.

If the instructor needs a refresher on how to create a course Backup, there’s a Flash movie and PDF printout covering the process available at http://web.jccc.edu/edtech/notes/get.asp?DocumentID=177.

Instructors should be aware that the way to download the backup file to your computer is a little circuitous, but not hard.

Once the Status of the backup is "Complete", you use the ActionLinks next to the name of the Backup file and choose "Save as File."
Unfortunately, the only choices for where to put the file are My Files or Class Files (My Computer is not an option). We recommend choosing My Files.
After saving the file (make a note of the filename), go back to the My Blackboard screen and click on the Content Manager tab - this accesses the My Files area.
Find the backup (by filename), and use the ActionLinks to choose Download.
You can now choose a location on your computer to save the file.

If you need assisance creating a CD or DVD copy of the backup file, please contact your Ed Tech Center Designer.

Difference Between Assessment Custom Instructions & the Description

2007-02-23T05:08:00.000-06:00

In Blackboard CE’s Assessment tool, you can create both “custom instructions” and an assessment “description.”

Blackboard CE’s “Custom Instructions” may be different than you initially expect. It’s easy to expect “Custom Instructions” to show up on the Assessments page before students begin assessments. The fact is, “Custom Instructions” don’t appear until the assessment is started.

In order for notes or instructions regarding the assessment to show before the assessment is begun (on the Assessments page) enter them using the “Description” field (near the top of the assessment properties page) rather than the “Custom Instructions” field (at the bottom of the assessment properties page). Assessment properties are accessed by clicking the ActionLink icon and then selecting the Edit Properties option.

“Custom Instructions” appear inside the assessment (accented in green).

The description appears on the Assessments page, outside the assessment or before the assessment is begun.

To enter either a Description or Custom Instructions select the Edit Properties option using the ActionLink icon.

The Description field is near the top and the Custom Instructions section is near the bottom.

Thanks to Davy Jones, Senior Analyst in the Educational Technology Center for this tip.

Minimizing Those HUGE PowerPoint Slideshows

2007-02-22T08:47:00.000-06:00

In yesterday’s tip, we talked about factors that cause “slow” access times on the Internet. On big factor that an instructor/designer has control over is file size. All things being equal, the smaller the file size, the faster the download. I’ve seen faculty trying to deliver 25 to 70MB files (usually PowerPoint slideshows) using Blackboard CE and they wonder why students complain of slow download times. A simple solution is to reduce the size of your PowerPoint slideshow. A handy tool to accomplish that task is PPTminimizer (http://www.pptminimizer.com/).

PPTminimizer is installed in the Ed Tech Center labs (LIB 371 and 373) and in the Center’s Faculty Media Development Area (LIB 375). Stop by and we’ll show you how it works, or use the following instructions.

To compress your PowerPoint slideshows using PPTminizer:

Open PPT Minimizer.
Click the “Open Presentations” button
Choose the PowerPoint file(s) you would like to optimize. You can select one slideshow to minimize or use the Add to List button to select multiple slideshows to minimize at the same time.
By default the optimized PPT file will be saved in the same folder as the original. If you want it saved in another folder, select the “…” button (appears under the “Optimized presentations” button, and choose the folder into which you want to save the optimized presentations.
If you select a different folder (not the source folder) into which to save the optimized file, you’ll see the “Add extension to Filenames” check box (found above the “…” button). Deselect if you do not ant the “(PPTminimizer)” suffix added to the filename.
Next you can choose your compression settings. The default “standard compression” is usually a good choice. If you would like an even smaller file size then move the compression slider to “Strong Compression”. This setting may reduce your image quality and you should always check the optimized presentation when choosing “Strong Compression”. Further, if you find the images in your slideshow too pixilated using “Standard Compression,” lower the slider to use “Low Compression.”
Click the “Optimize Presentations” button.
If you are asked to confirm conversion of embedded objects, you should click the “yes” button in order to reduce file size. You will not be able to edit the embedded objects in the optimized file, but you can edit it in the original slideshow and run the file through the optimizer again when changes need to be made.
Once the progress bar reaches 100% your file has been optimized.
You’ll see three buttons: View Presentation(s), E-Mail Presentation(s) and Delete Presentation(s). Be sure to view your compressed slideshows to verify that they look satisfactory.
Next you are presented with the statistics of the optimization including how much spaced you saved. Out experience is tat typical slideshows with graphics can be reduced in size easily from 60% to 95%.
Your optimized file is placed in the directory you specified.

Try it, you’ll like it and so will your students.

Consider File Size!

2007-02-21T08:02:00.000-06:00

Are your students complaining about slow download times when accessing PowerPoint slideshows in your Blackboard CE course? If so, you need to first understand file sizes. If you want to see a chart of equivalencies, e.g. how many kilobytes (KB) in a megabyte (MB), and so on, check out http://www.t1shopper.com/tools/calculate/.

The basics are obvious: it takes longer for a 5 MB file to download than a 1MB file and it takes longer for a 500 KB file to download than a 1 MB file. So smaller is better.

Also effecting the download time is the type of internet connection (ISDN, DSL, Cable, Dial-up and so on). You can determine your connection speed (it’ll be different in your office, on a laptop at Starbucks, or at home) by going to http://promos.mcafee.com/speedometer/test_0600.asp. Keep in mind that the access speed may vary each time you take the test (depending on factors such as time of day and network traffic). If you and/or your students are experiencing slow access, take the test several times (at different times when you might normally access the Internet) to get a sense of the connection speed at which you can expect to access online materials. You can also see the optimal speed for various types of connections by visiting http://support.primus.ca/en/dsl/speedtest.php (review the chart on the right side of the web page).

Your connection’s “optimal” speed is based on average network traffic between your computer and the server; obviously heavy network traffic or outages between your home/office and the Blackboard server (or any server on the Internet for that matter) can reduce the download speed (upload speed too).

Another factor is whether media is non-streaming (e.g. PowerPoint slideshows) or streaming (e.g. MP3 and Flash files). Streaming files start playing before the entire file is downloaded (so it appears to download faster) while non-streaming media must be completely downloaded before playing.

So, in a perfect world without heavy network traffic, without considering Blackboard or browser problems or any network disruptions, you can calculate the best possible download time for a file traveling from one location on a network to another by using the calculator at http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/abouthp/accessibility/webaccessibility/download_tool.html.

The calculator asks you to enter kilobytes, so remember that a one megabyte (MB) file is 1024 kilobytes (KB) and a 25 MB file is 25,600 KB. As an example, if you have a 25 MB PowerPoint slideshow (e.g. 25600 KB) and were using a DSL or T1 connection, it would optimally take 2000 seconds (or over 33 minutes) to download that single file. On the other hand, if the file were reduced in size to 1 MB (e.g. 1024 KB) using the same connection, it would take 80 seconds to download the file. Obviously slower Internet connections (ISDN, dial-up) would take significantly longer.

We’ve seen PowerPoint slideshows within Blackboard courses that range from 25 to 70 MB. In tomorrow’s tip, we’ll tell you how to reduce a PowerPoint slideshow file by 60-95%. Imagine how that will increase download times and reduce frustration!

Changing an Answer After an Assessment Has Been Administered

2007-02-20T04:15:00.000-06:00

Let’s suppose that you have a fill-in-the-blank question in an assessment where you’ve indicated the correct answer is “criteria.” After some students have taken the assessment, you realize that “criterion” is also a valid answer. While it should be used cautiously, you can change the answers to a question (in this case add a correct answer). The process is anything but intuitive and requires these steps:

On the Build tab, select the Assessment tool and locate the specific question.
Select the question and the Edit…Question screen appears (you get to the same screen when you locate the quiz, display the questions, click the ActionLinks icon folloiwng the question and from the pop-up menu select Edit This Question).
When the Edit…Question screen appears, change the title of the question; make it a minor change if you wish, such as adding a period (.) to the end of the title.
Next add the new correct answer (if you change the correct answer from one choice to another, be prepared to tell students who lost points as well as alert those who earned points as a result of the change).
Click the Save button to save the revised question.
You’ll see a warning message indicating that you’re about to “overwrite the original question and could change Student grades.” Click OK if this is what you intend to do. In essence, you’re using a different question name and the revised question will replace the original question in the assessment.
Next, select the Teach tab and go to the Grade Book.
Select the ActionLink for the assessment that needs to be re-graded. It’s at the top of the column.
From the ActionLink pop-up menu, select the View Submissions option. You can get to the same place if you go to the Assessment Manager, select the ActionLink behind the assessment name and then select the View Submissions option). On this screen you’ll see a little red double-cross symbol after each score indicating the assessment has been changed since last graded.
Select the ActionLink in the top left corner of the screen (behind the assessment name) and select the Update All Outdated Attempts option. This option may take a few seconds to work and is not available except when you have outdated assessment scores.

By the way, the above works for other types of questions but is more complex (grading-wise) if you’re not just adding additional correct answers. For obvious reasons this option should be used sparingly if students have already completed the assessment. It can be confusing to students to find that what they “supposedly” answered correctly is actually incorrect.

Editing a Chat Log

2007-02-13T07:26:00.000-06:00

Once you enable the Chat tool and chat logging, you may want to make the log available to students. You can simply enable it but a typical Chat room log may be confusing to read. By editing the log and posting it (for instance under a Discussion topic), you gain the ability to:

Clear the log after each session and preserve only particular sessions.
Edit the log as necessary and remove personal information added by students that should not have been shared online or delete student flaming (angry exchanges) or delete other inappropriate entries or language.
Trim the log of multiple entry and exits notations, and so on.

Here’s a way to edit and post the edited log.

Using FireFox:

On the Teach tab, select the Chat tool.
Click the ActionLink next to the desired room and select "View log."
Right-click anywhere on the log itself.
Choose "This Frame" and then choose "open in new window" or "open in new tab."
Use the File -->Save Page As... command, choose a location to save to, and indicate a filename.
From the “Save as type” drop-down list select "Web Page, HTML Only."
You now have an editable text/html document that can be edited and then posted.

Using Internet Explorer:

On the Teach tab, select the Chat tool.
Click the ActionLink next to the desired room and select "View log."
Right-click anywhere on the log itself.
Choose “Select All” and then Edit --> Copy from the Browser menu bar (or Ctrl+C).
Open Notepad, select the Edit --> Paste command (Ctrl+P) to add the text to the new Notepad document.
Save the document using a filename you select (e.g. chatlog2-13-2007.txt).
You now have an editable text/html document that can be edited and then posted.

With the new document open you can use Notepad or an HTML editor to clean it up. When done, you can:

Upload the file to the course and attach it to a Discussions posting or a Mail message.
Upload the file and link to it from within the course, e.g. learning module, folder, or home page.

For details on how to turn on Chat room logging, check out yesterday’s tip at http://ce-annotations.blogspot.com/search/label/chat%20log.

Logging Chat Sessions

2007-02-13T06:00:00.000-06:00

You may or may not want all Chat room sessions logged in your course. If you have a session that is basically Q&A and not all students can participate because of the synchronous nature of a chat session, you can log the session. Those students who missed it can read the transcript at their leisure. On the other hand, if you set up a Chat room for students to casually chat (as a Student Lounge or whatever) you may not want to log that room.

If you click on the Chat link in the Build tab, you should see the current logging status for your chat rooms in the last column. If Logging is off and you want it logged,

On the Build tab select the Chat tool.
Select the ActionLink following the Chat room name you want logged and select the Edit Properties option.
At the bottom of the options, select the More Options link to expand the options displayed.
Under Enable logging, select the Maintain chat room log check box.
Click the Save button to save your changes!

When the Chat room page reappears, the final column (Logging) should now be set to "on."

If you want all new Chat rooms to be automatically logged, from the Build or Teach tab, select Manage Course --> Settings --> Chat. Simply set the “Logging is on by default in newly created chat rooms” option to True.

If you want all Chat room logs to automatically be viewable by students you will need to also set the “Allow Students to view chat logs” option to True (also found under Manage Course --> Settings --> Chat). However, you may want to clean up the Chat room logs before posting. Tomorrow’s tip will cover how to edit the log before posting for students to view.

Learning Modules, TOCs and System Exception Errors

2007-02-08T11:05:00.000-06:00

If you are using a Learning Module (LM) in your Blackboard CE course and that LM includes 20 or more entries (e.g. headings, Web Links, HTML pages, Assignments, Quizzes, and so on), read on. These issues have come to our attention as we’ve taught the iTeach Online Workshop (formerly WebCeTera) and discovered additional flaws or bugs in Blackboard CE 6.1.1.

Background
Normally as you construct each module, the student would see a left-hand table of contents (TOC) that indicates every entry in the module. The entries in the TOC are hyperlinks to navigate through the module (skipping entries, viewing just the elements the student wants to review and so on). The TOC serves as a site map for the module. Normally, the student can quickly discerned the structure of each LM; e.g. the fact that each module starts with learning objectives, includes pages of content (text, PDF and Movie files) and ends with a page of assignments, module tips and maybe an assessment covering the module’s content.

The Problem
Due to a “bug” that cropped up with CE 6.1.1 (and was not present the last time we offered WebCeTera using CE 6.0.2) if you include the TOC as the first page of a LM or have it displayed in a left-hand panel and the student is using Internet Explorer, the student will get an “unexpected system exception error” each time they click a TOC link. Further, even though the message has a link to “Return to My Blackboard” that link simply displays another “unexpected system exception error.” The net effect is the student (designer and instructor too) must close the browser, log back in and if you try the same process again (even to access a different LM page), the browser crashes again.

Solutions
The only options to date are:

Require everyone to use FireFox (which requires that it be installed and configured for Blackboard) – Firefox doesn’t encounter the same problem.
Break each module into 20 or less entries; but that may require hours of rebuilding the course, cause an awkward separation of related information and may devastate the planned structure of the course (requiring changes in course syllabus and other instructions).
Turn off the TOC and have students navigate blindly not knowing how many elements are in each LM. Additionally, the student will need to navigate the module sequentially to find and view or review a specific page.

Additional Problems
For iTeach Online, we finally decided to break the modules up because we could export a module and then import it two or three times and in each duplicate module remove enough entries so the total number of entries would be under 20. The net result would be the revised Module 1a, 1b, 1c and so on where each new module would have less than 20 entries and the student would need to complete all of them as part of what the syllabus called “Module 1.”

So we tried it and found two more bugs. When you export and then import a Learning Module, Web Links are not imported. In our case the most time consuming aspect of the task was not avoided (e.g. creating Web Links and identifying the specific URL for each).

We also discovered that even though Blackboard doesn’t allow duplicate, identical names for assessments, if you import a Learning Module that has an assessment link in it, the assessment is duplicated with the very same name. The import process also ignores the release criteria for the quiz when it creates the duplicate. That means students will see the quizzes and they’ll be available immediately…which will cause confusion.

We are detailing these bugs because, even if you’ve avoided encountering them early in your course, you may still encounter problems if later modules include 20 or more entries. Blackboard has the TOC fix planned for Application Pack 2, tentatively scheduled for Spring 2007. So at best, we’ll have a fix for Summer 2007…we’re still looking for an effective work-around.

Custom Instructions vs. Assessment Descriptions

2007-02-05T19:18:00.000-06:00

You may find the following explanation of the differences between an assessment "Description" and "Custom Instructions" beneficial.

“Custom Instructions” as labeled by Blackboard may be different than expected. It is easy to expect “Custom Instructions” to show up on the Assessments page before students begin assessments. The fact is, “Custom Instructions” don’t appear until the students starts the assessment.

In order for notes or instructions regarding the assessment to show before the assessment is begun (on the Assessments page) enter them using the Description field (near the top of the assessment properties page) rather than the Custom Instructions field (at the bottom of the assessment properties page).

Assessment properties are accessed via the ActionLink icon using the Edit Properties option. “Custom Instructions” appear inside the assessment (see the area accented in green).

Descriptions appear on the Assessments page, outside the assessment, that is, before the assessment is begun.

To enter either a Description or Custom Instructions select the Edit Properties option from the specific assessment's ActionLink icon (see below).

The Description field is near the top and the Custom Instructions section is near the bottom.

Thanks to Davy Jones for documenting this information.

Student Access Dates

2007-02-03T08:12:00.000-06:00

This semester, at faculty request, we enabled student access to all Blackboard course shells on the first day of the semester (unless the instructor requested otherwise through the Help Desk). As a result courses starting on the first day of the semester did not show on the students' My Blackboard screen until the first day of the semester. This caused students who had already enrolled to think they were not enrolled and they called Admissions or contacted their instructor.

We’ll update the online student letter to be clearer about when courses show on the My Blackboard screen. Further, we’ve submitted a feature enhancement indicating the course should appear on the My Blackboard screen (after enrollment) as either an inactive link or (preferably) as an active link that when selected indicates class access starts on a specified date (e.g. the first day of the semester or the date set administratively at your request).

Have You Decided Not to Use That ePack After All?

2007-02-02T19:14:00.000-06:00

If you create your course based on an epack that requires students to enter an access code and you decide to cease using the epack …read on!

If you start with a course based on an epack and strip out all course content that came with an epack (which you must legally do to no longer require students to purchase the access code), the new course will still require the access code. Even if you copy the course to a new course shell after deleting the epack content, the new course shell will still require students to use an access code.

The access code “trigger” is buried in the course shell and cannot be removed by you or the campus Blackboard server admin (that is, we do not have the tools or scripts required to do so, even if we could legally do so).

If you want to cease using an epack that requires an access code, you must start with a fresh course shell and build all content in that course shell.

Allowing Students to Add Web Links

2007-01-31T09:38:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-31T09:31:00.000-06:00

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:

From the My Blackboard screen, select the My Settings link.
Next select the My Tool Options tab.
Scroll down to the Who’s Online area.
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.
Select the Save button.

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

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

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

Always Use Lowercase for Filenames

2007-01-31T09:27:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-30T17:10:00.000-06:00

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:

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

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

2007-01-12T11:20:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-12T07:26:00.000-06:00

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?

2007-01-11T08:37:00.000-06:00

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.

Click the Start button, then select Settings, and then Control Panel.
Double-click on the Java Control Panel icon to open it.
Select the Update tab (see below).
Uncheck the check box that says Check for Updates Automatically.
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:

Click Start, and then select the Control Panel.
Click Add or Remove Programs.
Scroll down to Windows Internet Explorer 7, click it, and then click Change/Remove.
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

2007-01-09T08:37:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-08T11:22:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-05T12:14:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-04T07:59:00.000-06:00

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.

From the My Blackboard screen select the My Settings link (upper right corner).
When the My Settings page appears, select the My Tool Options tab.
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.
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

2007-01-03T14:38:00.000-06:00

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

2007-01-02T08:55:00.000-06:00

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.

WebCT Good News/Bad News #5

2006-12-15T16:27:00.000-06:00

These (sort of) daily “Good News/Bad News” messages are meant to inform you of what works and what doesn’t in CE 6.1.1. If you have comments, you’re invited to email me directly (jbacon@jccc.edu) or share on the dlfaculty@jccc.edu list.

CE 6.1.1 Good News: Miscellaneous Tools

(Discussions) A course instructor or teaching assistant can now lock and unlock a topic and still post in the Discussions tool.
(Glossary) When you create an export CE 4.1 file and then use that file to import an entire course into CE 6.1.1, 4.1 courses with a Glossary of 1000 or more items can now be imported properly (they didn’t in CE 6.0.2). However, with CE 6.1.1 the import will not work if the exported file is too large. The best work-around is to delete course backups before creating the 4.1 export file. With the export file "slimmed down" the import still appears to fail (the import progress bar never moves to the "finished state") but if you wait a few minutes and then jump to another tab, when you return you'll see that the Glossary entries have been imported and are available.
(File Manager) When uploading or downloading files the browser (Internet Explorer) does NOT freeze and require a reboot.
(File Manager) When using Safari 2.0.3, if you select the Get Files button in the File Manager, the My Computer icon appears and works.
(Folders) Any icon alignment changes made in folders does show correctly on the Build tab.
(Grade Book) The Histogram (under column statistics) displays all grade ranges.
(Grade Book) The default sort order (alphabetic) in the Grade Book is now correct.
(Grade Book) Rearranged columns (on the View All tab) are now reflected when viewing Column Settings for the Grade Book.
(HTML Creator) When loading the HTML Creator in Mail or Discussions, the tool does not grab control of the cursor, but leaves the cursor in the top field of the form.
(Course Import from 4.1) When importing a course from CE 4.1 to CE 6, the "Do not have permission to copy or move" error no longer appears.

CE 6.1.1 Bad News: Discussions

Discussion posts do not always update the Unread totals, so indicators of the number of Unread and Read messages may be incorrect.

If You Can't Post, Attach or Submit to CE 6

2006-12-11T07:58:00.000-06:00

Students and faculty members continue to have problems:

Posting messages in the Mail tool and the Discussions tool,
Submitting files in the Assignments tool, and
Attaching files to messages, postings and submissions, respectively, in the Mail, Discussions and Assignments tools in Campus Edition 6.

This document is meant to serve as a comprehensive guide to the steps we believe will cure most of these problems.

Run the browser check in WebCT to check for obvious errors. While not comprehensive, the Check Browser link checks for the obvious items (supported browser, cookies enabled, javascript enabled, pop-up window blocker for the Campus Edition server domain enabled, and Sun Microsystems Java installed and enabled).
You may have more than one pop-up blocker installed (Windows includes one as does the Google toolbar, MSN toolbar, Norton Security, Yahoo toolbar, Zone Alarm and others). Check to see if any of these extra pop-up blockers are installed and enabled on your computer. For details on how to disable pop-up blockers for webct.jccc.net, webct.jccc.edu and online.jccc.edu, read: http://students.jccc.net/documents/webct_common_issue.htm. Additional information on trusting pop-ups on the JCCC server sites is available at http://web.jccc.edu/edtech/notes/get.asp?DocumentID=126.
Until Blackboard certifies Internet Explorer 7, don't install it. It's not certified for use with JCCC's Campus Edition 6.0.2 (in use Fall 2006) but it is certified for use with CE 6.1.1 (anticipated version of Campus Edition for Spring 2007).
Make sure you have only one copy of Java 1.5.0_XX (on Windows systems) listed in the Control Panel (go to Start --> Control Panel --> Add-Remove Programs and look for listings that begin with "J2SE Runtime Environment"). There should only be a single entry. If you see multiple entries, follow the instructions at http://students.jccc.edu/documents/javauninstall.htm to uninstall all versions and then use the instructions at http://students.jccc.edu/documents/javainstall.htm to install a single version.
There are occasions when one of the Java applets used with Campus Edition becomes corrupt in cache (Windows will go to the cache to run the program, which speeds up the start-up, but that can also be a problem if the cache copy is corrupt). So if you've completed steps 1-4 and are still having problems, try clearing the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) Cache. Instructions are available at
http://java.com/en/download/help/5000020300.xml.
Finally, if all else fails, try clearing your web browser's cache. Instructions are available at http://java.com/en/download/help/5000020400.xml.

Note the following sites list top issues and possible resolutions (and other useful aids) to fixing Java problems: http://www.java.com/en/download/help/ and
http://www.java.com/en/download/faq/top_issues.xml

If you have other tips on how to configure the end-user's workstation to cure Blackboard Campus Edition problems, please share them (jbacon@jccc.edu).

Addendum: One JCCC faculty member (George Belzer) offered the following comment: "The problem many of you are reporting with your students sounds very similar to the problem I was having myself. I tried most of the steps Jonathan mentions but the problem remained. Then Jeff Kosko suggested I uninstall Java version 9 (latest version) and install the older version 6, available through the JCCC Students Support website (see http://students.jccc.edu/documents/javainstall.htm). The problem was immediately solved and now adding attachments and uploading files works fast and correctly. I then went into the Java control console (accessed from the Windows Control Panel) and turned off the automatic upgrade feature to prevent version 9 from uploading again."

WebCT Good News/Bad News #4: The Media Library Tool Problems

2006-12-07T20:05:00.001-06:00

One of the major problems we’ve encountered with CE 6.1.1 is related to Media Library collections. If you use the Media Library tool, by default, your course includes a glossary collection, but you can add other collections too. Media Library collections can include simple text entries (e.g. a text only glossary) or collections of other types of items such as text with images, images only, PDF files, audio and/or video files.

During our testing of CE 6.1.1 we discovered that Media Library collections are instantly broken if any item in a collection includes an attached image (JPEG, GIF, PNG or TIF file). Specifically, you can have a fully functional collection with images in 6.0.2 and as soon as the server is upgraded to CE 6.1.1 (in late December) the collection will be broken. Further, if a new item is added to a collection and you attach a JPEG, PNG, GIF or TIF image, the tool will be immediately broken. By broken we mean all or some of the items in a collection (which includes even a single image) will not be visible to either the student, instructor or course designer. Because you cannot see the item, you can’t detach the image or otherwise edit the collection.

Collections of other types of items (PDF files, audio or video files) do not cause the problem.

Blackboard is working on a solution; they’ve replicated the problem, and plan to provide a late January hot fix. However, once received we’ll need to test the hot fix on our test server and make a determination regarding whether it is safe to install mid-semester.

Here’s what’s happening to cause the problem:

When a media library collection is viewed, CE 6.1.1 inspects each entry to see if it has an image link. If it has a link, CE 6.1.1 checks for a thumbnail. If the thumbnail isn't present, CE 6.1.1 attempts to generate one. If thumbnail generation fails, CE 6.1.1 leaves the entry in its original state, and will try to generate a thumbnail again the next time the collection is accessed. All entries are in this state initially.
When a media library entry with an image link is added, CE 6.1.1 attempts to immediately generate a thumbnail. If thumbnail generation fails, the entry is still added, but the thumbnail is omitted. This leaves the entry in the same state as #1 above.

The error occurs when a “poorly designed SQL query” tries to generate a thumbnail for an attached image, which causes a database spike that severely effects server performance.

After applying the future hot fix (now in development by Blackboard) these issues will no longer occur. While the Media Library tool could be disabled system-wide (to prevent the problem), that action would mean that all collections (whether they included images or not) would be unavailable. So we plan to leave the Media Library tool enabled system-wide.

Here’s what you need to know and do:

If you have Media Library collections that do not include any images, do nothing. You and your students have dodged the bullet.
If all or some of your Media Library collections include images, then you have several (not very satisfactory) options. You’ll need to chose some combination of the following:

Disable/Hide the Media library tool and don’t use it until the hot fix is installed (could be February or not until after Spring 2007 semester).
Hide the Media Library collections with images (you can hide specific collections, but not specific entries).
Convert all your images to PDF files, which don’t break the tool.
Temporarily delete all images (might work if your collection is a glossary and you can temporarily do without the images—but you’ll need to re-add the images later).
Create a series of web pages (HTML) that include the images and text from your collection(s) and create a Learning Module that serves as the repository for the collection.

We’re trying to produce a report of all Media Library collections that will be adversely effected by this bug, but you may need to just check your course(s) yourself and select a course of action. If you have questions or need help with any of the above solutions, contact your Ed Tech Center Designer.

WebCT Good News/Bad News #3: Announcements & Media Library

2006-12-06T13:24:00.000-06:00

These daily “Good News/Bad News” messages after meant to inform you of what works and what doesn’t in CE 6.1.1. Even though you may not have time to test, this should give you a sense of what the upgrade will “do to your course.” If you have comments, you’re invited to email me directly (jbacon@jccc.edu) or share on the dlfaculty@jccc.edu list.

CE 6.1.1 Good News: Announcements

You can now change pages when viewing lists of announcements that span multiple pages. However, if you change the Paging Preferences (accessed by clicking the three dog-eared sheets icon in the bottom right corner of the WebCT Announcements window) to increase the “Number of records per page” setting (10 is the default) the increase in visible announcements may not display immediately. You may need to jump to another tool or tab and then return to the Announcements tool for it to take effect.
Images in announcements now correctly display.
The Delete button now deletes Announcements (but only if you were the instructor who created the announcement)

CE 6.1.1 Bad News: Announcements & Media Library

When you create an announcement by default it goes to all students, instructors, auditors and teaching assistants. There’s a bug that prevents you from sending an announcement to just one of these groups of course participants.
Media Library collections (such as the Glossary) are broken if the imported collection includes an attached JPEG, GIF or TIF file. Further if a new JPEG, GIF or TIF image is added to a new or existing Media Library collection, the tool is broken. The only work-around is to not use JPEG, GIF and TIF images in the Media Library. Blackboard is working on a solution; they’ve replicated the problem, and are trying to provide a late January hot fix to address the issue.

WebCT Good News/Bad News #2:

2006-11-29T19:22:00.000-06:00

Here’s today’s installment of good news/bad news concerning CE 6.1.1:

CE 6.1.1 Good News – Assessments & Assignments

Assessments with embedded images copy satisfactorily from one CE 6.1.1 course shell (when you copy the entire course) to another CE 6.1.1 course shell.
The histogram (report) for statistics now displays all scores.
There is no longer a 1300 characters limit to comments in the Assignment tool…the limit is now 1333 characters. :-)
An error is no longer generated when the cutoff date for an assignment is left blank because it no longer defaults to “blank.” You must enter a cutoff date, so the error cannot occur.
Comments entered in Assignment Dropbox are automatically viewable in the student’s view of the Grade Book.
Files attached to the Assignment tool can be replaced by a file of the same name and the old version no longer is displayed. This fixes a bug in 6.0.2.

CE 6.1.1 Bad News –Importing and Exporting Assessments

When you export assessments from CE 6.1.1 with embedded images (using the HTML image tag, as opposed to the Browse button) and then try to import that assessment into another CE 6.1.1 course, the embedded images are not imported. In fact, the folder in which the images are stored in the source course shell is not copied to the target course shell.

WebCT Good News/Bad News #1: Assessments & Media Library

2006-11-28T16:22:00.000-06:00

By the end of next week, we’ll know whether JCCC will upgrade to Blackboard Learning System CE 6.1.1 (e.g. the new name for WebCT) over the Holiday Break. The decision to proceed or not will be based on:

Feedback from faculty and staff CE 6.1.1 testers
Comments we receive over the next few days from the JCCC WebCT users list,
Feedback from the Distance Learning Coordinating Council, and
Input from two campus-wide committees: the Academic Technology Advisory Council (ATAC) that meets on Monday, December 4, 2006 and the Academic Information Management (AIM) Committee that meets on Friday, December 1, 2006.

This is a first of the daily “Good News/Bad News” messages I'll post to inform JCCC faculty of what works and what doesn’t in CE 6.1.1. Even though JCCC faculty may not have time to test, the daily posting will indicate what the upgrade will “do to your course.” If you have comments, you’re invited to email me directly (jbacon@jccc.edu) or share on the dlfaculty@jccc.edu list.

CE 6.1.1 Good News -- Assessments

The Assessments screen as viewed by students now lists start and due dates for all assessments (tests and quizzes).
The Item Statistics report for students in the lower 25% of a class now calculates correctly.
Performance reports can be generated even when an assessment has submissions that are not yet graded.
Calculated questions that do not require units of measure are graded correctly.
Courses imported from Campus Edition 4.1 to CE6 now properly display images referenced by inserting the HTML image tag in the General Feedback field.

CE 6.1.1 Bad News – Media Library

If you import Media Library collections that include JPEG images or you add JPEG images after a course is imported or copied, the Media Library tool becomes broken; e.g. after you select the View All Media Library entries option, existing and new entries cannot be viewed, deleted or edited by the designer/instructor and students cannot view the entries. We’re working with Blackboard support to get this fixed or find a work-around.

Perils of the Internet Explorer 7 Upgrade

2006-10-23T19:42:00.000-05:00

JCCC currently has Campus Edition (CE) 6.0.2 in production. With that version, we've had sporadic problems with the new Microsoft Internet Explorer browser (Version 7) due out prior to November 1, 2006. The most common problem seems to be that the menu bar on the left side of the CE 6.0.2 interface collapses to the point where text and icons are not visible. This problem has been confirmed by other schools using CE 6.

Word from WebCT is that IE 7 is compatible with CE 6.1.1 (due to upgrades and hot fixes included by that version). Since we will not be at CE 6.1.1 until after the semester ends (at best), faculty members and students using WebCT are warned to not let your browser (IE) automatically upgrade to version 7.

Additional detail is available from Microsoft at the link above.

The easiest way to avoid the upgrade is to decline Internet Explorer 7 when Automatic Updates notifies you that the update is available to install. We suggest you inform your students to choose “Don’t Install” when prompted by the Internet Explorer 7 welcome screen. According to Microsoft, "Users will not need to take special action to receive notification, and all users will have the ability to decline installation."

We also understand that FireFox 2 may be released soon (http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/2.0/releasenotes/). We have not tested the new version with CE 6.0.2 and cannot recommend an upgrade at this time.

There's also a toolkit available to block automatic delivery of IE7. For more information, check out the FAQ at http://www.microsoft.com/technet/updatemanagement/windowsupdate/ie7blockertoolfaq.mspx