Friday, November 24, 2006

Bb List Information

Fri, 24 Nov 2006 06:00:46

You are subscribed to the Bb list at the University of Miami. I created
this list to distribute information about the Blackboard course web site
system at UM.

Here are a few reminders.

1. If you want to unsubscribe you can do it a number of ways. A. Send me
an e-mail and I will remove you from the list. B. Go to
http://listserv.miami.edu/archives/bb.html, click on the "Join or leave
the list" link, and follow the instructions. C. Send the message
"UNSUBSCRIBE BB" (in the body of the list, not the subject) to
listserv@listserv.miami.edu. (This will only work if sent from the
address that you are subscribed as.)

2. If you know someone who would like to subscribe tell them to do one of
the following. A. Send me an e-mail and I will add them to the list. B.
Go to http://www.snurl.com/bbforms and fill out the "Mailing List" form.
B. Go to http://listserv.miami.edu/archives/bb.html, click on the "Join
or leave the list" link, and follow the instructions. C. Send the message
"SUBSCRIBE BB" (in the body of the list, not the subject) to
listserv@listserv.miami.edu.

3. Searchable archives of the list are available at
http://listserv.miami.edu/archives/bb.html. The archives go back to July
2001 when the Bb list was created.

Bill Vilberg bill.vilberg@miami.edu Home: 305-255-9138 Work: 305-284-3949
Cell: 786-218-3052

Wednesday, November 15, 2006

[BB] Academic Resources tab in Blackboard

Blackboard list members,
 
A new tab was added to the Blackboard system today: Academic Resources.  Most of you log in and go directly to your courses and probably don't even notice the tabs very much.  Please click on this tab and tell me if you can think of any items that need to be added or changed. 
 
A member of the Honor Council called me today and asked whether a link to their citation guides could be put on Blackboard in order to reduce plagiarism.  This is a response to that request that goes beyond plagiarism issues to include many academic resources that a student might find helpful.  We will be promoting it on the Home page in various ways, to increase student awareness of it.
 
Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944
 

Friday, November 10, 2006

[BB] Spring course sites

Blackboard teachers,
 
The spring course sites have been created, and students are being added to the course sites the day after they register for the courses. 
 
To access your spring course sites at this time, click on the "All Courses" tab in Blackboard.  The spring course sites should be at the bottom of the list.
 
If you would like any spring sections combined, so that you have one Blackboard site that includes multiple sections or listings for the same course, please go to the "Support" tab in Blackboard, click on the "Online Forms" link, and then click on the "Course Merge" link to access the on-line form.  Part of our process is manual, so it may take two work days to complete this particular request.
 
Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944
 

Saturday, October 07, 2006

[BB] SafeAssignment Performance Update


SafeAssignment users,

This note came in Friday from SafeAssignment. It appears that they have
applied one more fix for institutions with more than 800 instructors
registered in Blackboard. That would be us! The final line says to
please let them know if you experience response times of more than 10
seconds. If you click on a SafeAssignment link and it takes more than
10 seconds for the page to come up, let me know and I will pass it on to
our contact at SafeAssignment.

Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944

-----Original Message-----
From: SafeAssignment/MyDropBox Suite Team
[mailto:developers@safeassignment.com]
Sent: Friday, October 06, 2006 3:02 PM
To: sa-admins@safeassignment.com
Subject: *** SafeAssignment Performance Update

Dear SafeAssignment Administrator,

We are glad to inform you that today we were finally able to fix a
database bug that caused slow SafeAssignment response times in certain
institutions.
This bug affected institutions with many (800+) instructors registered
in the Blackboard system, and now, after this bug has been fixed, such
institutions should experience performance increase by 5-10 times in
most operations with response times ranging from 1 to 3 seconds in 99%
of cases.

We will implement another significant performance improvement later this
weekend or early next week, depending on how successful our reliability
tests are, and after that SafeAssignment should provide response times
comparable to response times of a typical Blackboard server in all
institutions.

We want to thank you for your patience and support, with special thanks
to those Blackboard administrators that provided us with access to their
systems and tremendously helped us in discovering the issues that slowed
the system down.

Please contact us if you still experience response times of over 10
seconds anywhere within your system, so that we could investigate your
specific case.

Thank you very much for using our products.

Best regards,
MyDropBox Development Team

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

[BB] Blackboard E-mail problems?

Bb Users,
 
We are getting repeated reports of e-mail problems on Blackboard.  Teachers are sending to the entire class and no-one is getting it, according to what we have been told.  In other classes the e-mail is working fine.
 
If you are having e-mail problems where your class is not receiving your e-mail, and you are willing to let me send some test messages to your class to try to figure out what is happening, please let me know, so that I can take steps to identify the cause of the problem and get it resolved.
 
Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944
 

Sunday, October 01, 2006

[BB] SafeAssignment Progress Update

Bb listserv members,

I just wanted to keep you updated with steps that SafeAssignment is
taking to eliminate the problems that we experienced last month. They
have applied a patch to the database, probably to improve their search
techniques. Hopefully this patch will improve things as it is applied
to the databases of the various schools using SafeAssignment. Sometimes
a patch such as this requires building new indexes or tables, to the
rollout takes some time.

Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944

-----Original Message-----
From: SafeAssignment/MyDropBox Suite Team
[mailto:developers@safeassignment.com]
Sent: Saturday, September 30, 2006 5:35 PM
To: sa-admins@safeassignment.com
Subject: *** SafeAssignment Progress Update and Downtime Warning (!!!)

Dear Technology Administrator,

We are happy to notify you that a significant increase of SafeAssignment
response speed is coming soon. We will be installing a database system
patch this weekend will be gradually introducing it into the production
environment over the next week. This improvement should make
SafeAssignment response time to equal to or better than the response
time you experienced last spring/summer.

***Please note that installation of this patch will require a full
database system shutdown for about 15-20 minutes. This shutdown is
planned for 11:00 PM EST this Saturday, September 30. We are sorry for
such a late notice, but we have just finished testing the patch and want
to implement it as soon as possible to prevent any issues that some
users may still periodically experience.

Thank you very much for your support and understanding.

Best regards
MyDropBox Developers Team

Friday, September 29, 2006

[BB] Janet's last day at UM

Blackboard mailing list people,
 
Janet de la Rosa, our Blackboard system manager and IAC systems analyst since last December, is taking a job as Senior Instructional Designer at Miami Dade College.  Today is her last day at UM.  We certainly wish her the best in her new position.
 
For continued Blackboard support, our recommended procedure is to click on the "Help" icon at the top of any Blackboard page, and then use the "Contact us" link to access a support request form.  That will get you the fastest response since it is monitored by our students as well as by me.
 
Hopefully the position will be posted soon and we will have a replacement in place quickly, so that you can continue to receive quality support for Blackboard.
 
Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944
 

Friday, September 22, 2006

[BB] Clearing attempts in SafeAssignment

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

We’ve received word that clearing attempts from the View Safe Assignment page (MyDropbox Suite/SA link) through the Control Panel fails with the new upgrade (v. 2.0.7) on our Blackboard version 6.3.1.  In order to clear attempts from a submission that a student has made, you would need to do it from the Gradebook. To do this, open the Gradebook, click on the grade or “!” matching the corresponding submission to open it, and then on the Modify Grade page, click on the Clear Attempt button.

 

The company has informed us that they are working on a fix for our version during the next few days.  We will let you know as soon as they do.

 

Thank you and we apologize for this inconvenience.

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst & Blackboard Manager

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Thursday, September 21, 2006

[BB] Blackboard not accessible through the wireless network

Blackboard Users,

 

IT is no longer blocking access to Blackboard. The wireless issue has been resolved. Please let us know if you have any questions.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst & Blackboard Manager

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

[BB] Blackboard not accessible through the wireless network

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

We were informed that Blackboard is not accessible through the Wireless network at the moment. We are currently working with IT to get this resolved. We will let you know as soon as it’s been repaired.

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst & Blackboard Manager

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Monday, September 18, 2006

[BB] Bb - Safe Assignment Problem

Blackboard Users,

 

Below is an email that we received from SafeAssignment regarding the improvement of their component within Blackboard. I am passing this along to let you know the status of the situation.

 

Please let us know if you experience any difficulty or if you have any questions.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

 

Janet De La Rosa

 

 

 

Dear Technology Administrator,

 

We are happy to inform you that SafeAssignment is finally functioning normally.  A new system update implemented this morning (Friday, Sep. 15) increased the processing speed to fully usable levels, providing response times of less than 2 seconds for 99% of requests.  Some rare slow-downs with response times up to 5-6 seconds are still possible, but they should be extremely rare and brief, with response times still within acceptable limits.  We have also shut off the page reload blocking system as it is no longer needed, so you should not see the "Please do not reload this Web page" error messages any more.

 

 

Please note that this is not the main fix that we are still working on, and performance of the system will dramatically improve over the next two weeks, but current performance of SafeAssignment should be comparable to the performance levels you experienced before this crisis.  We have also started working on a software stress-testing system to ensure that no components of our processing system would cause such situations in the future.

 

Thank you very much for your patience and support.  We sincerely apologize for any inconveniences caused by this incident.

 

Best regards

 

MyDropBox Developers Team

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Friday, September 15, 2006

[BB] Bb - SafeAssignment Problem

Blackboard Users,

 

Below is an email that we received from SafeAssignment regarding the performance of their component within Blackboard. I am passing this along to let you know the status of the situation.  Please let us know if you experience any difficulty or if you have any questions.

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

 

 

 

 

Dear Technology Administrator,

 

We regret to inform you that SafeAssignment performance issues are still not resolved completely.  A new system update implemented this morning resulted in further performance improvements in all areas, and most importantly significantly reduced the percentage of time when SafeAssignment is "slow".

Now SafeAssignment provides close to normal response times (1-5 seconds) most of the day with slower response only during peak load hours.

 

We still do not have an exact ETA for the ultimate fix, but we have already identified a number of possible optimizations that should bring SafeAssignment performance to a normal level even before the fix is implemented.  We will continue working on fixing the main bug and implementing performance optimizations simultaneously.  Tomorrow we will install one more update, which can reduce the "slow" periods to just few minutes a day or completely eliminate them.  This issue will remain our top priority until we can ensure response times of less than 2 seconds on 99% of requests.

 

We are very sorry for these inconveniences and appreciate your patience and understanding.

 

 

Best regards

 

MyDropBox Developers Team

 

 

 

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Wednesday, September 13, 2006

[BB] Bb - SafeAssignment Problems

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

This morning the new release of building block 2.0.7 was applied to SafeAssignment within Blackboard.  I went ahead and checked the functionality in a few courses and the system still appeared to be a bit slow.  I contacted their technicians and they stated that many clients are currently applying this new format so the system load is high.  It should improve by later today according to Safe Assignment.

 

Please let us know if you encounter any problems or issues regarding SafeAssignment. Thank you for your patience and again, we apologize for the inconvenience this may have caused.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst and Blackboard Manager

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Tuesday, September 12, 2006

[BB] Bb - SafeAssignment Problems

Blackboard Users,

 

In relation to the previous email sent this afternoon concerning the SafeAssignment issue; the company has informed us that the new release will be available sometime tomorrow morning. We will let you know once this update has been made.

 

Again, we apologize for this inconvenience.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

-----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

[BB] Bb - SafeAssignment Problems

Blackboard users,

 

The Safe Assignment component of Blackboard is having problems.  The company, MyDropBox, states that their database currently has a bug resulting in slow processing times; pages that take 2-3 minutes to appear.  An error page is generated, when the user clicks twice on the “MyDropBox Suite/SafeAssignment” link within the Control Panel of the course. If you experience the slow processing when clicking on “My Dropbox Suite/SafeAssignment” from the control panel once, it’s best not to click the link twice because the error page will come up.  Safe Assignment should load but it may take a couple of minutes.

 

The company is working on the problem and they state that a new release will be available today for resolving this issue. 

  

As always, we apologize.  If you need help assistance, remember to click on the "Help" icon at the top of any page in Blackboard, and then click on "Contact Us" to open a ticket.  That is the best way to receive assistance from our team promptly.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa

 

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst and Blackboard Manager

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Friday, September 08, 2006

[BB] SafeAssignment Issues

Update on the SafeAssignment issue...

Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944

-----Original Message-----
From: SafeAssignment/MyDropBox Suite Team
[mailto:developers@safeassignment.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 07, 2006 5:50 PM
To: sa-admins@safeassignment.com
Subject: SafeAssignment Issues

Dear Technology Administrator,

Today SafeAssignment/MyDropBox Suite products episodically experienced
the same issues that were described yesterday. The issues had a
different cause but had similar influence on user experience. We
identified the cause of the issues and implemented a temporary solution
that fixes everything except periodical slowness of some requests, which
should not be as bad as it was during the last day and a half.
Unfortunately, we cannot guarantee that the problems will not return
until we implement a permanent solution. The permanent solution is
being developed now and is expected to be implemented by Monday. We
will do everything possible to minimize any possible inconveniences
until complete resolution of all current issues.

We are very sorry for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience
and support.

--
Best regards,
SafeAssignment Development Team

Thursday, September 07, 2006

[BB] SafeAssignmentl problems at UM

Blackboard users,
 
The SafeAssignment problem was reportedly resolved at 10:00 AM this morning, but has just returned.  The problems seem to be sporadic and effect only some interactions with the servers some of the time.  So waiting 30 seconds of so and trying again, will often overcome error messages.  The best solution for a blank screen is to wait up to 2 minutes for the page to appear.  If it doesn't. try again.  In both cases, use the "Back" button in your browser and then try whatever you were doing.  Just reloading the page will probably not work. 
 
Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
305-284-3944
 


From: Max Lytvyn [mailto:max.lytvyn@sciworth.com]
Sent: Thursday, September 07, 2006 2:48 PM
To: Vilberg, William R.
Subject: RE: Still problems at UM

Hi Bill,

 

The problems were resolved by about 10:00 today, but just came back.  We are experiencing the same situation as yesterday now, but for a different reason which is yet unknown.  We will send more information out as soon as we at least know what happened.  I am very sorry for this.

 

 

Best regards

 

Max Lytvyn, MBA
====================================
Director of Marketing and Business Development
MyDropBox Family of Products
Sciworth Inc.
Phone: 888-412-0973 ext. 8

International Line: 1-416-907-0703
Fax: 888-479-5874

From: Vilberg, William R. [mailto:bill.vilberg@miami.edu]
Sent: September 7, 2006 2:41 PM
To: Max Lytvyn
Subject: Still problems at UM
Importance: High

 

Max,

 

The last notice I got was yesterday, saying that EVERYTHING would be resolved by 8:30 AM today.  We just got a call from a faculty member.  When he went to check a set of Safe Assignment papers, he got the error message about a problem connecting to the backend server.  When we tried the same thing, we got an empty page.

 

What is the status on the problem that you were working on yesterday?

 

Bill Vilberg

Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement

305-284-3944

 

Wednesday, September 06, 2006

[BB] Safe Assignment problems

Blackboard users,
 
The Safe Assignment component of Blackboard is having problems.  The company, MyDropBox, performed some "critical performance and stability updates" between 8:30 and 9:30 this morning, resulting in a series of short service outages.  Since then there have been some additional issues that have created problems.  The symptom is an incredibly long page of Oracle errors, with instructions that you should contact me and send me the complete error report.
 
The company is working on the problem and says that all delays will be completely resolved by 8:30 AM tomorrow, Thursday. 
 
Meanwhile, if you experience the problem, use the "Back" button on your browser to return to the previous page, and resubmit the request.  The outages are short enough that you should get through again fairly quickly.  At least that is what they said.
 
As always, we apologize for the problem.  If you need help with this or anything else, remember that you can click on the "Help" icon at the top of any page in Blackboard, and then click on "Contact Us" to open a ticket.  That is the best way to receive assistance from our team.
 
Bill Vilberg

Monday, August 28, 2006

[BB] Blackboard use during storm

Blackboard Users,

 

Blackboard will be up and running during closure of the university.  The Blackboard server is hosted in Washington, DC and is accessible at all times.  Take advantage of the email capabilities incase you would like to contact your students via Blackboard and also the announcements area if you need to post messages for them as well.

 

This video shows how to use the email function within your course site: http://www6.miami.edu/bb/demos/fac/emailall.html

 

We have also placed a link on the login page of Blackboard to the university’s storm advisory page under Special Notice for up-to-date information.

 

Please let us know if you have any questions regarding Blackboard.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

 

Janet De La Rosa

 

Bb Help Desk

http://umblackboardhelp.helpdeskconnect.com/

 

 

Thursday, August 24, 2006

[BB] Enrollments

Your class rolls on Blackboard may not agree with your official MyUM class rolls.  The enrollment process on Blackboard had a major problem that we have identified and are correcting.  We will be updating the system with corrected data later today.  We will let you know when everything is corrected.

 

 

Bb Help Desk

 

 

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

[BB] First year students added

First year students were added to their course sites on Blackboard as of 5:00 AM today (Wednesday).  Have a great semester!
 
Bill Vilberg

Friday, August 18, 2006

[BB] Spring 2006 Courses

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

The spring 2006 courses have been moved from the “My Current Courses” listing. They are currently listed under the “All Courses Tab” when you log into Blackboard. 

 

Please let us know if you have any questions or need assistance. Visit us at http://umblackboardhelp.helpdeskconnect.com and click on the “Contact Customer Service” link for any requests you may have.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa and the Bb Help Desk

305.284.3949

 

 

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

[BB] Blackboard setup help

Blackboard users,
 
The clock is ticketing and the campus is about to burst into life again.  If you are setting up your course sites for the fall, here are some reminders.
 
1. Remember that new UM students are not enrolled in Blackboard until courses begin.  Students new to UM should appear in your course web site sometime Wednesday morning. (To see who is in your course web site, go to Control Panel > List / Modify Users > Submit button.)
 
2. If you need multiple sites combined into one site (what we refer to as a Course Merge) fill out the "Course Merge" form at http://snipurl.com/bbforms
 
3. If you want to copy an old site into your new site, you can do it yourself.  The video "How do I copy an old site into a new site?", which can be found at http://snipurl.com/bbinstructors, shows you how to do it. (Be sure to enter the course number when searching for the destination site.)
 
4. You can copy individual folders or items from one course site to another.  If you have seen the Modify and Remove buttons for items, note that there is a Copy item there, as well.  It allows you to copy the item either within the course or to another course.
 
5. If you use the Digital Dropbox, please contact us.  This feature is being phased out in favor of the Assignment feature.  We recommend that you switch, since Assignments is much more powerful and easier to use.  Dropbox will continue to be available until we upgrade to Blackboard version 7, and we will certainly not do that during this semester.
 
6. We are using a new ticketing system.  If you need help you can create a ticket by clicking on the Help button on Blackboard or going to http://umblackboardhelp.helpdeskconnect.com and click on the "Contact customer service" link.  We will handle messages sent to blackboard@miami.edu by manually entering them into the ticketing system.
 
Bill Vilberg
Assoc. Dir. of Instructional Advancement
 

Wednesday, July 26, 2006

[BB] Fall Term Courses Released

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

The fall term courses should now show up in the “My Current Courses” area of Blackboard.  These courses are received from the registration system.  Please let us know if a course that you are registered for is not showing.

 

If you need course merging assistance, please refer to this form:  Course Merge: http://www6.miami.edu/bb/forms/combine_courses.htm

 

Here are some helpful videos regarding course copying and preparation of content areas:

http://www6.miami.edu/bb/demos/instructors.html

 

Please feel free to contact us should you have any questions or need assistance.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa & the Bb Help Desk Team (blackboard@miami.edu)

 

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Monday, June 05, 2006

[BB] Fall 2000 - Spring 2003 Course Status

Blackboard Users,

 

Course sites from Fall 2000 through Spring 2003 have been rolled off of the blackboard system as part of our system maintenance. Restoration of any individual sites can be requested through blackboard@miami.edu if necessary.  Please let us know if you have any questions or need any assistance.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa & the Bb Help Desk

Friday, May 26, 2006

[BB] Removal and Uploading of Course Documents Resolved

Blackboard Users,

The problem dealing with removal and uploading of course content has been resolved. Please let us know if you experience any difficulty with your courses. Remember when adding an item to your course site, always make sure it worked by clicking on the link and view the document.

Please let us know if we can be of any of assistance. Thank you for your patience.

Sincerely,

Janet De La Rosa and the Bb Help Desk

Thursday, May 25, 2006

[BB] Removal and Uploading of Course Documents

Blackboard Users,

 

We have identified the cause of problem mentioned last Tuesday 5/18/06 dealing with removal and uploading of course content.  Instructors and administrators are not able to upload documents or remove them. In addition, broken links are generated within course document items and assignments that are copied from one course to another such as Word documents, Powerpoint files, and PDF’s.  If you add an item to your course site, always remember after you upload to make sure it worked by clicking on the link and view the document.

 

We will keep you updated. If you have any questions please let us (blackboard@miami.edu) know.

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa & the Blackboard Help Desk

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Thursday, May 18, 2006

[BB] Removal and Uploading of Course Documents

Blackboard Users,

This afternoon our help desk started noticing some problematic course content areas within a couple of course sites. The problem deals with the menu items such as Course Documents, Assignments, and Syllabus areas. Instructors and administrators are not able to upload documents or remove them. However, items are created and an error ID is generated when a file upload is attempted. This may not be the case for all course sites. If you experience any difficulties or the symptoms mentioned above with your course site(s) please let us (blackboard@miami.edu) know. The problem was escalated to our Blackboard technicians this afternoon and they are researching what exactly is going on.

We will keep you updated as to when this problem will be resolved. If you have any questions please let us know.


Sincerely,

Janet De La Rosa & the Blackboard Help Desk

Tuesday, May 09, 2006

[BB] Enrollments of Fall 2006 Students in Course Sites

 

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

The process for uploading enrolled students into their course sites for Fall 2006 has been completed. 

 

If you need assistance in merging courses for the Fall 2006 term, please fill out our form so that we can assist you with this request: http://www.miami.edu/bb/forms/combine_courses.htm

 

Other videos on assisting instructors with various tools on Bb are also available here: http://www.miami.edu/bb/demos/instructors.html

 

Please let us (blackboard@miami.edu / x.3949) know if we can be of further assistance or if you run into any difficulty while setting up your courses.

 

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa and the Blackboard Help Desk

 

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Monday, May 08, 2006

[BB] Bb Server Downtime over this past weekend

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

The Blackboard server experienced downtime on Saturday, May 6th, 2006 due to loading errors at times 5:17 p.m. and then at 7:28 p.m. The downtime was brief and no longer than 3 minutes. The system has been restored and should be running normally now. We apologize for this inconvenience especially now during the finalization of grades. Please let us know if you experience any difficulties with Bb from this point on.  (Blackboard@miami.edu, x.3949)

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa and the Bb Help Desk

----------------------------------------------------------

Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

-----------------------------------------------------------

 

Friday, May 05, 2006

[BB] Enrollments of Fall 2006 students in course sites

Hello Blackboard Users,

 

On Monday, May 8th, 2006, at approximately 9:00 am, we will begin to upload students into their fall 2006 courses. All students except freshman will be uploaded.  These courses will not show up under the “My Current Courses” under the home tab, but they are available under the “All Courses” tab.

If you are currently uploading content or working with content within your courses, you may want to make the course unavailable. To make a course unavailable, go to the control panel of that course, go to settings under course options, click the second link “Course Availability”, and then click No.  

 

Please let us (blackboard@miami.edu x. 3949) know if you have any questions or concerns regarding the enrolling of the students into your course sites for Fall 2006.

 

Also, let us know if we can be of assistance with anything else.

 

Sincerely,

 

Janet De La Rosa and the Blackboard Help Desk

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Janet De La Rosa (janet.delarosa@miami.edu)

Systems Analyst

Instructional Advancement Center

University of Miami 

Coral Gables, FL

www.miami.edu

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