[BB] Safe Assignment situation

Blackboard users,

 

If you (1) used Safe Assignment last semester and (2) copied your old course site into this semester's course site, you may run into problems.  Here are the things to do in your new course site.  (If you are not going to use Safe Assignment until next week sometime, wait until then and follow the new directions that I will be distributing on Monday or Tuesday.  We will be applying a technical patch that will simplify this process.)

 

1. Go to Control Panel > MyDropBox Suite and click on the "Synchronize this course" link.  Wait five minutes.  Nothing will visibly change, but the assignments and database should be correctly attached.

 

2. Go to the Control Panel > Assignments (or where ever your Safe Assignment links are located) and, for each Safe Assignment, click on the Modify button, and the Submit button.  You don't need to change anything, just submit the page.  That will update the links to point to your current course.  Otherwise the students (but not you) will get error messages when they try to submit a paper because the link will point to your previous course.

 

This ONLY applies to course sites where Safe Assignments were copied from a previous course site.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Recall: Putting assignments on Blackboard

Vilberg, William R. would like to recall the message, "Putting assignments on Blackboard".

[BB] Sorry - sent message to list rather than our support team

Blackboard users,

 

The last message I sent probably makes no sense.  The subject was "FW: Putting assignments on Blackboard" and you should just delete it.

 

I meant to send it to the Blackboard support team.  Instead I sent it to the Bb mailing list.  Sorry. 

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] After course copy, synchronize Safe Assignment

Blackboard users,

 

After copying a course site that has Safe Assignments, you should ALWAYS go to the new course > Control Panel > MyDropBox Suite (SafeAssignment), and click on the link to synchronize this new site. 

 

Even if the synchronization status message, when you get there, says that synchronization was successful, you NEED to synchronize it manually.  OK?

 

The synchronization process takes care of fixing the Safe Assignments so they point to your new site, rather than the old site.  If you don't do this there will be a number of problems that you and the students may encounter.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] SafeAssignment issue resolved / Synchronize your previous sites

Blackboard users,

 

The SafeAssignment issue has been identified and resolved.  SafeAssignment should be working now.  If you still encounter any error messages, let us know, OK?

 

If you have existing SafeAssignments, you should make sure that they are "synchronized" with the upgraded version of SafeAssignment that we are using.  The submissions and reports from previous classes will not be available until you take this step.

 

To synchronize, go to Control Panel > MyDropBox Suite (SafeAssignment) in each of your sites.  When the page loads it will either say that synchronization was successful (as shown below) or failed. 

 

 

If it failed, click on the "Synchronize this course" link.  Then check back in 5-15 minutes to see if synchronization succeeded.  If it didn't, please let us know, OK?

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] SafeAssignment issues / Seeing your site as a student

Blackboard users,

 

Some classes are running into problems with SafeAssignment.  The company, MyDropBox, is looking into the situation.  I will report back what I hear. 

 

If you are using SafeAssignment you might want to test things as a student before announcing your first assignment.  If you need a student account in order to do that, please fill out the on-line form.  You can find the form by clicking on the "Support" tab in Blackboard, then the "Online Forms" link, and then the "Student Account" link.  Once we create the student account we will let you know.  Once you have the account you can enroll it in your classes by going to Control Panel > Add Users and searching for you last name to locate the account.  Then enroll it.  When you login with the student user name and password, you will then be able to experience your course site as your students experience it.  OK?

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

LAMS Building Block

LAMS is an opensource system that allows for synchronous computer moderated learning.  There is a b2 to integrate it with Blackboard.

 

www.lamsfoundation.org (Encourages use of LAMS)

www.lamsinternational.com (Sells support services)

 

[BB] The cost of getting a new Bb customer

FYI:  One of my daily newsletters, Wired Campus, included a blurb about Blackboard's cost of acquiring customers.  If you are interested, read on and check out the link.

 

The Economics of Blackboard: For Blackboard, the popular provider of collegiate course-management systems, new clients don't come cheap. A new study estimates that Blackboard spends about $259,000 -- mostly on software demonstrations and proposal writing -- for each college it woos. To make that fee worthwhile, writes the blogger Michael Feldstein, the company tries pitching its wares to university systems rather than individual campuses. And Blackboard makes it a point to "upsell and cross-sell like crazy," aggressively offering additional products to institutions that already use its learning-management system, Mr. Feldstein says. On the one hand, that's just capitalism at work. But on the other, it's in sharp contrast to the economics of open-source digital course management, in which the virtues of new products are self-evident and require little promoting. (e-Literate)

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Bb back up

Bb list members,

 

The Bb system is back up.  We have a log file that is VERY large (55 GB) and growing rapidly.  Blackboard is investigating why that is happening and keeping tighter watch on that file.  Hopefully they will be able to identify the error message that is being written to that file and eliminate it so that this won't happen again.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Bb system not responding

Bb mailing list,

 

Our Bb system stopped responding a few moments ago.  We have been on the phone with Blackboard.  They are working on it.  I will let you know when I hear something.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] SSL certificate has been updated

The SSL certificate on Blackboard has been updated.  When going to www.miami.edu/blackboard, you shouldn't see any more security warning messages related to the security certificate.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Missing content AGAIN

Bb list members,

 

The snapshot problem has, again, stepped on your course sites.  The first symptom is the extra "Welcome" announcements.  A more serious consequence is the removal of any content that was not in Syllabus, Course Documents, or External Links, to the best of my knowledge.  So if you had a content area called, "Projects", it is gone. 

 

If the area came from a previous site we will be happy to copy it into your spring 2006 site.  Just tell us what needs to be copied, where to find it, and where to put it.

 

If it was created in your spring 2006 site you are going to have to redo the process.

 

I promise that this will not occur again.  I am changing the automated snapshot update process by adding a manual inspection step before the data is processed.  That will mean that updates won't occur in the middle of the night, but it will keep situations such as this from occurring again.  Twice in the past seven days is at least once, if not twice, too much!

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Archiving your course sites

Bb list members,

 

I am fully aware that the loss of content twice in the last two weeks has reduced confidence.  I am sorry.

 

WHAT WE HAVE DONE:  We have changed the update process so that it is no longer fully automated.  We must go in, inspect the data, and release it, before it will be processed.  That should eliminate the repetition of the problem we have just experienced.

 

WHAT YOU CAN DO:  We encourage you to "export" your course site each time you have worked on it.  Every few weeks, or anytime you have invested an hour or more working on a site, export your site to your computer.  This creates a file that we can use, at any time in the future, to restore your site as it was when exported.  The process of exporting a site consists of going to Control Panel > Export Course, selecting the things that you want exported, and clicking the Submit button. When the next page appears, right-click on the "Click the right mouse button and select Save As" link and select "Save As" or "Save Target As" or whatever it is called in your browser.  Then specify where to save the file ON YOUR COMPUTER.  This is a zip file, containing everything from your course site and all the settings needed to recreate your site.  It can be used to restore your site, or a temporary site, so that you can access the content as it was when exported.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Again...

I know I said it wouldn't happen again.  Imagine my surprise when a faculty member called me on my cell around 6:00 PM and told me it already had happened again.  If I can't believe myself, who can I believe?

 

SHORT EXPLANATION:  Things got messed up at 4:00 PM when the whole mess started up again.  It repeated the process of removing anything that had been accomplished today.  It was supposed to be stopped sometime before 7:00 PM so, supposedly, things are back to a point where the sites can be worked on.

 

If we did work for you, correcting the error on your site after either of the previous problems, we will automatically reapply the corrections.  I will start working on it now.  We will send out notifications as we complete the sites that we know about.

 

LONG EXPLANATION:  At 3:30 PM I asked Blackboard to kill any snapshot processes that were still running from this mornings fiasco and then to start the hourly snapshot processing.  That way, when I put the files out tomorrow after carefully inspecting them, they would be processed on the next hour.  At 4:00 PM the process ran.  The process does three things: it transfers any files from a location at UM to our Blackboard system.

 

COMMENT:  I want to thank the people who have informed of these problems.  In each of the three cases it was a faculty member who made me aware of the issue.  I cannot overstate how wonderful that is.  I need your eyes monitoring what is happening.  Never hesitate to communicate with us about any issue.  Your notices are NEVER inappropriate.  I list my phone numbers on my signature so that you can use them.  Feel free to call, especially if you have sent an e-mail message and I haven't replied or sent a heads-up to the Bb mailing list.  The notice today came on my cell phone while I was driving down US 1.  The faculty member apologized profusely for calling me after hours on my cell phone.  There was no need to apologize.  I thank him, and all of you who are helping monitor things.  I promise to keep you informed whenever a problem appears.  I thank you for keeping me informed when you see something that might indicate a problem exists.

 

Best Day  (A good day is when good things happen.  Today was not a good day.  A best day is when you make the best of whatever happens.  We tried to make today the best day we could.)

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Snapshots gone wild!

Bb list members,

 

It appears that the snapshot process was corrupted again last night and 062 content may be messed up.  I haven't had time to check but I wanted to let you know that I am working on it.  I will send an update as soon as I have more information.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] SSL Certificate situation

Our SSL certificate expired yesterday.  You may start seeing a warning when you go to Blackboard about a certificate problem.  I have contacted Blackboard to renew the certificate ASAP.  I hope we can get this accomplished before Tuesday, when classes begin.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Please check any content in your spring sites

If you set up your spring 2006 sites prior Saturday, the snapshot error on Friday might have removed some of the content.  Please review your site to make sure your content is all there.  If it isn't there you will have to repeat the process that you used to put it there before.  I apologize for the extra work that this will cause.  If we can help in any way, let us know what needs to be copied, etc., OK?

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Problem with course sites - explained

Bb list members,

 

BRIEF EXPLANATION:  The multiple announcements issue is now explained.  Our snapshot file on Thursday night contained all 6,000+ spring course sites. It should have only contained the 10 or so new courses that had been added to the registrations system. This caused the repeated "Welcome!" announcements on all the sites.

 

CONSEQUENCE:  There is no way to automatically correct the problem.  I apologize.  To correct the problem on your spring 2006 sites, please go to each of your sites and use Control Panel > Announcements and then Remove the extra "Welcome!" announcements.

 

LONG EXPLANATION:  Every hour the snapshot processes starts running and processes any data that is present.  If there is no data, it shuts down.  If there is data, it processes it.  Normally this process takes a few minutes, at most, to create any new courses, add any new users, and enroll both students and instructors in their course sites..  Part of creating a new site is copying the Announcement into the new site.  That takes a bit of time.  With 6,000 sites it takes longer than an hour.  So a second process began before the first process ended and started reprocessing the data.  That added a second announcement.  This took longer than an hour, so a third announcement was added.  With more processes running, the whole thing slowed down.  Each one took longer and longer to make it through the entire list of 6,000 sites.  The sites at the beginning of the list were processed by all each run that started, but the ones at the end of the list were only processed by the runs that were able to end normally.  We killed all runs at around 11:00 AM.  The list is alphabetical, so Accounting (ACC) has 10 "Welcome!" announcements while Theatre Arts (THA) only has 3 "Welcome!" announcements.

 

In order to keep this from happening again we will be getting Blackboard to change the way the snapshot files are processed so that a new job will not start if the previous job has not completed.

 

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] SafeAssignment updated to MyDropBox Suite

SafeAssignment has been updated on our Blackboard server.  SafeAssignment now contains a number of new features to streamline your workflow.  Here are some quick notes, provided by the company.

1. Interface Enhancements:

a. New Quick Submit Functionality – Quick Submit functionality became independent of Blackboard Assignments, and now allows instructors to upload files for checking directly from their instructor accounts in a more intuitive manner. Also, the new Quick Submit feature supports organizing batch uploads into subfolders for higher convenience. (WRV NOTE: Files that you Quick Submit using the new Quick Submit tab in the MyDropBox Suite tool, are NOT associated with a specific course.  They are your submissions and are shown in the Quick Submit tab of the MyDropBox Suite in ALL your courses.  If you use this feature, I encourage you to use the New Folder box to create folders to organize your paper BEFORE you submit it.)

b. New Safe Assignment View page – the table displaying the list of submitted papers and available reports in SafeAssignment is now more compact with graphical icons instead of text links.

c. New View Paper Link – now instructors can view the text of student-submitted with all original formatting, meta-information about the paper, and student comments on one screen without downloading the file with the corresponding paper (downloading is also available).

d. New Grade Update Form in the Gradebook – now SafeAssignment reports and other SafeAssignment-related information can be viewed directly from the Grade Update form in the Blackboard Gradebook, making the grading process one-step, as opposed to the two-step process with SafeAssignment 1.x.

e. New Integrated Student View – now students can view assignment grade, instructor comments and SafeAssignment report in one integrated view.

f. Local Time Zone Support – SafeAssignment 2.0 uses local time zone of your Blackboard server for all time management within Blackboard (e.g. assignment availability dates & times, submission timestamps in Gradebook and Control Panel etc). Please note that there is still one place where submission timestamps are displayed in Eastern Standard Time – the headers of the reports (fix be fixed soon). All timestamps have time zone abbreviations attached to them to avoid any confusion.

g. Unfortunately, some of the expected and announced interface enhancements, such as progress bar display on big/slow report downloads or paper uploads, sorting Safe Assignment View table by submission time, and “What Is This” links next to some of the elements of SafeAssignment forms that may require extra explanation, were pushed back to version 2.1, which is due in February 2006. However, some of such interface enhancements will be added on the background without reinstallation of the SafeAssignment Building Block, and will appear automatically before the version 2.1 is released.

2. Integration with the MyDropBox Suite – (not relevant at UM) this version brings integration with the MyDropBox Suite Standalone and with the Re:Mark online grading and marking solution. Other products will be integrated later this spring. For more information on the MyDropBox Suite visit our updated Web site (http://www.MyDropBox.com/).

a. Re:Mark Integration – (not relevant at UM) Re:Mark online paper marking and grading system is offered to all current users of SafeAssignment at no extra cost only until August 2006 and is automatically enabled after upgrade to SafeAssignment 2.0. Any paper submitted to SafeAssignment can be commented on via Re:Mark right in Blackboard. However, due to temporary lack of training materials on Re:Mark, it is recommended to limit use of this tool to product reviews and evaluations. You can find more information on Re:Mark in the corresponding section of the MyDropBox Web site (http://www.mydropbox.com/services/remark.php). You can also preview Re:Mark enhancements planned for this spring - http://www.mydropbox.com/info/remark_demo.exe. Please forward to us any suggestions and/or feature requests regarding Re:Mark.

b. MyDropBox Suite Standalone Integration - (not relevant at UM) all changes committed by a user in the Blackboard interface, including all papers, grades and reports, will now be synchronized with the corresponding user’s account in the standalone version of the MyDropBox Suite, which makes parallel use of Blackboard-integrated and Standalone versions in one institution much easier. Standalone and Blackboard-integrated versions of the MyDropBox Suite now use one institutional database of submitted papers guaranteeing proper comparison of papers across two different versions of our services used within one institution. Please note that at this point synchronization of Courses and Assignments is offered in one direction only – from Blackboard to Standalone (i.e. Assignments registered in Standalone are not created in Blackboard, but Assignments created in Blackboard automatically appear in Standalone). Other (smaller) data units, such as reports, are synchronized bi-directionally.

3. Speed and Stability Enhancements:

a. Faster Paper Uploads and Report Downloads – on very fast connections, where data transfer speeds were limited by our servers, the throughput can increase by more than 5 times. Users with slower Internet connections should also experience noticeable speed increases.

b. Easy Copying of Courses with Safe Assignments – with SafeAssignment 1.x, copying a course (e.g. using one course as a template and “multiplying” it), would break connections between each new copy of the course and the corresponding database record in SafeAssignment system. This issue could be fixed by manually synchronizing each Safe Assignment in each new copy of a course. Now all Safe Assignments in a new copy of a course can by synchronized with one click (http://www.safeassignment.com/sync_course.pdf).

c. Numerous other stability enhancements and minor bug fixes.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)

 

[BB] Problem with course sites

Bb listserv members,

 

Something is going on with the course creation process on Blackboard.  It looks like the process is stuck.  As it cycles through, trying to create our course sites over and over, it adds another copy of the default announcement and removes any banner that you might have added.

 

Material that you have placed in your course sites should still be there.  This problem shouldn't remove items, other than the banner, as far as I can tell.

 

Blackboard has been notified and is investigating.

 

Please don't try to "correct" things at this time.  Once Blackboard has stopped the runaway process, I will let you know.  Then any problems can be corrected.  This will probably be a manual process that you will need to perform.

 

I am embarrassed that this has happened.  The Announcement page is the first page that anyone sees when they enter a course site.  Having multiple copies of the same announcement looks very unprofessional and my name is listed next to each one.  Sorry.

 

If you have special information about your course site that contradicts what I have said above, please let me know so I can investigate further.

 

Bill Vilberg

305-284-3949 (work); 786-218-3052 (cell); 305-255-9138 (home)