Blackboard Updates

Blackboard production has been updated as follows:

1. Installation of the SafeAssign building block
2. Purging of the Activity accumulator table
3. Upgrade of the Learning objects Building blocks
1. Journal
2. Team
3. Podcast
4. Expo
4. Fall course closing

These updates have been confirmed and tested by CIRT

Blackboard 8 Upgrade

The installation of Blackboard 8 has been patched up to 8.0.375.0. The installation has been confirmed and tested by CIRT.

Blackboard Maintenance Complete

The Blackboard Learning System maintenance is complete and Blackboard is now available. Instructors may login to Blackboard: http://blackboard.unf.edu
to access Blackboard courses and to request Spring 2009 courses using BbCAR (Blackboard Course Action Request System).

Instructions: http://www.unf.edu/dept/cirt/bb/faq/course_request.html

New features in Blackboard include Safe Assign, a plagiarism-detection tool. More information is available here:

http://www.unf.edu/dept/cirt/bb/pilot/safeassign.html

*Note- the Safe Assignment content type is not available by default; to use the tool, turn on in Control Panel.
CONTROL PANEL > MANAGE TOOLS > CONTENT TYPE AVAILABILITY

Learning Objects Wiki tool partial outage

Bb Wiki was generating errors for some users this morning (12/4/2008). This was a partial outage and only affected certain users, while others were able to use the tool. Bb Wiki is functioning properly for everyone as of 11:40 AM.

6:40 PM: It was reported that the wiki tool failed again on one of the servers. The Learning Objects tool has been restarted at 6:40 PM.

Finals Week and Blackboard Winter Maintenance

Finals week is quickly approaching and as in previous semesters, in anticipation of increased usage of Blackboard during the final week of the semester (December 7 -12), we will further optimize Blackboard's performance by making the Course Copy feature unavailable. Enrollment updates will also be suspended and will resume on December 14, 2008.

We ask that you follow these tips to further improve Blackboard performance during the remainder of the semester:
• Allow your students to take an examination during non-peak hours (such as at night or during the weekend).
• Allow an extended time period for exams: set a timer for an exam and allow students an extended period of time over which they may take the timed assessment.
• Setup your exams to display all questions at once rather than one at a time.
• Do not delete assessments that have been deployed and graded. Instead, make the items unavailable in a content area and make the Gradebook item unavailable and do not include the item in Gradebook score calculations.
• Do not import courses or course cartridges to Blackboard during the last weeks of the semester.
• Remind students not to attempt assessments during the Blackboard Maintenance Windows: every day from 2 AM until 5 AM and additionally on Sundays from 5 AM until 9 AM.
• For more assessment tips, visit the CIRT website:
o Tips for Faculty: http://www.unf.edu/dept/cirt/bb/support/assess_tips_faculty.html
o Tips for Students: http://www.unf.edu/dept/cirt/bb/support/assess_tips.html

Blackboard will be unavailable for scheduled maintenance from December 19, 2008 at 12:01 a.m. until December 23, 2008 at 11:59 p.m. During this system downtime, users will be unable to access Blackboard courses and Blackboard Course Requests (BbCAR).

Please note: Fall Term Grades are due Tuesday, December 16, 2008 by 10:00 a.m. If you keep your grades on Blackboard and are unable to turn in your grades by this deadline, you will need to download your Blackboard Gradebook by 11:59 p.m. on Thursday, December 18, 2008. Click here for instructions: http://www.unf.edu/dept/cirt/bb/faq/download_grades.html

Please contact CIRT if you have any questions or concerns: cirtlab@unf.edu or 904.620.3927.

Learning Objects Wiki tool Restored

The learning object wiki tool was restored to full functionality on all instances of Blackboard as of 9:00 am Monday morning.