Our Custom Theme is back and working great!
Thanks to the good working of Product Development, the Web Tech team, and Bb Support, we have our custom 2012 theme working great again.
As you may recall from an earlier post, in our 2012 theme we use 2 small images, one of our College logo and another is the 1x1 transparency slide to hide the plus sign "+" image on the background of the Learn environment.
In pleading my case to Blackboard that I want to be able to "brand" my environment, they adjusted the SaaS environment so that all of us can do that now.
We made the change during our Spring Break in March and I am happy to report all is working well now.
I know this took some work on Blackboard's part and i very much appreciate their efforts to provide what we needed. I believe this will benefit everyone.
Tuesday, April 4, 2017
Tuesday, February 28, 2017
February 28, 2017 - EvaluationKIT - You will not believe this one!
We started using EvaluationKIT in the fall semester of 2016 while we were still self-hosted. At that time, we talked with EvalKIT about our move to SaaS and they shared with us a link to their SaaS building blocks.
I learned today that their link to their SaaS B2s were ... let's call them ambitious. It seems their integration will use REST API not building blocks. What they shared with us and what we had loaded on our SaaS environments are apparently not going to work so we wasted time and effort.
To our benefit, Blackboard Support Tier II appreciating our situation is riding in as my "knight in shining armor" and will work with EvalKIT's developers and help us deploy and test the REST API.
Yes, I have to trail blaze once again but it is great Bb Support is there to help and support us.
We started using EvaluationKIT in the fall semester of 2016 while we were still self-hosted. At that time, we talked with EvalKIT about our move to SaaS and they shared with us a link to their SaaS building blocks.
I learned today that their link to their SaaS B2s were ... let's call them ambitious. It seems their integration will use REST API not building blocks. What they shared with us and what we had loaded on our SaaS environments are apparently not going to work so we wasted time and effort.
To our benefit, Blackboard Support Tier II appreciating our situation is riding in as my "knight in shining armor" and will work with EvalKIT's developers and help us deploy and test the REST API.
Yes, I have to trail blaze once again but it is great Bb Support is there to help and support us.
Monday, February 27, 2017
In testing 3100.11, Q4 2016 CU1, we found a problem with meta data displaying in Users and in tables for users and courses in the GUI. Put in a ticket with Support and found out our "custom theme" is causing the meta data to display. It is another example of not being able to brand our environment.
This apparently means for every update, we will have to rebuild the theme. I really wish I did not have to do that.
This apparently means for every update, we will have to rebuild the theme. I really wish I did not have to do that.
Thursday, February 16, 2017
February 16, 2017 - Building Block in SaaS Will Require Change Management
In SaaS, one no longer has the ability to add or update building blocks. From my chair, that is GREAT! The wear and tear of keeping up on the Maintenance Guide and Groups A, B, C, etc. for properly updating B2s was a great deal of work. I am MORE an happy to simply create a ticket and ask Support to add/update a building block.
One change I wasn't expecting was seeing in Saint Mary's collection of B2s non-licensed 3rd party building blocks such as Respondus Lockdown Browser. It is listed but the status is inactive.
For the SaaS environments, it appears all partner building blocks will be listed, it is just up to each client (institution) if they wish to license it and make it available. We have been dealing with the Barnes and Noble for years this way so to me, this is no big deal. I sort of like seeing who are "possible" partners!!!
A girl can dream!
In SaaS, one no longer has the ability to add or update building blocks. From my chair, that is GREAT! The wear and tear of keeping up on the Maintenance Guide and Groups A, B, C, etc. for properly updating B2s was a great deal of work. I am MORE an happy to simply create a ticket and ask Support to add/update a building block.
One change I wasn't expecting was seeing in Saint Mary's collection of B2s non-licensed 3rd party building blocks such as Respondus Lockdown Browser. It is listed but the status is inactive.
For the SaaS environments, it appears all partner building blocks will be listed, it is just up to each client (institution) if they wish to license it and make it available. We have been dealing with the Barnes and Noble for years this way so to me, this is no big deal. I sort of like seeing who are "possible" partners!!!
A girl can dream!
February 16, 2017 - Changes in Privileges to Roles
I do not know when this happened but privileges to standard roles (instructor, course building, TAs) got changed along the way. The student role was not affected.
I put in a ticket with Support and requested a report of our activity accumulator and Support was able to help find who had created accounts and what enrollments had taken place outside of our SIS feed files. SaaS is checking to see when and why the privileges were changed.
Note to self... periodically check privileges.
I do not know when this happened but privileges to standard roles (instructor, course building, TAs) got changed along the way. The student role was not affected.
I put in a ticket with Support and requested a report of our activity accumulator and Support was able to help find who had created accounts and what enrollments had taken place outside of our SIS feed files. SaaS is checking to see when and why the privileges were changed.
Note to self... periodically check privileges.
Tuesday, January 31, 2017
February 7, 2017 - Themes problem in SaaS.
I first posted about this a week ago and didn't want to update it until we have a fix. Even though we are "running" okay for now, we are not where I want us to be.
I have always kept our Blackboard system very "vanilla". When it came to branding, all I did was change the colors of the 2012 theme to use Saint Mary's colors, added the 1x1 transparency image to get rid of the pixeled plus sign Blackboard icons and a banner image file for the top frame so users knew they were at Saint Mary's.
We have been experiencing periods of slowness. Like 20 to 45 seconds to open a link, tool, etc. For a cloud environment, that shouldn't happen.
I put in a ticket and it was discovered that my 2 little image files are living on a part of the SaaS environment that is then populating, deploying every time someone clicks on something in a course. So, the more users on the system, the more areas navigated in a course, the slower the system gets!
Moving my 2 files to a different location appears not to be a quick fix so.... I am having to use a Bb default 2012 theme and I cannot brand the theme to look the way I want.
So, I had to send yet another email to the faculty explaining I have to make the visual change, reassure them, nothing content-wise will be touched and say yet again, I am so sorry.
I do trust Blackboard will find a way to give me my branding back but how this wasn't discovered until now I do not understand.
I first posted about this a week ago and didn't want to update it until we have a fix. Even though we are "running" okay for now, we are not where I want us to be.
I have always kept our Blackboard system very "vanilla". When it came to branding, all I did was change the colors of the 2012 theme to use Saint Mary's colors, added the 1x1 transparency image to get rid of the pixeled plus sign Blackboard icons and a banner image file for the top frame so users knew they were at Saint Mary's.
We have been experiencing periods of slowness. Like 20 to 45 seconds to open a link, tool, etc. For a cloud environment, that shouldn't happen.
I put in a ticket and it was discovered that my 2 little image files are living on a part of the SaaS environment that is then populating, deploying every time someone clicks on something in a course. So, the more users on the system, the more areas navigated in a course, the slower the system gets!
Moving my 2 files to a different location appears not to be a quick fix so.... I am having to use a Bb default 2012 theme and I cannot brand the theme to look the way I want.
So, I had to send yet another email to the faculty explaining I have to make the visual change, reassure them, nothing content-wise will be touched and say yet again, I am so sorry.
I do trust Blackboard will find a way to give me my branding back but how this wasn't discovered until now I do not understand.
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