Blackboard was upgraded from Service Pack 5 to Service Pack 9 in September 2013.
There are several new features in Service Pack 9 that will benefit students and instructors. See TAC’s web page for more details on what’s new in the upgrade.
Category: Blackboard Tips
Scheduled Blackboard Maintenance April – December 2013
We are happy to announce a series of scheduled outages to perform maintenance on Blackboard.
We are also planning two longer outages later this year for proposed service pack upgrades.
The planned maintenance and upgrades will benefit Blackboard users and keep our system stable and up-to-date.
Outage schedule:
– 3-hour (6-9AM) outages on the following Saturdays for general maintenance activities
April 20 2013 – complete
May 18 2013 – complete
July 6 2013 – complete
August 3 2013 – complete
October 19 2013 – complete
November 28 2013 (Thanksgiving Day) – this outage will last from 6 am – 6 pm – complete
– 3 day outages for proposed service pack upgrades:
September 13-15 2013: Service Pack 9 – complete
December 20-22 2013
Blackboard Mobile
Blackboard Mobile Learn, an app for Mac and Android devices, is available for students and instructors to purchase and download directly from the Apple or Android store for $1.99 per year, or $5.99 for a lifetime license. The mobile app allows you to use some of the features of a full Blackboard course site on your smartphone or tablet: post announcements, use discussion boards and blogs, view class lists, and check tasks. More information on Blackboard Mobile here
Changes to Cross-Listed and Combined Course Sites
Changes in the ways that cross-listed courses and combined sections are displayed in Blackboard rolled out on March 6. Until recently, instructors combined sites (e.g. C001) or a cross-listed sites (e.g. X495), but not both. If you have multiple sections of a cross-listed course, you now have the option to choose between a combined site or a cross-listed site; both will be generated in Blackboard. More details here on combined and cross-listed sites
Paste from Word tool
Pasting text from MS Word directly onto a Blackboard page can cause formatting issues due to hidden code in Word.
Blackboard has a Paste from Word tool in the text editor that cleans up code in the pasted text while retaining its formatting.
Look for a button on the right side of the bottom tool bar in the text editor window. Click the down arrow, and select Paste from Word:
Course Copy Email
If you copy a course to a new term, Blackboard sends an automated “course copy complete” email.
But this email is often sent before the actual copy process has completed. It’s a good idea to wait a few hours after receiving the email before checking the new course site.
You can find the course copy in the Control Panel under Packages and Utilities:
