As part of the DEO’s work to future-proof and improve the Re/Play service, we will be working with IT Services from 11 am on 12 April to implement an improved data service. This work will switch the data provision from legacy to current systems and introduce some improvements in the way staff are associated with recordings.

There should be no impact on the service and we will be monitoring activity prior to and during the start of term.

If you have any questions, please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

As we enter 2024 and approach the start of TB2, we wanted to highlight how to get the best from Re/Play content that has been copied into Blackboard courses from previous years. During 2022 and 2023, we updated the way that Re/Play presentations are added to Blackboard and, as a result of that, content that was added prior to 2022 will not work for students when copied into new courses.

As part of your content preparation, we would recommend checking your Re/Play presentations and updating them where needed. If a presentation does not have the orange play icon, but has either four orange dots or a green play icon, it will need replacing.

To replace a presentation:

1. Log on to Blackboard.
2. In your Blackboard course, click on Build Content and Item or Blank Page (or edit an existing item).
3. In the Blackboard editor, add any descriptive text required to support the presentation, position the cursor where you wish to add it, then click the ‘⊕’ button in the editor menu bar (if the button is not visible, click ‘…’ to expand the bar.)
4. Choose Re/Play Content from under Additional Tools. If the presentation you want to add is already on Re/Play, in this Add Video section you can select it. If you can’t find it, use the Filters box to narrow down your search. You can filter by several parameters. First check for ownership – whether you created the video or if it was shared with you. Then you can filter by how the recording was created. Mediasite recorder is the in-room box for lecture capture, Mosaic (video showing installation and use) is the software you can use to create ad hoc recordings, and Media Upload is where you have manually uploaded a file from your device.
5. Then select Embed Video.

For further support, please see our Re/Play guidance.

Some students are experiencing issues when trying to view Re/Play videos embedded in Blackboard, receiving an error message stating that there is a problem with the LTI launch due to not being authorised to view the content. Playback via the link in the left-hand menu of courses is not being affected.

The supplier is aware of this issue and is working to bring the service back to normal functioning. We will update this blog with any further developments.

You can add content via the ‘Build Content’ menu in your Blackboard course to mitigate the issue:

1. In your Blackboard course, click on Build Content and Item
2. Select RePlay Content
3. Locate the presentation you wish to add and select Link Video.

If you have any concerns or questions, please contact us by emailing digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

You may be experiencing intermittent issues with searching within Re/Play when adding presentations to Unit Collections, or searching for unit folders to locate presentations to add to Blackboard content areas. As these issues are intermittent, you may have success trying again at another time.

The supplier is aware of this issue and is working to bring the search back to normal functioning. We will update this blog with any further developments.

Student playback of videos is not affected by this issue.

If you have any concerns or questions, please contact us by emailing digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

This update relates to problems with Editing in Re/Play

The issue whereby some edits made in Re/Play returned a ‘fail’ error was acknowledged as a bug by the supplier. A fix for this bug was implemented on the 18th March. DEO testing and monitoring suggests that this fix was successful.

The supplier has notified us that sometimes the fail message was returned in error, when edits had in fact saved successfully. If you received an error message previously, it may be that your edits have already been saved. You should be able to see from the video playback whether your edits have or haven’t saved successfully. Please contact us at digital-education@bristol.ac.uk if you are unsure, or need further guidance.

Please note that if you edit the video while the captions are being generated, this can cause the captions to fail. They will then need to be requested again which can be done through the My RePlay area in Blackboard. Captions are automatically generated when the recording is made available to students. It can take up to 24 hours for the captions to generate.

If you have any questions please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk

This is an update of this issue

The issue identified earlier today which resulted in a time-out error when accessing Re/Play collections is now resolved. Our supplier confirmed that they had fixed the issue, and currently the system is working as expected.

We will continue to closely monitor the service.

We are aware of reports of a timeout error message when accessing Re/Play from a Blackboard course menu link (eg to the unit collection of recordings) and searching for recordings through My Re/Play. The supplier has been informed and we are awaiting confirmation of the remedial action required. Recordings added or shared by other methods (eg added via the build content tools in Blackboard) and room recordings are currently unaffected.

We apologise for any inconvenience this has caused.

We are aware of a problem with selecting ‘full screen’ for Re/Play videos when accessed via the Re/Play link on a Blackboard course menu. The supplier is investigating as a matter of urgency.

In the interim, you can get the ‘full screen’ button to show by opening the video collection in a new tab or window:

• click the Re/Play link in the course menu as normal to open the collection
• ‘right-click’ (PC) or ‘CTRL + click’ (Mac) on the ‘Home’ button at top left (see screenshot below)
• select “Open link in new tab” or “Open link in new window” from the menu that appears.

This workaround has been successfully tested in Chrome and Edge browsers.

If you have any questions, please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

This is an update of this issue

The issue identified earlier today which resulted in a time-out error when accessing Re/Play collections is now resolved. Our supplier confirmed that they had fixed the issue, and currently the system is working as expected.

We will continue to closely monitor the service.

We are aware of reports of a timeout error message when accessing Re/Play from a Blackboard course menu link (eg to the unit collection of recordings). The supplier has been informed and we are awaiting confirmation of the remedial action required. Recordings added or shared by other methods (eg added via the build content tools in Blackboard) and room recordings are currently unaffected.

We apologise for any inconvenience this has caused.