Questionmark scheduled maintenance 15 January 09:00- 15:00

Posted on by Roberta Perli

Dear colleagues,

Questionmark Scheduled Maintenance: Saturday 15 January 2022 –  09:00-15:00

The purpose of the maintenance is to deploy system updates to ensure the ongoing reliability, security and up time of the platform.

During this time all users may experience service disruptions. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

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

[Closed] Issue with submissions to Blackboard group assignments reoccuring

Posted on by digitaleducation

We have been informed that an intermittent bug affecting group submissions to Blackboard assignments has reoccurred. This does not affect individual Blackboard assignments or Turnitin assignments.

When a student submits to a group assignment, the bug means that they may be presented with an error message: ‘Failed to submit Assignment. Please try again.’ Additionally, the submission may not generate any receipt so students will not receive a confirmation email. Despite this, the submission will be successful.

We have reported and further escalated the issue with Blackboard, and they are working on a fix as a matter of priority.

We also wanted to reassure students that their submissions have been made, despite the error message and lack of receipt. Students can check if their submission has been successful as follows:

  • Submit as usual.
  • If you encounter a red banner saying ‘Failed to submit Assignment. Please try again.’ use the left-hand menu to return to the Assessment, Submission and Feedback area.
  • Locate the assignment submission point as before and click on it.
  • You should be presented with a review page displaying the work you submitted.
  • We recommend you take a screenshot of this page for your own records. Be sure to include the submission date and time (under ‘ATTEMPT’ on the right-hand side) in the screenshot.

We apologise for the inconvenience and will blog again as soon as we hear anything further from Blackboard. If you have any concerns or questions, please get in contact with us: digital-education@bristol.ac.uk

[Closed] Error accessing Turnitin submissions through the Grade Centre and My Grades

Posted on by Dan Wilson

This issue is now resolved.

We are aware of an issue that is currently affecting instructors accessing Turnitin submissions via the Grade Centre, and students accessing their Turnitin submissions via My Grades. Users are seeing an error message when trying to access Turnitin through these routes. We are currently investigating this issue with Turnitin and Blackboard.

In the meantime, it is still possible to access submissions via the ‘Course Management’ menu by expanding ‘Course Tools’ and selecting ‘Turnitin Assignments’. Students are able to view their marks and feedback via the submission point; these will need to be made available if they are not already.

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

Scheduled Maintenance – Blackboard Collaborate Ultra January 13th 2022

Posted on by Martin Nutbeem

Blackboard have advised us that there will be scheduled Blackboard Collaborate maintenance taking place on Thursday, January 13th, between midnight and 4 am. During this time, users will experience intermittent availability. The purpose of the maintenance is to update Collaborate to version 21.24. You can read about improvements to functionality and features on the Collaborate Release Notes page.

During the maintenance, you can check Blackboard’s service status page.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused. If you have any questions, please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

Please check the IT service status page to see how the University’s systems and services are working and for planned maintenance information.

Re/Play: preparing for your Teaching Block 2 recordings

Posted on by Pete Herbert

As part of your planning for TB2, don’t forget that you can request changes to what is recorded within Re/Play. As standard, we only record the audio and the slides of your lectures, but other options are available:

  • Video Capture – if you use moving images or the visualiser as part of your teaching, you can request a faster capture which give smoother playback of moving images (eg your hand and writing).
  • Camera Capture – in a number of our equipped rooms, we have cameras installed to capture the chalk or white boards in addition to the screen. If you use these as an integral element of your teaching, you can ask for this to be enabled.
  • Live Streaming – if you need to stream what is being recorded in the room to students unable to attend in person, you can request this option, with the stream link available in Blackboard at the same time as the session.

If you would like to request any of the above, please email the IT Service Desk with the unit code at least 48 hours before the lecture.

If you have any questions, please email the Digital Education Office.

Turnitin scheduled maintenance – Saturday 8th January 2022

Posted on by digitaleducation

Turnitin have advised us that there will be scheduled maintenance taking place on Saturday 8th January from 00:00 – 08:00 GMT. Turnitin services will be unavailable at this time.  We apologise for any inconvenience caused. If you have any questions please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk

You can stay up to date with Turnitin system status by visiting the Turnitin status page.

[Resolved] Re/Play playback issues 9th December- resolved

Posted on by Sophie Shippen

We are pleased to confirm the issue connecting to the Re/Play service, which was affecting playback of videos in Blackboard is now resolved. The Digital Education Office are continuing to monitor the service.

If you have any questions please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk, please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

[Closed] Re/Play playback issues 9th December

Posted on by Sophie Shippen

Some users may currently be experiencing an issue connecting to the Re/Play service, which is affecting playback of videos in Blackboard. We are working with the supplier to investigate and resolve this problem.

We will provide updates on this blog as soon as we have them. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

[Resolved] Re/Play playback issues 3rd December- resolved

Posted on by digitaleducation

We are pleased to confirm the issue connecting to the Re/Play service, which was affecting playback of videos in Blackboard is now resolved. The Digital Education Office are continuing to monitor the service.

If you have any questions please email digital-education@bristol.ac.uk, please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.