Digital Education Office blog – Page 50 – Service announcements and essential information from the Digital Education Office

Blackboard Collaborate scheduled maintenance, Friday, November 6, midnight – 4 am

Posted on November 2, 2020November 2, 2020 by Hanrahan Highland

Blackboard Collaborate has advised us that there will be scheduled maintenance taking place on Friday, November 6, between midnight and 4 am. The purpose of the maintenance is to provide critical improvement to Collaborate’s stability and performance.

During this time, users will experience intermittent availability. We strongly recommend avoiding using Collaborate throughout this maintenance window, due to the database maintenance being performed, even if the tool is available.

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.

Update to Re/Play to Blackboard connector – 3rd November, 8 am

Posted on November 2, 2020November 2, 2020 by Pete Herbert

In order to mitigate a repeat of the problems we encountered in Week 1 with Re/Play affecting Blackboard performance, IT Services and the Digital Education Office will be updating the connector at 8 am on 3rd November.

We do not expect there to be any disruption of service to users, but there may be a slower-than-normal connection to the service while the connector is installed.

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

Questionmark Scheduled Maintenance: 15 November 2020

Posted on November 2, 2020November 2, 2020 by Roberta Perli

Questionmark have advised us that there will be scheduled maintenance taking place on 15 November 2020. 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

Turnitin services now back to normal: 20th October 16:45

Posted on October 20, 2020October 20, 2020 by Naomi Beckett

Turnitin have informed us they believe the issues that they had earlier are now resolved.

Users may experience slowness while using the service as the system recovers.

Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Turnitin service disruption: 20th October at 15:00

Posted on October 20, 2020October 20, 2020 by Naomi Beckett

Turnitin have advised us that there is an issue with some users accessing Turnitin. We will update you with any new information when we have it.

More information can be found on the Turnitin Status page.

We apologise for any inconvenience.

EesySoft Course Reports working correctly

Posted on October 16, 2020October 16, 2020 by Dan Wilson

The issue with EesySoft Course Reports has now been resolved. It only affected users with the ability quick-enrol so did not affect the vast majority of users.

EesySoft Course Reports disruption

Posted on October 15, 2020October 15, 2020 by Dan Wilson

We’ve been made aware of disruption to the EesySoft service which is used to report on Blackboard course activity. This has been reported the supplier who is investigating. We will provided updates when we have them. If there is any urgent report data that is needed, please get in contact with the DEO.

Blackboard access issues fixed

Posted on October 15, 2020October 15, 2020 by Hanrahan Highland

The issues that led to some people having difficulty accessing Blackboard, from around 12.15 today, have now been fixed. We are continuing to monitor the situation.

Please accept our apologies if you were affected by this issue.

Some users reporting Blackboard access difficulties due to external issues

Posted on October 15, 2020October 15, 2020 by Hanrahan Highland

<< update 15/10/20: 13.05 – this issue is now resolved>>

Some people may be having difficulty accessing Blackboard currently due to external network routing issues. The issues appear to be impacting Blackboard users worldwide. We are investigating, and will provide updates when we have them.

Minimise impact of issues in live online teaching sessions

Posted on October 14, 2020October 14, 2020 by digitaleducation

The DEO has gathered together some tips on minimising the impact of issues in live online teaching sessions. This includes steps you can take beforehand to reduce the likelihood of issues, as well as things you can do during and after sessions, together with links to useful resources. The document has been put together partly in response to questions we have received from colleagues in the first few days of teaching. If you have any comments or suggestions please do let us know at digital-education@bristol.ac.uk