DEO faculty liaison roles to support the move to Ultra

Posted on by Suzanne Collins

To support faculties moving to Blackboard Ultra for the 2024/25 Academic Year, the DEO and the Ultra project are establishing dedicated faculty liaison roles. The aim of these roles is to be a named contact in the DEO for Ultra wave 1 participants – someone who can direct staff to the support they need and ensure the project better understands faculty and school needs and any blockers or barriers. The role will advise on customisation of central training and guidance to better fit with local needs, encourage the dissemination of good practice, and provide guidance to Ultra student developers. 

Faculties involved in wave 1 will be receiving more information on their faculty liaison shortly. For all general project enquiries, please contact blackboard-ultra@bristol.ac.uk.

[Open] Turnitin error: ‘Invalid or missing state’

Posted on by digitaleducation

We are aware that some users are seeing the error message ‘Invalid or missing state’ when trying to access Turnitin. This issue has been reported to Turnitin; the following workarounds should re-enable access.

If using Safari or Firefox, we recommend that users try accessing Turnitin via Chrome or Microsoft Edge in the first instance.

If the error persists, we ask that instructors edit their Turnitin assignments to open in the same tab as the Blackboard page. To do this:

  • Click on the chevron next to the Turnitin assignment and select Edit
  • Scroll to the Web link options section and change ‘Open in New Window’ to ‘No’

  • Click Submit at the bottom of the page.
  • You will see a pop-up asking if you would like to change the Turnitin submission to open in a new window; click Cancel.

  • You will exit the Edit page; click on the assignment to check that Turnitin opens in the same tab.

If you experience any problems, please contact the DEO via digital-education@bristol.ac.uk.

Resource List link – updated

Posted on by chris.poyser

Please refer to our more recent blog post on this topic.  

Due to the deprecation of the Resource List tool by Anthology (Blackboard), you will need to replace the old links with the new Talis Aspire Reading Lists tool to access the reading lists from within your courses.

To replace a link in the left-hand menu in an Original course, click the ‘plus’ symbol at the top of the menu and choose ‘Tool Link’. “Talis Aspire Reading Lists” will appear within the drop-down menu. Once created, click the link to set up your reading list (you may be asked to authenticate the tool on first use); you will then see your reading lists and you will be able to add the required list to your course.

Talis Aspire left hand menu

You can also add a link within the content area of your course via the ‘Build Content’ drop-down menu.

Talis Aspire build content menu

If you are using an Ultra course, you can find the Talis Aspire Reading Lists link under ‘Course Tools’.

Talis Aspire Ultra Course Tools

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

Questionmark OnDemand Scheduled Maintenance 20 July 2024 09.00-21.00

Posted on by nova.ghorique

Questionmark will be carrying out scheduled maintenance on Saturday 20 July between 09:00 and 21:00.

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 users may experience service disruption. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

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

[Resolved] Turnitin long loading times

Posted on by pshamek.szczodry

We are pleased to advise that service has been restored: Turnitin long loading times now resloved.

Due to an unexpected service incident, users of Turnitin and Turnitin UK may have experienced slowness when navigating the service, when logging in, uploading submissions, and accessing Similarity Reports. Users accessing these services via an integration may also have been affected.

The incident occurred between the following times:

BST: June 18, 09:20 – June 18, 12:20
PDT: June 18, 01:20 – June 18, 04:20
AEST: June 18, 18:20 – June 18, 21:20

We regret any inconvenience this may have caused if you were impacted by today’s incident.

[Closed] Turnitin long loading times

Posted on by digitaleducation

We have been made aware that the Turnitin LTI is taking a long time to load when submitting work, creating a submission point, and when editing or interacting with an existing submission point. The delay in access can take up to five minutes to load.

We are currently working with the supplier to resolve this and will update as soon as we are able.

Xerte upgrade issues, problem identified, new upgrade date 12th June

Posted on by Martin Nutbeem

Our colleagues in IT Services experienced an issue during yesterdays Xerte upgrade which resulted in the service being unavailable till 9:30am this morning.

They have identified the cause of the issue and have rolled back to the previous version and Xerte is now live.

This means the feedback bug experienced in limited circumstances has not been fixed. We will upgrade Xerte with the latest version Wednesday 12th June to fix this issue.

We apologise for any inconvenience caused by the downtime.

[Open] Turnitin issues with Firefox and Safari

Posted on by Sophie Shippen

We have been made aware that some instructors and students are seeing the error message ‘invalid or missing state’ when trying to access Turnitin when using Safari or Firefox. We are currently investigating the issue with Turnitin; in the meantime, please use Chrome or Edge, as these browsers do not appear to be affected. 

We apologise for any inconvenience.

Questionmark OnDemand Scheduled Maintenance 15 June 2024 09.00-1500

Posted on by nova.ghorique

Questionmark will be carrying out scheduled maintenance on Saturday 15 June between 09:00 and 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 users may experience service disruption. We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

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