Blogboard @ SHSU

The Blackboard Faculty Support Blog at Sam Houston State University

Thursday, October 9, 2008

One Down, and Another One Down!

The issue that prevents students/instructors from attaching Office 2007 documents in the Assignment Manager has (finally) been solved! If you are on campus and still receiving the error, log off and log back on and it should work.

Thanks for your patience.

Wednesday, October 8, 2008

One down one to Go!

Collaboration(virtual classroom)is back up and running. We are still working on the office 2007 file upload issue in assignments. Our ticket is being looked at by Blackboard support engineers as this blog entry is being typed.

Monday, October 6, 2008

Virtual Classroom/Chat Issues

We are aware of Java Applet Load failing when trying to access either the Virtual Classroom or the Chat functions. We have put in a support ticket with Blackboard, and will be working hard to rectify the issue.

Friday, October 3, 2008

Blackboard Downtime 10/3 @ 8pm

Blackboard will be taken down 10/3 @ 8pm in order to update the software. The update will clear up the security certificate issues student and faculty see when in assessments, discussion boards and other content areas. Downtime estimate: 1 hour.

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

Having trouble uploading to the Grade Center?

If you are getting an error when uploading a Grade Center file (from Excel) that says "incorrect file format," here's why:

Blackboard downloads the file in what is called Unicode format, but sticks a different file extension at the end (the period and three letters that represent the file format). So when you go to upload it again, even if you didn't change anything, it gives the error!

For the time being, here is an easy way to get around the bug.
  1. When you download the file, choose "Tab Delimited" out of the three formats that are available to download.
  2. The box comes up asking if you'd like to Open or Save. Instead of Saving (like you normally should) choose Open, you'll save it after.
  3. The file will open in Excel. Go to the Office Button, and choose Save As, Other Formats.
  4. From the pull-down menu under where you enter the file name, choose "Text (Tab Delimited)" and save the file.
Voila! Now it is in the correct format, and you can make changes then upload it back to Blackboard without a problem.