Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8
Release Notes
9.1.82223.0
Publication Date: February 14, 2012
Revision: 2
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Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 2
Contents
About the Release Notes ....................................................................................................................6
Known and Resolved Issues ............................................................................................................6
End User Impacts ............................................................................................................................6
System Administration and Integration Impacts ..............................................................................7
New Features and Enhancements .......................................................................................................8
System Administration ...................................................................................................................8
SIS Data Integration Improvements ...................................................................................................... 8
Learning Information Services (LIS) 2.0 Support ................................................................................... 8
ActiveMQ ............................................................................................................................................... 9
Manage Tasks with New bbconfig.server.backend.processor Setting ............................ 9
Emergency One-time Login URL .......................................................................................................... 10
Basic LTI Enhancements....................................................................................................................... 10
Orphaned Content ............................................................................................................................... 10
Security ........................................................................................................................................11
Security Features and Improvements.................................................................................................. 11
Authentication ..................................................................................................................................... 11
Related Security Advisories ................................................................................................................. 12
Security Fixes in this Release ............................................................................................................... 12
Acknowledgments ............................................................................................................................... 16
Secure Configuration Recommendations ............................................................................................ 16
Course Delivery ............................................................................................................................19
Merge Enrollments .............................................................................................................................. 19
Terms Support ..................................................................................................................................... 19
Course-to-Course Navigation .............................................................................................................. 19
Activity Reports.................................................................................................................................... 19
Goal, Content Alignment, and Course Performance Reports.............................................................. 20
Goal Coverage Reports ........................................................................................................................ 21
Automated Regrading.......................................................................................................................... 21
Negative Marking ................................................................................................................................ 21
Course Structures ................................................................................................................................ 21
Course Themes .................................................................................................................................... 21
Quick Setup Guide ............................................................................................................................... 22
New Default 2012 Theme Upon Fresh Install ...................................................................................... 22
Action Bar Functions in Content Area Have Been Renamed ............................................................... 22
Users Can Choose to Create Link to Course Tool ................................................................................ 22
Add Menu Item Redesigned ................................................................................................................ 22
New View Grade History Option.......................................................................................................... 23
Improvements to Handling Mini-Websites and File Packages ............................................................ 23
Content Management ...................................................................................................................24
Goal Alignment to Files and Folders .................................................................................................... 24
Orphaned Content ............................................................................................................................... 24
Archive/Export With Files in Content Collection ................................................................................. 24
Improvements to Handling Mini-Websites and File Packages ............................................................ 25
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 3
Community Engagement ...............................................................................................................26
Institutional Hierarchy ......................................................................................................................... 26
Customized Login Pages Possible for Multiple Brands ........................................................................ 26
eCommerce Replaced by eAccounts and ePOS ................................................................................... 26
Outcomes Assessment ..................................................................................................................27
Evaluation Workflow ........................................................................................................................... 27
Reporting Efficiency ............................................................................................................................. 27
User Experience Enhancements .......................................................................................................... 27
Goals Update ....................................................................................................................................... 27
Goals Coverage Reports....................................................................................................................... 27
Partner Integration .......................................................................................................................28
McGraw-Hill 2.0 Building Block ........................................................................................................... 28
Kaltura Video Building Block ................................................................................................................ 28
Follett CafeScribe Building Block ......................................................................................................... 28
Barnes & Noble NOOK Study Building Block ....................................................................................... 28
Internships.com Building Block............................................................................................................ 29
NBC Learn ............................................................................................................................................ 29
Building Blocks .............................................................................................................................31
Bboogle Building Block ........................................................................................................................ 31
About the Paste From Word Mashup Building Block .......................................................................... 31
Accessing the Building Blocks .............................................................................................................. 32
Known and Resolved Issues ..............................................................................................................33
Performance and Scalability .............................................................................................................34
Performance Issues and Improvements .........................................................................................34
System ................................................................................................................................................. 34
Course Delivery .................................................................................................................................... 35
Content Collection ............................................................................................................................... 35
Community Engagment ....................................................................................................................... 35
Outcomes Assessment......................................................................................................................... 36
Recommended Deployment Approach ..........................................................................................37
64-Bit Deployments ............................................................................................................................. 37
Recommended JVM Tuning Set .....................................................................................................38
Apache 2.2 HTTP server ................................................................................................................39
Supported Technologies ...................................................................................................................40
Platform Technologies ..................................................................................................................40
Deprecation of Supported Technologies ........................................................................................44
Installation and Upgrade Information ...............................................................................................45
Direct Upgrade Paths ....................................................................................................................45
Indirect Upgrade Paths .................................................................................................................45
Paths for Importing and Restoring Courses ....................................................................................47
Upgrading Server Software ...........................................................................................................48
Before Running the Updater .........................................................................................................50
Pre-Upgrade Utility for Linux and Solaris Platforms with an Oracle Database ................................... 50
Windows Server 2008 IIS 7 Roles and Features Configuration ........................................................... 51
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 4
Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8.............................................................................................54
Upgrade Documentation...............................................................................................................54
Provide New License ............................................................................................................................ 54
Warnings and Tips for Upgrading ........................................................................................................ 54
Running the Updater on Windows ................................................................................................60
Running the Updater on UNIX (Red Hat and Solaris) ......................................................................61
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 5
About the Release Notes
About the Release Notes
The Release Notes provide System Administrators with information about the changes from the
previous release, 9.1 Service Pack 7 (9.1 SP7) to this Service Pack, 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1
SP8). These changes fall into two categories, changes that impact end users and changes that
impact system administrators. The categories are meant to assist you with planning your
upgrade to this service pack release.
The list below provides some highlights of changes that we believe will affect most usage
scenarios. Always review the entire document and consider how the information listed below
affects your specific usage patterns.
If you are upgrading to Release 9.1 from Release 9.0, 8.0, 7.x, or CE8, CE4, Vista 8, ANGEL
7.4, or ANGEL 8.0, please go to the Upgrade Center for information targeted to your needs.
Important Note: Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8 only supports a 64 bit environment. You must be
operating in a 64 bit environment to use any direct upgrade path to SP8. If you are currently
running any of these service packs in a 32 bit environment, you must migrate to a 64 bit
environment first. This is especially relevant to Academic Suite 8.0 SP7 running on Windows.
More information on migrating to a 64 bit environment is available in help.blackboard.com.
Known and Resolved Issues
•
Resolved Issues can affect all users of the system, including your end users. While we
hope these changes are positive, please review the list for any changes you may want
to communicate directly to your community.
•
The Known Issues list provides a description and targeted path to resolution for issues
occurring on Blackboard Learn 9.1.
End User Impacts
Items that fall into this category will generally be new features or enhancements that will
improve the user experience, but may require communication and training.
Highlights include:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Course Relationship Management and Term Support
Course to Course Navigation
Negative Marking
New Course Themes, Course Structures, and Welcome Page
Align Content to Goals
Improvements Handling Mini-Websites and Files Packages
Institutional Hierarchy Delegation features
Student Activity Reporting
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 6
About the Release Notes
System Administration and Integration Impacts
Items that fall into this category impact the administration of the system, including API
integration. A review of Building Blocks, Snapshot or other integrations may be required. We
also recommend that you review the Security Settings of your system and review the new
Security section.
Highlights Include:
•
Security – Several cross-site scripting, cross-site forgery request, path traversal, and
link injection vulnerabilities were addressed.
A new authentication framework is available through the user interface that improves
management of custom authentication solutions. Support for Centralized Authentication
Service (CAS), Shibboleth, Windows Auth, Webserver Delegation, Datatel, and OpenID
providers.
•
Supported Technologies Changes – 32-bit server configurations are no longer
supported. Windows Server 2003 is no longer supported. These changes were initially
announced in February 2011.
•
Performance and Scalability – This section details the latest analysis from our
Performance Engineering team and how to tune an installation of this release.
•
Installation and Upgrade Information – This section describes any changes to the
installation, detailed upgrade paths, warnings, and tips for running the installer.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 7
New Features and Enhancements
New Features and Enhancements
The Release Notes provide a high-level overview of the new features and enhancements for
Release 9.1 SP8.
If you are new to Release 9.1, please refer to the “Understanding the Change” document,
available for each product through Behind the Blackboard. This is a comprehensive look at the
features and functions of Release 9.1 and how they compare to your current production version.
Working through the Upgrade Center will provide a step-by-step planning guide to assist you
through this process.
System Administration
SIS Data Integration Improvements
The SIS Data Integration framework includes the following enhancements:
•
Snapshot XML and Flat File Support - Learn ships with a Building Block that registers
an integration type supporting snapshot processes.
•
Custom Headers - Flatfile (Snapshot) supports custom headers with name mapping and
addition of new headers, facilitating migration of ANGEL clients.
•
Reuse of Integration Settings - Administrators can export their customized integration
settings for import on a different Learn server.
•
Terms Support - Administrators can assign terms to course and leverage SIS
provisioned course and term relationships. Both LIS 2.0 and Enterprise 1.1 integration
types support Terms.
•
Merged Courses Support - The SIS integration has information on cross-listed courses
and multiple sections of a course. Enterprise 1.1 integration types support merged
courses. The LIS 2.0 integration type does not currently support merged courses.
•
Logging – Log messages contain the processing timestamp for the event generating the
log entry.
Learning Information Services (LIS) 2.0 Support
The Learning Information Services (LIS) 2.0 standard is supported in 9.1 Service Pack 6 and
above.
Now supported are Flatfile and Snapshop XML integrations using LIS 2.0.
LIS integration supports the WS Security authorization protocol for LIS web service request
authorization.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 8
New Features and Enhancements
If you are integrating with Sungard’s SIS to take advantage of LIS 2.0 integration, you have to
map certain User Object fields using the scripts below.
Learn Object Name
Custom Mapping Script
Username
data.person.extensions.get('LogonId').value
Password Encryption Type
data.person.extensions.get('Password Encryption
Type').value
Password
data.person.extensions.get('Password').value
Other SIS systems might require different customization. Contact Blackboard Services for more
information.
ActiveMQ
ActiveMQ is a Java Messaging Service (JMS) implementation that Blackboard is using to
provide a distributed, fault-tolerant mechanism for sending messages to be processed in the
background of the application. ActiveMQ was first introduced in Blackboard Learn Service Pack
7. Detailed configuration instructions are available in help.blackboard.com under Configuring
ActiveMQ Messaging.
ActiveMQ is installed on all application servers in a given Blackboard Learn configuration so
they can communicate with each other. The default communication port is 61616, and must be
open on all servers. If this port is not open, the servers will not be able to connect to the
ActiveMQ broker and will cause some functions to work incorrectly.
The communication port for ActiveMQ can be changed by editing
bbconfig.messagequeue.transport.port in the bb-config.properties file.
In addition, each application server needs to be able to resolve the hostname configured by all
the other appservers to communicate. The host name is the one configured in
bbconfig.appserver.fullhostname in the bb-config.properties file.
Manage Tasks with New bbconfig.server.backend.processor Setting
In the past, the bb-tasks.xml and bb-tasks.xml.bb needed to be edited by hand on all loadbalanced servers except for one so that some background tasks were prevented from running
on multiple servers. In Blackboard Learn SP8 a new line in the bb-config.properties file:
bbconfig.server.backend.processor allows you to set which appservers will run all
background tasks and which will run only those that need to run on every appserver.
The default value of bbconfig.server.backend.processor is set to =true when you do a
full installation of Learn and =false on those where you do an appserver only install.
You must run a PushConfigUpadtes after changing any of the settings.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 9
New Features and Enhancements
Emergency One-time Login URL
Administrators can use an Emergency One-time Login URL tool to create a one-time session
limited login for a user from the comment line.
Basic LTI Enhancements
Three enhancements have been made to the Basic LTI implementation.
•
Administrators have the option to add one or more placements for a Basic LTI tool
provider, with the option to place in the Student Tools area or in the Interactive Tools
menu in the content folder action bar.
•
Administrators can add tool specific parameters to a Basic LTI tool configuration as
specified by the Tool Provider.
•
Administrator can view how many instances and who is using installed Basic LTI tools,
enabling proactive configuration changes if necessary.
Orphaned Content
Content is considered orphaned when the user that owns the content no longer has a valid
system account or if a course or organization is removed from the system but content related to
that course or organization still appears in the Content Collection. Orphaned content does not
include content owned by disabled or inactive users.
When a course is deleted, administrators are informed that the course content is marked as
orphaned content. Any course folder where the course has been deleted is marked as orphaned
content, even though it is possible another course maintains active links to the files in that
folder. Use the 360° View option to see if the course folder has files linked to another course.
A visual identifier has been added to a column in this report to indicate the existence of course
references to a given orphaned file/folder. This helps the administrator differentiate between
obsolete content that can safely be removed from content that needs to be moved to a
permanent location to ensure the integrity of existing courses.
Administrators can sort folders in the Orphaned Content report based on whether or not they
have linked content (content that is linked in another course). This sorting by reference status
facilitates bulk delete or move operations as appropriate. Administrators can click Recheck
Content to run the system task that checks for newly orphaned content and update references
of existing orphaned content in the report.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 10
New Features and Enhancements
Security
Blackboard is committed to improving security features and resolving security vulnerabilities
quickly and carefully. Such security vulnerability resolutions may lead to the release of a
Security Advisory as well as any needed product update for our customers based on the
context, severity and timing of confirmed vulnerabilities. Below we have outlined the security
enhancements and security vulnerabilities resolved in this release.
For more information on each of the features and improvements, please see the System
Administrator documentation.
Security Features and Improvements
•
Decoupling of Apache HTTP Server from Blackboard Learn (using Apache 2.x or
Standalone Tomcat): Customers may choose to run Apache 2.x or Tomcat in
standalone mode with an HTTP listener. Blackboard Learn no longer requires
customers to run Apache 1.3, which installs and ships by default with Blackboard Learn.
Furthermore, Apache HTTP Server is no longer required to run Blackboard Learn but if
customers choose to run Apache HTTP Server, customers may utilize the latest version
of Apache HTTP Server and subsequently, the latest version of OpenSSL.
•
Support for SSL Offloading: Provides ability to handle SSL Offloading at the Load
Balancer and use plaintext communication behind the Load Balancer, providing secure
performance. See System Administrator documentation for more information.
Authentication
•
CAS Extension: Provides a customizable Central Authentication Service (CAS)
extension and a proper logout that logs the user out of Blackboard Learn and optionally
out of CAS.
•
Shibboleth Extension: Provides a Shibboleth authentication extension while also
providing a functioning logout that logs the user out of Blackboard Learn and optionally
out of Shibboleth. Support for Shibboleth 2.x by using Apache 2.x (see "Decoupling of
Apache HTTP Server from Blackboard Learn (using Apache 2.x or Standalone
Tomcat").
•
Authentication Logging: The new default authentication provider, when the legacy
authentication provider is disabled, provides a new authentication log that uses a
common log format that facilitates integration with log management systems. The log
format is pipe-delimited key value pairs. The log utilizes event code standards and
tracks successful and failed logins, session expiration, and explicit logout events. Log
fields include timestamp, user id, username, event name, event code, source IP
address, application server, event severity, browser user agent, etc.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 11
New Features and Enhancements
•
Forwarded Client IP Addresses in Blackboard Learn application logs (XForwarded-For): Customers using Load Balancers need to forward client IP addresses
to ensure that application logs do not only reflect the load balancer IP address. This
release provides support for the X-Forwarded-For header such that wherever the client
IP address is used, the client IP address is derived from the X-Forwarded-For header.
Such locations include Assessment IP address restrictions and Session Fingerprinting.
This support is accomplished through a custom extension to RemoteIpValve, which
changes the request's IP address to match the X-Forwarded-For header. For more
comprehensive logging, Blackboard recommends customers enable request IP
addresses to be logged on the load balancer.
Related Security Advisories
Many of the security fixes related to the following security advisory are available in this release.
•
LRNSI-2284 - Vulnerabilities in Blackboard Learn Could Allow Elevation of Privilege
o
For more information, the Solution section of the advisory identifies the exact
fixes included in this release.
Security patches released via the following security advisories are rolled up into this release.
•
LRN-49374 - Java Hashtable Collision Vulnerability Could Allow Denial of Service
•
LRN-35512 - Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Blackboard Learn Could Allow
Elevation of Privilege
•
LRN-30687 - Path Traversal Vulnerability in Blackboard Learn Could Allow Elevation of
Privilege
•
LRN-31984 - Non-persistent Link Injection Vulnerability in Blackboard Learn Could Allow
Phishing
•
LRN-28277 (AS-158601) - Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Blackboard Learn
Discussion Board Could Allow Elevation of Privilege
Security Fixes in this Release
Workaround for Apache Tomcat and Java Hashtable Collision Vulnerability
The recommended maxPostSize workaround in Apache Tomcat that protects from potential a
Denial of Service attack is already configured in this release. For more information, see the
LRN-49374 security advisory.
Changes to Embedded Mini-Website User Permission Defaults
Changes in security settings have altered the way access to mini-website files are granted.
Starting with Service Pack 8, users who attach HTML files to course objects are given the
opportunity to grant access to the folder that HTML resides in to ensure access to resources
such as images and style sheets is granted. These options are presented at the time that the file
is linked to the content item and generally the “Give users access to all files and folders in the
folder” access option is correct for most mini-websites, as the HTML file and dependent
resources are typically stored in a single folder structure.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 12
New Features and Enhancements
Users who used Blackboard to build mini-websites in previous releases may find that those
websites no longer work. To correct this, each broken mini-website must have the HTML file reattached to the content item and all contributing folders must be granted access. Websites
unlikely to be affected by upgrading to SP8 are simple websites where all contributing files and
folders are contained in a parent directory folder, which is the most common way of structuring
these files and includes legacy Blackboard HTML package file content.
The website structure that is most susceptible to this breakage involves an HTML file
attachment that has embedded references to resources that reside outside of the folder
containing the HTML file. When the user has not explicitly granted permissions to these auxiliary
folders, the websites break after upgrading to SP8. Granting access to files outside the directory
structure involves manually managing permissions, which is not compatible with Adaptive
Release and Guest Access. As a result, this content may need to be refactored so it resides in a
single folder.
For more complicated websites, the most effective way to manage access is to consolidate the
files into a single directory structure, with all files and folders containing resources referenced by
the HTML stored in one single parent directory. This ensures access can be granted through the
new access control features.
Key
Summary
LRN-45225
Embedded Mini-Website User Permission Defaults Could Allow Information
Exposure
Cross-site Scripting Fixes Requiring Global Cross-site Scripting Security Control
The following security vulnerabilities are resolved in this release when the Global Cross-site
Scripting Security Control is properly configured and set to the strictest setting. As a reminder,
Blackboard recommends customers ensure the Global Cross-site Scripting Security Control is
enabled and set to the strictest setting. This control is properly configured by default in this
Service Pack and designed to neutralize user-controllable input before it is placed in output
used by the application. For more information, see Using the Cross-site Scripting Control.
Key
Summary
LRN-40783
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Blog Metadata Could Allow Session Hijacking
LRN-40789
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Course Tools Could Allow Session Hijacking
LRN-31031
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Course Tools Could Allow Session Hijacking
LRN-30521
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Course Tools Could Allow Session Hijacking
LRN-34476
Cross-Site Scripting Vulnerability in Course Catalog Could Allow Session
Hijacking
LRN-36147
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Partner Building Block Could Allow Phishing
LRN-39956
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in Tabs and Calendar
LRN-35512
Cross-site Scripting Vulnerability in VTBE Could Allow Elevation of Privilege
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 13
New Features and Enhancements
Apache Configuration Updates
Key
Summary
LRN-49374
Apache Tomcat and the Java Hashtable Collision Vulnerability Could Allow Denial
of Service
LRN-40101
Enabled HTTP TRACE Verb Could Allow Information Exposure
LRN-39950
Usage of SSLv2 in Apache Could Allow Information Exposure
Other Security Fixes
Key
Summary
LRN-40001
Authorization and Cross-site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Partner Building
Block Could Allow Denial of Service
LRN-28527
Authorization Vulnerability Courses for Unavailable Users Could Allow Information
Exposure
LRN-29158
Authorization Vulnerability in Announcements Could Allow Tampering
LRN-32145
Authorization Vulnerability in Blog Grades Could Allow Information Exposure
LRN-42874
Authorization Vulnerability in web.xml Could Allow Information Exposure
LRN-29409
Authorization Vulnerability in Building Blocks Could Allow Tampering
LRN-39954
Cookies Missing HttpOnly Flag Could Allow Session Hijacking
LRN-40060
Cross-site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Address Book Could Allow Tampering
LRN-43549
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Administrator Panel Could Allow
Denial of Service
LRN-43010
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Administrator Panel Could Allow
Tampering
LRN-42986
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Administrator Panel Could Allow
Tampering
LRN-42801
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Community Could Allow Tampering
LRN-43954
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Course Content Collection Could
Allow Tampering
LRN-43951
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Course Content Collection Could
Allow Tampering
LRN-40080
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Course Groups Could Allow
Tampering
LRN-40049
Cross-site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Courses Could Allow Tampering
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 14
New Features and Enhancements
Key
Summary
LRN-43560
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Groups Could Allow Tampering
LRN-40076
Cross-Site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Notification Settings Could Allow
Tampering
LRN-40059
Cross-site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Personal Information Could Allow
Information Exposure
LRN-40062
Cross-site Request Forgery Vulnerability in System Admin Could Allow
Information Exposure
LRN-40063
Cross-site Request Forgery Vulnerability in Tasks Could Allow Tampering
LRN-40801
Header Injection Vulnerability in Course Files Could Allow Tampering
LRN-30557
Inconsistent Error Message for Authentication Failure Could Allow Information
Exposure
LRN-35213
Insecure Direct Object Reference Vulnerability in Course Content Could Allow
Information Exposure
LRN-29642
Insecure Direct Object Reference Vulnerability in Course Content Could Allow
Information Exposure
LRN-35203
Insecure Direct Object Reference Vulnerability in Course Tools Could Allow
Information Exposure
LRN-31707
Insecure Direct Object Reference Vulnerability in Courses Could Allow
Information Exposure
LRN-29610
Insecure Direct Object Reference Vulnerability in Personal Information Could
Allow Information Exposure
LRN-27953
Insecure Prohibit Backtracking in Tests Allows Tampering
LRN-30677
Lack of Autocomplete on Login Form Could Allow Tampering
LRN-40036
Missing Session Identifier Update Upon Login Could Allow Tampering
LRN-32177
Pages Restricted to HTTPS accessible via HTTP Could Allow Spoofing
LRN-30525
Potential SQL Injection Vulnerability in My Portfolio Could Allow Tampering
LRN-33900
Updated Version of Spring Framework for Bb-wiki
LRN-40047
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Content Collection Could Allow Phishing
LRN-40046
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Content Collection Could Allow Phishing
LRN-40044
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Content Collection Could Allow Phishing
LRN-40932
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Courses Could Allow Phishing
LRN-28181
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Locale Could Allow Phishing
LRN-39942
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Portals Could Allow Phishing
LRN-35687
URL Redirection Vulnerability in Portals Could Allow Phishing
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 15
New Features and Enhancements
Acknowledgments
Blackboard thanks the following people for collaborating with us to help protect customers:
•
•
•
•
Mark Carroll of Stony Brook University for reporting LRN-29409
Rachid Ben Moussa, Roel Verdult, Jan Rijnders, and Marko van Eekelen of Radboud
University Nijmegen for reporting LRN-28277
Bill Harshbarger from ITNS (Information Technology Networks and Security) of Purdue
University for reporting LRN-31984
Zakary Wade from Paul D. Camp Community College, VCCS for confidentially reporting
LRN-35512
Secure Configuration Recommendations
Blackboard strongly recommends all customers implement the following secure configurations
as they provide added protection against security threats.
Secure
Configuration
Categories
Secure Configuration Controls
1. Content Sanitization
a) Global Cross-site Scripting Security Control
Description
This security control is designed to neutralize user-controllable input
before it is placed in output that is used by the application. This control
protects customers from Cross-site Scripting vulnerabilities and is
enabled by default and set to the strictest setting beginning in new
installations of Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 4. Cross-site
scripting vulnerabilities occur when untrusted data is used by a web
application, typically entered through a web request.
Managed Hosting Clients
Blackboard Managed Hosting will apply this configuration change for
customers on releases with this security control if the control is not
already enabled.
Instructions
Instructions are available in this KB Article
Available In
This security control is available beginning in:
•
•
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 Service Pack 1
Blackboard Learn Release 9.0 Service Pack 6
Blackboard Learn Release 8.0 Service Pack 7 Hotfix 2
Customers on earlier versions of Blackboard Learn are strongly
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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New Features and Enhancements
Secure
Configuration
Categories
Secure Configuration Controls
advised to move to 9.1 Service Pack 7, 9.0 Service Pack 6, or 8.0
Service Pack 7 Hotfix 2, as this control hardens your system against
security threats.
b) Add/Edit trusted content Privilege
Description
Evaluate whether the ability to "Add/Edit trusted content with scripts" or
"Add/Edit Trusted Content" (depending on your product version) is
necessary for certain System and Course/Organization Roles as this
follows security principle of Least Privilege. Blackboard Learn ships by
default granting Instructors the privilege to add dynamic content
(JavaScript), whether malicious or not. Students are not granted the
privilege by default.
Managed Hosting Clients
Customers can evaluate this configuration and make changes directly
via the System Admin panel.
Instructions
•
•
•
•
•
Login as a user with administrator privileges
Go to the "System Admin" panel
Go to "Privileges"
Remove roles that do not need to enter dynamic content
capability by removing the "Add/Edit trusted content" privilege.
If only certain users need the privilege, create a new role, add
the specific users to the role, and grant the role the privilege.
Available In
This security control is paired with the Global Cross-site Scripting
Security Control and available beginning in:
•
•
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 Service Pack 1
Blackboard Learn Release 9.0 Service Pack 6
Blackboard Learn Release 8.0 Service Pack 7 Hotfix 2
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 17
New Features and Enhancements
Secure
Configuration
Categories
3. Secure
Communication
Secure Configuration Controls
a) Enable SSL system-wide
Description
Enable SSL system-wide and install a minimum 2048-bit key SSL
Certificate.
Managed Hosting Clients
Customers that do not have this already enabled may contact Support
to enable SSL system-wide.
4. Secure
Performance
a) Forward Client IP Addresses from Load Balancer, if present
Description
Though not related to a vulnerability, the following recommendation
supports security investigations for self-hosted customers.
Customers utilizing a load balancer, which is external to Blackboard
Learn, should forward the client IP Address otherwise application log
files will only reflect the load balancer IP address.
Managed Hosting Clients
No action is required for Managed Hosting clients.
Instructions
•
This configuration is implemented on the load balancer device,
by enabling X-Forwarded-For. Please see your load balancer
vendors documentation for more information.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 18
New Features and Enhancements
Course Delivery
Merge Enrollments
•
Multi-section management: Instructors sometimes teach multiple sections of the same
course. Merge Enrollments allows system administrators to merge the rosters of those
courses into one master course. Merging the rosters allows the instructors teaching
multiple sections of the same course to manage the content, course management, and
communications tasks for all sections of the course from one central location.
•
Crosslisting: Schools commonly offer a course under multiple programs. For example,
an advanced literature course might be available for credit in an English degree program
as well as a Journalism program. Instructors and registrars are challenged with
managing student enrollment, grading, and content being used in a single course. Cross
listing is the act of delivering two or more courses/sections as a single combined course.
In physical world terms, students with different courses listed on their timetables would
show up in the same classroom and get taught at the same time. In Blackboard Learn
terms, students would see a course they are enrolled in on their My Courses tabs, but
when clicking to enter it, will share the same course content as all other students across
all combined courses.
Terms Support
Terms support allows administrators to create date-based terms and associate them with a
selection of courses. This allows the administrator to align many of the date-based course
settings and preferences to multiple courses in batch.
Course-to-Course Navigation
When in a course, click the Action Link next to the course title to jump from course to course to
access the same page/tool. For example, if you are in one course’s Grade Center, you can jump
to the next course’s Grade Center easily to complete your grading tasks. As a student, you can
jump from one course’s announcement page to another.
Activity Reports
The Student Overview for Single Course report displays an individual student's activity within
a course, sorted by date. Data includes the total overall time the student spent in the course as
well as detailed information about the student's activity, such as which items and Content Areas
the student accessed and the time spent on each. This is accessed as a Course Report by the
instructor, and at the system level by the Administrator.
The Course Activity Overview displays overall activity within a single course, sorted by
student and date. Data includes the total and average time spent per user and the total amount
of activity the user had in the course. This is accessed as a Course Report by the instructor and
at the system level by the Administrator.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
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New Features and Enhancements
The User Activity Overview displays overall system and course activity for all users, including
average logins and time spent, and statistics on user activity by course. This is accessed at the
system level by the Administrator.
The Single User Activity Overview displays all system and course activity for a single user.
Data includes total system access time sorted by date and total course time sorted by date or
course. Any user such as instructors and their activity can be tracked using this report. This is
accessed at the system level by the Administrator.
Administrator may generate reports for any course on the system and all user activity in the
system. Instructor reports are limited to their individual courses and the students enrolled in
those courses.
Goal, Content Alignment, and Course Performance Reports
All Course Delivery clients can now create and manage Goals to be used in assessing course
and student performance. Goals can be entered from the Administrator Panel and then
associated to courses.
The Goals tool set has been updated to allow for direct editing, creation, alignment and
reporting on Goals. In addition to direct editing, schools can still import K12 NCLB standards
(via Academic Benchmarks) or other goals using XML data files.
The new Goals capability is supported with updates to the file system and reporting. The file
system has been enhanced to allow you to search for content in the file system based on
standards alignment.
Once associated to a course by the Administrator, instructors can align individual content items
to Goals in order to produce a Course Performance Report. This report generates three views to
help institutions understand what course content is aligned to stated learning objectives to
identify gaps, determine how a student is performing against learning objective(s) within a
course and determine how the collective student membership within a single course is
performing against a single goal/learning objective.
Course Performance displays information showing how a single Blackboard Learn Course
performs against a selected set of Goals. Performance targets and a range of acceptable
performance for the course can be determined when running the report. Data includes averages
for the entire course as well as breakdowns for individual students and goals.
Learner Performance is a student-centric view measuring how a particular student has
performed against the stated learning objectives. This is done by reporting their performance
against all graded items that were aligned to a goal. At the course level, the instructor can see
how the student has performed against goals and content items within that course. Instructors
access this view by selecting an individual student within the Course Performance Report. This
report is also accessible from the Grade Center.
Goal Performance shows performance against single goal or learning objective. Instructors
access this view by selecting an individual goal within the Course Performance Report.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
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New Features and Enhancements
Goal Coverage Reports
Goal Coverage reports show instructors and administrators how course content aligns to stated
learning objectives.
The Course Coverage Report displays goals coverage information for a single Blackboard
Learn course. Data includes both covered and gap values for all curricular areas that the course
is associated with, as well as a breakdown of course items that have been aligned to goals.
Instructors and administrators can run this report.
The Full Coverage Overview shows curriculum coverage of goals across the entire system.
This report displays aggregated coverage information across courses for all active Goal Sets
within the selected Source and Goal Type. An overview of the types of content items aligned to
these goals is also provided. This report is only available to administrators.
Automated Regrading
Instructors can now fix problematic questions by simply editing the invalid question directly and
having all necessary updates flow automatically to the Grade Center.
For any given question, Blackboard now allows instructors to drop, give full credit, change point
value, or change the correct answer. After the question has been updated, Blackboard
recalculates the score of all submitted assessments that included the updated question, reflects
the updates in the Grade Center, and provides notification to both the instructor and optionally
to the student for all impacted submissions.
Note: Instructors have the option of saving as new when editing a question in a pool.
Negative Marking
Negative marking allows instructors to apply negative point values for wrong answers on test
questions. This allows them to prevent (by penalty) guessing or the selection of egregiously
wrong answers.
Course Structures
Blackboard offers Course Structures instructors can use as a launching pad to create a course,
organize content, share knowledge, and build communities. Course Structures contain course
areas, optional sample content, pedagogical information, and instructions to help instructors
design their course. Course Structure content and Course Menu links are added to the course’s
existing content if you elect to add a structure.
Course Themes
Within a course, instructors can apply a Course Theme to match their design preferences and
teaching methods. Course Themes add a background image to the course display and change
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
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New Features and Enhancements
the color of the user interface, including the Course Menu, buttons, and controls. Applying a
theme does not affect course content, and users can change the theme again at any time.
The Course Themes feature can be used if:
•
the new Bb Learn 2012 Theme is enabled as the default system theme
or
•
an institution’s own custom theme has been updated and rebuilt based on the new Bb
Learn 2012 Theme is enabled.
Quick Setup Guide
When instructors enter a course initially, a Quick Setup Guide screen appears helping
instructors set up a new course. Instructors are initially asked update the name and description
of their course and then to apply any changes. Instructors can go on to step two and design
their course menu by applying a course structure from over 30 different pedagogically based
selections. At this point, instructors can also decide whether to add sample content to the
course. Finally, there are links to additional resources to help instructors learn more about
building their courses. The Quick Setup Guide will appear every time an instructor enters their
course unless it is turned off. When turned of, the Quick Setup Guide can be accessed from the
Control Panel under Customizations.
New Default 2012 Theme Upon Fresh Install
A new default theme is set when Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8 is installed as a “fresh” installation.
If you are upgrading from a previous service pack, the default theme you already have will
remain. A new theme, Bb Learn 2012 will be added to the Theme and Palette Catalog and may
be applied at a later time. The Bb Learn 2012 theme is presented with a soft background with
neutral colors. Clutter is removed from view and controls are shown to users when they are
needed.
Action Bar Functions in Content Area Have Been Renamed
Build Content remains the same, but the others are renamed to Assessments, Tools, and
Publisher Content. This resulted from moving adding tool links to the Tools drop-down list and
making the naming more generic.
Users Can Choose to Create Link to Course Tool
Instead of adding tool links from the Build Content function in a course area, adding tool links
is now moved to the newly renamed Tools drop-down list and more tools are available in the
list.
Add Menu Item Redesigned
The Add Menu Item option list for the Course Menu has a new look. The option names are
shorter.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 22
New Features and Enhancements
New View Grade History Option
A new View Grade History option appears in the contextual menu for a column in the Grade
Center where users can choose a time period for the history that is shown.
Improvements to Handling Mini-Websites and File Packages
If an instructor links to a HTML file attachment from a course item, access to that HTML file will
be granted to all users enrolled in that course. Release 9.1 SP8 will also provide the instructor
options to also grant access to other files in the same folder (or selected files in the Content
Collection for those licensing content management capabilities) to handle mini websites and
packaged content. In SP8 we ensure student access is constrained by Adaptive Release rules,
and these rules and access to the files will be propagated along with the files when the course is
copied. This means that packages of files that together constitute a mini website can be
constructed within a course and controlled by a single index.html entry point.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 23
New Features and Enhancements
Content Management
Goal Alignment to Files and Folders
Files in the Content Collection or Course Files can be aligned to Goals. It is also possible to
view a file’s alignment to goals in the file’s 360 View.
When adding a file to the course as a file item, an attachment, or link in the Text Editor, it will be
possible to search content collection by Goal.
If a file is attached to a content item in a course, the user will have the option of having the
content item inherit the alignments on the file at the time of attaching.
Orphaned Content
When a course is deleted, administrators are informed that the course content is marked as
orphaned content. Any course folder where the course has been deleted is marked as orphaned
content, even though it is possible another course maintains active links to the files in that
folder. Use the 360 View option to see if the course folder has files linked to another course.
A visual identifier has been added to a column in this report to indicate the existence of course
references to a given orphaned file/folder. This helps the administrator differentiate between
obsolete content that can safely be removed from content that needs to be moved to a
permanent location to ensure the integrity of existing courses.
Administrators can sort folders in the Orphaned Content report based on whether or not they
have linked content (content that is linked in another course). This sorting by reference status
facilitates bulk delete or move operations as appropriate.
Archive/Export With Files in Content Collection
In SP8, both Archive and Export now offer the choice to include links or both copies and links to
files outside of the Course Files home folder (from the Content Collection). This allows users to
make a more complete archive of a course such that external file content can be included in the
point-in-time archive. The Manage Package functionality also includes a view into the external
content such that users can pick and choose the files they want maintained in the
archived/exported package.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 24
New Features and Enhancements
Improvements to Handling Mini-Websites and File Packages
If an instructor links to a HTML file attachment from a course item, access to that HTML file will
be granted to all users enrolled in that course. Release 9.1 SP8 will also provide the instructor
options to also grant access to other files in the same folder or selected files in the content
collection to handle mini websites and packaged content. In SP8 we ensure student access is
constrained by adaptive release rules and these rules and access to the files will be propagated
along with the files when the course is copied. This means that packages of files that together
constitute a mini website can be constructed within a course and controlled by a single
index.html entry point.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 25
New Features and Enhancements
Community Engagement
Institutional Hierarchy
•
•
•
•
Delegation of Tabs and Modules: As of SP8, the Institutional Hierarchy feature
provides the ability to delegate management of Tabs and modules by Node in the
institutional Hierarchy. Associating a Tab or Module with a Node provides a Node
Administrator (that has been assigned the appropriate System Role with the appropriate
privileges) to manage those Tabs and Modules without being given access to manage
any other Tabs and Modules not associated with their Nodes.
Delegation of Tool/Building Block Availability: In SP8, System Administrators and
Node Administrators have the ability to manage the availability of Tools (including
Building Block tools) on a node-by-node basis. A Node's availability settings will apply to
any Courses or Organizations associated to that particular Node.
Changes to Tab Management Interface: "Tab Groups" have been renamed to "Top
Frame Tabs" to make the name more descriptive of the actual position of the interface
element. Also, in order to streamline Tab management, the separate “Tabs” and “Tab
Groups” management tools have been combined into a single tool called “Tabs”. In the
new “Tabs” interface, Administrators can toggle between two views: (1) a Tree View that
shows all of the Top Frame Tabs and their associated Tabs, or (2) a List View that
shows a flat list of all Tabs.
Institutional Hierarchy – Tool Tab: In order to give a Node Administrator access to the
Institutional Hierarchy interface without having to grant them access to the Administrator
Panel, Institutional Hierarchy can now be treated as a Tool, and a Tool Tab can be
created that contains the Institutional Hierarchy functionality for delegated
administration.
Customized Login Pages Possible for Multiple Brands
Custom login pages used to only be able to be set system-wide, limiting the scope of
customization. As of SP8, a separate custom login page can be uploaded for each brand that is
linked to a host name, not an institution role. This allows for deeper customization to be done,
for example, the nursing school (nursing.school.edu) might have a different theme and custom
login page than the engineering school (eng.school.edu).
eCommerce Replaced by eAccounts and ePOS
In 2010 Blackboard announced that the eCommerce features that previously shipped as a
component of the Community Engagement license would no longer be supported. With SP8,
legacy components of that feature are no longer available in the product. The account
management features of the Community eCommerce capabilities have been replaced by
Blackboard Transact eAccounts. The emarketplace features have been replaced by a partner
product, Sequoia ePOS. If there are any questions about eAccounts or ePOS, please contact
the Blackboard Transact account representative for your institution.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 26
New Features and Enhancements
Outcomes Assessment
Evaluation Workflow
In 9.1 SP8, the evidence collection evaluation workflow allows:
•
Multiple evaluators to evaluate collected evidence using a rubric in Outcomes.
•
Reporting on the rubric results from the Blackboard course from which the evidence was
collected without conducting an additional rubric evaluation in Outcomes.
Reporting Efficiency
All of the pre-built reports that are shipped with Outcomes will now run significantly faster due to
a new Extract, Transform, and Load (ETL) process that will change the database tables that are
referenced for the pre-built reports.
Custom reports will not automatically run against the new ETL tables, but they will continue to
function normally. Note, however, that these custom reports can be made to work against the
ETL tables if you wish to do so, either on your own, or with the help of Blackboard Consulting.
User Experience Enhancements
A Discover Goals interface allows users to select goals from several places within the
application.
Goals Update
Standards and objectives are now referred to as Goals.
Goals can be created from any “place” within Outcomes Assessment (e.g. Institution, Units,
Programs).
When batch loading or changing goals, clients will be able to use our XML-loading method
which has been available with K-12 Standards previously. This batch upload utility is available
for system administrators with the necessary privileges.
Goals Coverage Reports
The Review Related Goals report shows all relationships that exist within in the system for the
selected set of goals. Choose to view all relationships or only relationships to a particular type of
goals. The report is only available to administrators with an Outcomes license.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 27
New Features and Enhancements
Partner Integration
McGraw-Hill 2.0 Building Block
This Building Block seamlessly integrates McGraw-Hill’s Connect,Create, and SimNet solutions
within Blackboard Learn, Release 9.1, allowing educators to create and access dynamic online
course material. This Building Block enables instructors to incorporate customized course
eBooks, LearnSmart study modules, and recorded lectures into their Blackboard courses.
Instructors teaching courses on computing applications will able to leverage SimNet, simulationbased software for teaching and assessing proficiency. Single sign-on and Grade Center
synchronization deliver centralized, immediate access to course content and grades.
Compliance with the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) ensures that student
privacy is protected. Installation instructions are available from Behind the Blackboard.
Kaltura Video Building Block
The Kaltura Video Building Block is a comprehensive solution for your institution’s expanding
media needs. With the Kaltura Building Block, teachers can easily add video content to course
pages, maintain a personal content repository, integrate lecture capture and interact with their
students using media. Students can create a personal media gallery, submit video assignments
and edit content online.
Learn more about getting started and to sign up for a free 10GB trial.
Follett CafeScribe Building Block
Give your students the ability to read, study, and collaborate with peers and professors from
within Blackboard Learn. Together, Blackboard and CafeScribe give teachers and students the
ability to access over 15,000 digital textbooks, delivering benefits to students, faculty, and busy
campus technologists as well.
The CafeScribe Blackboard Building Block allows professors to assign and students to acquire
CafeScribe digital textbooks with a single click within their Blackboard Learn courses. They can
easily highlight passages and add notes or insights within the digital textbook, quickly compile
notes and highlights into a powerful study and reference resource, and interact and learn within
the digital course material itself by sharing notes and information with other students and
professors.
Barnes & Noble NOOK Study Building Block
Barnes & Noble’s NOOK Study Building Block allows instructors and students to use NOOK
Study directly from the Blackboard course environment and seamlessly integrate NOOK Study
eTextbooks into course content. Instructors can integrate NOOK Study eTextbooks into a
syllabus and create links to chapters, sections, or pages of books for courses. Students can
access e-textbooks through courses and use NOOK Study to read, annotate, and search their
eTextboook. This Building Block enables e-commerce for institutions through BN.com or the
campus bookstore so that instructors and students can purchase and distribute eTextbooks
from within Blackboard.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 28
New Features and Enhancements
The Building Block is available to higher education institutions in North America that license
Blackbord Learn, Release 8.0 and higher.
After installation, the Building Block is “Unavailable” by default. Once the Barnes & Noble
NOOKstudy Blackboard Building Block is installed and made Available, you need to activate the
Building Block using the administration page by requesting a license key from Barnes & Noble.
Barnes & Noble needs to receive your request as there are behind-the-scenes ecommerce
configurations that must be made before the Building Block can be properly used. After you
accept the software agreement, receive and enter your license key, you can make the building
block available to all courses.
More information on installing and configuring this Build Block is available in their User Guide
available from the Blackboard’s Partnerships Catalog.
Internships.com Building Block
Internships.com is the largest marketplace for internships, part-time jobs, and entry-level
positions for students. The Internships.com Building Block created by Blackboard provides a
powerful resource for students, employers, and educators to optimize and find internship and
job opportunities right inside the Blackboard Learn course environment. Use this Building Block
to help students succeed inside and outside of the classroom.
With single sign-on access to original content and proprietary career development tools, this
free Building Block delivers an integrated career-oriented experience within the Blackboard
Learn platform:
•
New My Career tab: Provides access to all available Internships.com resources in one
place inside the Blackboard Learn.
•
My Institution module: Enables students to search and apply for internships, student
jobs and entry-level positions directly from the My Institution page.
•
Course Search Tool: Allows instructors to insert search link within their course.
•
Facebook Integration: Allows student to repurpose their social network as a
professional network by utilizing their existing contacts to find jobs and get introduced to
hiring companies.
•
Career Predictor: Evaluates personal preferences and shows students and job seekers
how they can help pursue and secure the right internship or job opportunity.
•
Resume Builder: Provides students with resume samples and tips.
Internship.com Building Block installation and administration documentation is available from
Behind the Blackboard.
NBC Learn
NBC Learn offers unique collections of video resources, primary sources, historic footage,
images, mini-documentaries and text resources designed for use in the classroom. The NBC
Learn Building Block enables member institutions to enhance classroom learning by leveraging
NBC News collections within their Blackboard Learn courses. The NBC Learn Building Block
seamlessly integrates with your current Blackboard installation and enables instructor to embed
NBC News content into existing courses for course delivery.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 29
New Features and Enhancements
NBC Learn Building Block features include:
•
Search NBC Learn by subject area, related topic, or keyword
•
Expect regularly updated news content, and short-form, preview playback of videos
•
Create user playlists and mashups
•
Download video clips and embed them directly in a Blackboard Learn course
•
Use video to emphasize specific topics, stimulate thinking, and enliven material
•
Screen clips in class
•
Use video commenting and rating features
•
Read and print full text transcripts
•
Students also can complete research in the archives and incorporate clips into
multimedia projects
Full, long-form playback of videos and advanced search features can be licensed directly from
NBC Learn.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 30
New Features and Enhancements
Building Blocks
The General Availability of two new Building Blocks for Blackboard Learn, Release 9.1 was
previously announced in October 2011, subsequent to the release of Learn 9.1 Service Pack 6.
These Building Blocks remain available for download from the Extensions Catalog, and are fully
supported on Release 9.1 SP8. This previously published information is included here as
reference and reminder for those upgrading to Release 9.1 SP8.
Bboogle Building Block
The Bboogle Building Block provides an easy way to integrate licensed Google Apps with
Blackboard Learn. Bboogle initiates a single sign-on request to Google Apps so that users can
link to any Google App tool from inside their Blackboard Learn courses. Schools that have
licensed Google Apps for Education® or Business can use Bboogle to provide users direct
access from inside their courses to the content and tools available in Google Apps. Bboogle
creates tool links in courses that permit users to go directly to the Google Apps tool they want to
use. Instructors can create content item links to Google calendars, sites, and documents,
providing direct access to specific items in the Google Apps system. These links can be
configured to provide edit permissions to the students in a course for dynamic, collaborative
content authoring in the Google Apps system.
In 2009 Blackboard and Northwestern University partnered on an integration to make Google
Apps for Education available to students within the Blackboard Learn platform with a single sign
on. Developed by Northwestern’s Information Technology development team, the Bboogle
Building Block has been released and resides on OSCELOT’s website as open source to let
other institutions use or build on the technology at no cost. That OSCELOT-sponsored version
remains available for use by the user community. Understanding the broad use of Google Apps
tools and in an effort to provide users with greater efficiencies, Blackboard collaborated further
with Northwestern University to refine the Building Block. The updated Building Block focuses
on simplifying the installation process and making the Building Block available for international
clients (language updates). This updated, supported version for Blackboard Learn is generally
available. Blackboard is pleased to further the work of our clients through support and adoption
of tools built by the user community.
To access documentation click on the link for the Bboogle Building Block 2.0 Administrator
Guide (Learn 9.1) or visit Behind the Blackboard.
About the Paste From Word Mashup Building Block
The Paste From Word Mashup Building Block provides an easy way to paste text from
Microsoft® Word into the text editor without bringing Microsoft specific markup with it. This
Building Block is a mashup that is added to the text editor. When used to paste text from Word,
Microsoft markup is stripped out so the text does not become corrupt and appears as it did in
the original Word document. Blackboard originally contributed this Building Block to OSCELOT
as an open source project, but now offers a Blackboard-supported version for easier
maintenance.
To access documentation click on the link for Paste From Word Building Block Administrator
Guide (Learn 9.1) or visit Behind the Blackboard.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 31
New Features and Enhancements
Accessing the Building Blocks
Both tools are available to be applied through the Building Block Manager on Release 9.1
Service Pack 4 and above. The Building Blocks can be downloaded from the Extensions
Catalog. Search on the names “Bboogle” or "Blackboard Paste From Word Mashup".
Documentation for each Building Block is also available via the Extensions Catalog. Future
updates to these Building Blocks will also be distributed through the Blackboard Learn Software
Updates module for those clients who have the module activated on their system. Note: The
Building Block on the Extensions Catalog is supported by Blackboard. The open source version
of each Building Block on OSCELOT is unsupported.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 32
Known and Resolved Issues
Known and Resolved Issues
The list of known issues in Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 is available on the Known Issues
page of the Maintenance Center. The Known Issues page provides a list of the issue ID,
description, and resolution path. This page is updated regularly with new client-reported issues.
The list of issues resolved in Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 SP8 is available on the Resolved
Issues Page of the Maintenance Center.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2012 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 33
Performance and Scalability
Performance and Scalability
Blackboard continuously invests in making Blackboard Learn more responsive and capable of
handling greater volumes of user traffic with each release. This section describes the
performance and scalability issues addressed within this release of Blackboard Learn, as well
new information about optimizing the configuration.
Performance issues occur when application responsiveness for a system not under load fails to
meet user expectations. Scalability issues occur when application responsiveness or stability of
a page request for a system under load fails to meet user expectations.
Issues are identified by clients through our traditional support channels and as a result of the
performance and scalability exercises performed as part of all Service Pack releases.
Performance Issues and Improvements
As part of the release, performance optimizations are introduced back into the product as a
result of a customer issue or internally found problem. The Blackboard Performance
Engineering team is responsible for refactoring under-performing areas of the application and
verifying regression improvements based on the optimization.
System
•
LRN-44164: Unnecessary cross-site scripting entitlement checks
An expensive database join query was getting executed in high concurrency for
unnecessary cross-site scripting entitlement checks against static contents. The cross-site
scripting filter has been modified to run against non-static resources that require context
only.
•
LRN-36033: Local variables in tag libraries not released when they’re supposed to
Some tag libraries were not properly releasing local variables. This caused the system to
keep unnecessary data in memory longer than necessary. Fix has been implemented to
address the issue. (LRN-36033)
•
LRN-35696: JVM crash from stack overflow
A bug in Java causes JVM to crash upon stack overflow error on Linux servers running 64bit JVM. The StackShadowPages size has been tuned to avoid this issue in the installer.
•
LRN-34017: Service controller hangs when wrapper.sh doesn’t respond to initial kill
command
Extra measure to terminate wrapper has been placed if it is still present after the
configured wrapper timeout.
•
LRN-32131: Apache Web server compression does not work with SSL
Neither mod_gzip or mod_deflate works when SSL is enabled on the version of Apache
that’s bundled with Learn. We now support swapping out Apache 2.2 for the shipped
Apache 1.3 Web server.
•
LRN-28412: Unnecessary database lookups of system registry entries
There were flaws in the logic of the caching mechanism that manages system registry
entries. The cached objects are now reused more efficiently.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 34
Performance and Scalability
•
LRN-27643: Misconfiguration of the MVC framework’s file upload size in memory
Incorrect syntax was used to specify MVC framework’s file upload size in memory. This
was causing the framework to use inefficient settings and creating unnecessary log
events.
•
LRN-48625: Cache Cluster Replication does not scale in large load balanced
deployments
Scalability issue in the cache cluster replication mechanism was uncovered during
Backboard’s internal benchmark testing. The issue has been resolved by leveraging
asynchronous replication technique where appropriate in order to eliminate time sensitive
requests from waiting on stale cache invalidation process again peer nodes.
•
LRN-43920: Database connection leak
A connection leak was fixed the Xythos core APIs.
•
LRN-33262: Oracle database statistics issue on a Xythos table
Oracle only samples the first 32 bytes (16 double-byte characters in the case of NCHAR
data) when creating a histogram on a string field. This limitation causes the optimizer to
generate inefficient execution plan against a Xythos table. Database index hints and
stats update job have been introduced to correct the issue.
Course Delivery
•
LRN-33724: Unnecessary data stored in assessment result cached objects
The application server was caching extra data that was never reused. A fix has been
made to eliminate this inefficiency in memory usage.
•
LRN-32937: Repetitive load of same term data from the database
Caching mechanism is now leveraged to reuse previously loaded data for looking up term
and course term objects if available. It reduced significant number of database calls and
avoided unnecessary load on the database system.
Content Collection
•
LRN-34750: Loading the left-side navigation menu’s folder view is slow
Users with large number of enrollments were experiencing latencies when loading Content
Collection pages. The child nodes of the folder tree are now lazy loaded to allow quick
entry to Content Collection pages.
Community Engagment
•
LRN-42963: Repetitive load of same module data from the database
Caching mechanism is now leveraged to reuse previously loaded data for presenting
modules to users if available. It reduced significant number of database calls and avoided
unnecessary load on the database system.
•
LRN-27556: Exceptions thrown for non-exceptional events
Generating large number of unnecessary exceptions incur system overhead. Unnecessary
exceptions are no longer produced when navigation tabs are looked up from the database.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 35
Performance and Scalability
•
LRN-7446: Exception in Multi-institution hierarchy node search
Multi-institution hierarchy node search used to throw an exception when the number of
existing nodes in the hierarchy exceeded 1,000. This has been fixed.
Outcomes Assessment
There were no Performance improvements made to the Outcomes Assessment system in SP8.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 36
Performance and Scalability
Recommended Deployment Approach
64-Bit Deployments
Starting Release 9.1 SP8, 32-bit deployments are no longer supported. You must use 64-bit
operating systems (OSs) and sub-components (Java and SQL Server or Oracle). With this
change, Blackboard encourages clients to take advantage of larger Java Virtual Machines
(JVMs) that range from 4GB to 32GB in size. The preferred size varies from 4GB to 8GB, but
performance testing has been conducted with acceptable performance as high as 32GB.
Customers should also migrate away from single server Tomcat cluster deployment. Tomcat
clustering on a single server was introduced for scalability purposes when the Blackboard Learn
architecture was 32-bit and customers wanted the ability to increase their memory usage
beyond the limitation of a single JVM capability. With the option to virtualize, Blackboard’s
benchmarking efforts have moved away from single server Tomcat cluster deployments.
Customers can achieve similar performance in a virtual environment on the same physical
server with multiple virtual instances as with a bare metal configuration with many Tomcat
cluster nodes. The difference in configurations is a smaller demand on the Apache or IIS web
server fronting the Tomcat instance(s). The deployment of 64-bit JVM with larger heap sizes
has suppressed the need for customers to run in a single server cluster option.
Blackboard recommends that customers consider a deployment approach that is distributed
across physical servers with the option to virtualize the hardware to take advantage of the CPU
and Memory capacity of these systems.
Database Availability Options
Customers should also consider database availability options such as Microsoft SQL Server
Active/Passive or Oracle RAC One Node, which is a single instance of Oracle RAC running
within one node in a cluster. Additional nodes can be added within Oracle RAC to address
scalability. In general, both offerings are more around high-availability and will have limited or no
capability to improve performance.
For More Information
For more information about the SQL Server Failover capabilities of Blackboard Learn, contact
Blackboard Consulting.
For information about running Blackboard Learn with RAC, see Oracle RAC Support on UNIX in
Blackboard Help for Administrators.
For more information about deploying Blackboard Learn, see the Hardware Sizing topics in
Blackboard Help for Administrators.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 37
Performance and Scalability
Recommended JVM Tuning Set
For every Service Pack, the Blackboard Performance Engineering team spends many hours
studying the transactional and systemic performance of Blackboard Learn and whether
particular tuning sets will have a positive or negative impact on performance or scalability.
This section provides the recommended Java Virtual Machine (JVM) tuning set as executed in
the Blackboard Performance Engineering laboratory against Release 9.1 Service Pack 8.
Customers are strongly encouraged to deploy their application environments in a 64-bit
configuration using the recommended 4GB or larger tuning set.
Blackboard recommends using the following tuning set for 8GB JVMs on Windows, Linux, and
Solaris systems with 4 CPUs using Java 1.6. These recommended settings are managed within
the bb-config.properties file.
bbconfig.min.heapsize.tomcat=8192m
bbconfig.max.heapsize.tomcat=8192m
bbconfig.max.permsize.tomcat=384m
bbconfig.max.stacksize.tomcat=400k
bbconfig.jvm.options.platform=-XX:StackShadowPages=20 (Linux only)
bbconfig.jvm.options.platform=-XX:StackShadowPages=10 (Solaris only)
bbconfig.jvm.options.extra.tomcat=-XX:NewSize=2048m
-XX:MaxNewSize=2048m -XX:SurvivorRatio=4 -XX:+UseConcMarkSweepGC
-XX:+UseParNewGC -XX:+UseTLAB -XX:ParallelCMSThreads=2
-XX:ParallelGCThreads=4 -XX:+AggressiveOpts -XX:+UseCompressedStrings
-XX:+OptimizeStringConcat -XX:+UseStringCache -XX:+UseCompressedOops
-XX:+ExplicitGCInvokesConcurrent -XX:+PrintVMOptions
-XX:+PrintGCDetails -XX:+PrintGCTimeStamps -XX:+PrintGCTaskTimeStamps
-XX:+PrintCommandLineFlags -XX:+PrintGCApplicationStoppedTime
-XX:+PrintGCApplicationConcurrentTime
The below formulas are applied to derive the suggested tuning set. Please note that NewSize
and MaxNewSize can take a range of values for optimal performance by dividing
bbconfig.max.heapsize.tomcat property value by either 4 or 3.
-XX:NewSize = (bbconfig.max.heapsize.tomcat) / 4
-XX:MaxNewSize = (bbconfig.max.heapsize.tomcat) / 4
-XX:ParallelGCThreads = <#cpus < 8 ? #cpus : 3 + ((5 * #cpus) / 8) >
-XX:ParallelCMSThreads = (ParallelGCThreads + 3) / 4
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 38
Performance and Scalability
A bug in Java causes JVM to crash upon stack overflow error on some Unix servers running 64bit JVM. The below Java option has be set in bb-config.properties file to avoid this issue.
Please refer to Java’s Bug 7059899 for more detail.
bbconfig.jvm.options.platform=-XX:StackShadowPages=20 (Linux only)
bbconfig.jvm.options.platform=-XX:StackShadowPages=10 (Solaris only)
Apache 2.2 HTTP server
In 9.1 SP8, Blackboard Learn supports swapping out external Apache 2.2 distribution for the
shipped Apache 1.3 Web server. The instructions can be found in the
config/apache2/README.txt file under the Blackboard Learn install. Apache 2.2 is
required under either of the following circumstances:
•
Shibboleth authentication provider is used
•
SSL and mod_gzip are used together
Process Model in Apache
Apache 1.3 serves requests using preforked processes. When the server’s parent process is
started, it forks a number of child processes that are responsible for accepting connections on
the listening sockets. When a connection is received, the system wakes up one of the
processes to handle the connection.
Apache 2.x supports pluggable concurrency models called Multi-Processing Modules (MPMs).
When building Apache, you must choose MPM. Two of the important MPMs are worker MPM
and prefork MPM. The worker MPM uses multiple child processes, each with multiple threads.
Each thread handles one connection at a time. Worker is generally a good choice for high-traffic
servers because it has smaller memory footprint than the prefork MPM. The prefork MPM uses
multiple child processes with one thread each. Each process handles one connection at a time.
Prefork is comparable in speed to worker, but it uses more memory. However, prefork's
threadless design can be used with non-thread-safe third-party modules, and it is easier to
debug on platforms with poor thread debugging support.
Estimating MaxClients for Optimal Performance
MaxClients sets the limit on simultaneous requests. Connection attempts beyond the
configured number of MaxClients are queued. Its default value is 256. When increasing this
value, you must also raise ServerLimit to the same value.
When MaxClients is set to a value lower than 256, do not set a value to the ServerLimit
directive. This configuration is valid for the prefork MPM mode.
Blackboard recommends calculating MaxClients using the below formula:
MaxClients = RAM Memory allocated to Apache Web server / Max child process
size
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 39
Supported Technologies
Supported Technologies
In every release, Blackboard devotes time and resources to make Blackboard Learn run on the
latest operating systems, databases, and browsers available, with the goal of creating a system
that is more manageable, more stable, and more user friendly.
This section highlights the major changes to the Supported Technologies and Browsers for this
release. For the most up-to-date information, see Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 SP8 Supported
Technologies and Browsers available on the Maintenance Center on Behind the Blackboard
The following sections highlight the new Platform and Client configurations tested for this
release using the following support terms:
•
Certified: Fully supported technology with highest level of testing before release.
•
Compatible: Fully supported technology with minimal level of testing before release.
•
Unsupported: Unsupported technology because it is either impossible or not tested.
Platform Technologies
32-bit Server Configurations Are No Longer Supported
64-bit Server Configurations
Application
Server/
JDK 1.6u26
SQL Server
2005
(64-bit)
SQL Server
2008
(64-bit)
SQL Server
2008 R2
(64-bit)
Oracle
10gR2
(64-bit)
Oracle
11gR1
(64-bit)
Oracle
11gR2
(64-bit)
Windows
Server 2008
(64-bit)
Certified
(64-bit JDK)
Unsupported
Certified
Certified
Unsupported
Unsupported
Unsupported
Windows
Server 2008
R2 (64-bit)
Certified
(64-bit JDK)
Unsupported
Certified
Certified
Unsupported
Unsupported
Unsupported
Red Hat
Enterprise
Linux
Server 5
(64-bit)
Certified
(64-bit JDK)
Unsupported
Unsupported
Unsupported
Compatible
Compatible
Certified
Red Hat
Enterprise
Linux
Server 6
(64-bit)
Certified
(64-bit JDK)
Unsupported
Unsupported
Unsupported
Unsupported
Compatible
Compatible
Sun Solaris
10
(64-bit
SPARC)
Certified
(64-bit JDK)
Unsupported
Unsupported
Unsupported
Compatible
Compatible
Certified
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 40
Supported Technologies
Configuration Notes:
•
•
•
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 is not supported. Please see this announcement from
February 2011 for more details.
Microsoft SQL Server 2005 is not supported in SP8. SQL Server 2005 requires a 32-bit
application server, which is no longer supported. All clients should upgrade to Microsoft
Server 2008 R2 64-bit and SQL Server 2008 64-bit.
Microsoft SQL Server 2008 Service Pack 1 or above is supported.
Non-English Operating Systems and Databases
Non-English operating systems and databases, such as a Chinese-language version of Oracle,
are considered compatible with Blackboard Learn.
Oracle RAC
Blackboard offers support for RAC with all versions of Oracle supported by Blackboard.
For information about running Blackboard Learn with RAC, see Oracle RAC Support on UNIX in
Blackboard Help for Administrators.
Hybrid Configurations
Red Hat/Solaris hybrid configurations have not been tested and are not supported.
SSL Configuration
Blackboard strongly recommends running the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol to secure
communication between a Blackboard Learn Web/App server and a client machine. If SSL is
not used, authentication may be compromised. For more information, see About SSL and SSL
Choice in Blackboard Help for Administrators.
JDK Support
Only JDK 1.6.0u26 and above is supported for Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8. JDK 1.7 is not
supported for SP8. Blackboard recommends using the latest available version of JDK 1.6.
Virtualization
VMware® ESX Server 4 (Linux® and Windows®) is the only configuration Certified by
Blackboard for Release 9.1.
Blackboard supports other virtualization solutions as long as Blackboard and the hypervisor
support the guest operating system.
In addition to VMware, Blackboard has experience with Citrix XenServer 5.5, Solaris 10 Zones
and Red Hat® Enterprise Linux® 4 & 5 Xen
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 41
Supported Technologies
Client Technologies
Blackboard’s support of Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox differs from the other supported
browsers. Chrome and Firefox are following a rapid release strategy and releasing updates
every 6 or so weeks. Chrome requires an automatic upgrade for end users, whereas Firefox
offers the option to turn off the automatic upgrade. Blackboard has decided to support Chrome
and Firefox in the broad sense meaning we will accept issues on both browsers and strive to
resolve issues on Blackboard Learn as appropriate.
Blackboard has conducted testing using the Stable Channel of Chrome (Chrome 16) and the
Final Release Channel of Firefox (Firefox 9) during testing of this release. We resolved browser
related issues at the time of releases, but cannot guarantee the compatibility of future
versions. We will conduct testing on the latest browsers and Blackboard Learn releases to
provide timely information on browser compatibility.
Windows Client Configurations
Internet Explorer
9
Internet Explorer
8
Firefox (Final
Release
Channel)*
Firefox 3.6
Google Chrome
(Stable Channel)**
Unsupported
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Windows Vista
(32-bit)
Certified
Compatible
Certified
Compatible
Compatible
Windows Vista
(64-bit)
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Windows 7
(32-bit)
Certified
Compatible
Certified
Compatible
Certified
Windows 7
(64-bit)
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Windows XP (32bit)
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 42
Supported Technologies
Mac OSX Client Configurations
Safari 5.1
Safari 5.0
Safari 4.0
Firefox1 (Final
Release
Channel)*
Firefox 3.6
Google Chrome
(Stable
Channel)**
Mac OSX 10.5
“Leopard”
Unsupported
by vendor
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
Mac OSX 10.6
“Snow
Leopard”
Compatible
Certified
Compatible
Certified
Compatible
Certified
Mac OSX 10.7
“Lion”
Compatible
Unsupported
by vendor
Unsupported
by vendor
Compatible
Compatible
Compatible
1
Firefox 8 and Mac OS are not compatible with the drag and drop functions on Blackboard
Learn.
*The Firefox Release Channel is the fully tested version by Mozilla and intended to be the most
stable. This channel is updated roughly every 6 weeks. For further detail on Firefox, please
review the material available at http://blog.mozilla.com/blog/2011/04/13/new-channels-forfirefox-rapid-releases/ .
**The Chrome Stable Channel is the fully tested version by Google and intended to be the most
stable as the name implies. This channel is updated roughly every 2-3 weeks for minor releases
and 6 weeks for major releases. For further detail on Chrome, please review the material
available at www.chromium.org.
Accessibility and JAWS
Blackboard strives to make all its products as accessible as possible. JAWS for Windows 11
and 12 were used during accessibility testing for SP8.
JRE Support
Blackboard Learn requires the latest version of Sun JRE 6. The JRE can be downloaded from
http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html. Windows System
Administrators who want to provide auto-download for users can find the.cab file link for the
appropriate JRE at http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/autodownload-140472.html.
JRE 1.7 is not supported for the Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8.
Java Applet Code Signing
Java applets bundled with Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8 are now signed with a timestamping
authority, https://timestamp.geotrust.com, which certifies that the Blackboard code signing
certificate was valid at the point in time when the applet was signed. Web browser client JDKs
that trust the timestamping authority will run the applets without error, even after the Blackboard
code signing certificate expires. All JDKs since version 1.5 trust this timestamping authority by
default.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 43
Supported Technologies
No Longer Supported
The following technologies are not supported:
•
Internet Explorer 6, 7
•
Firefox 1.x, 2.0, 3.0, and 3.5
•
Safari 2.0, 3.x and any version on Windows
•
Mac OSX 10.3, 10.4 “Tiger”
•
Java 5, although it may continue to work
Deprecation of Supported Technologies
The following technologies are deprecated as of 9.1 SP8 and will be removed from support in a
future Service Pack. Deprecation is a standard software practice to notify the community of
future removal of support. These technologies are still tested and expected to perform in the
intervening releases until the release in which they are removed from support.
•
•
The following technologies as not supported as previously communicated on February
22, 2011. Link to the Support Bulletin.
o
32-bit configurations starting with the release of 9.1 Service Pack 8.
o
Windows Server 2003 starting with the release of 9.1 Service Pack 8.
Mac OS X 10.5 “Leopard” will no longer be supported with the release of 9.1 Service
Pack 10.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 44
Installation and Upgrade Information
Installation and Upgrade Information
For information about fresh installations of Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8, see Installing Blackboard
Learn in Blackboard Help for Administrators.
For information about upgrading to Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 SP8, see the Upgrade Center
or find the Upgrade Kit for your current version in the Document Library.
Direct Upgrade Paths
The following releases have been tested and can be upgraded directly to Blackboard Learn 9.1
SP8.
Important Note: Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8 only supports a 64 bit environment. You must be
operating in a 64 bit environment to use any direct upgrade path to SP8. If you are currently
running any of these service packs in a 32 bit environment, you must migrate to a 64 bit
environment first. This is especially relevant to Academic Suite 8.0 SP7 running on Windows.
More information on migrating to a 64 bit environment is available in help.blackboard.com.
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 Service Pack 7 (Build: 9.1.70081.0)
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 Service Pack 7 Hotfix1 (Build 9.1.70081.25)
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1 Service Pack 6 (Build: 9.1.60230.0)
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.0 Service Pack 7 (Build: 9.0.692.0)
•
Blackboard Academic Suite Release 8.0 SP7 (Build: 8.0.494.0)
•
Blackboard Academic Suite Release 8.0 SP7 HF1 (Build: 8.0.494.5)
•
Blackboard Academic Suite Release 8.0 SP7 HF2 (Build: 8.0.494.35)
Indirect Upgrade Paths
Important Note: Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8 only supports a 64 bit environment. You must be
operating in a 64 bit environment to use any direct upgrade path to SP8. If you are currently
running any of these service packs in a 32 bit environment, you must migrate to a 64 bit
environment first. This is especially relevant to Academic Suite 8.0 SP7 running on Windows.
More information on migrating to a 64 bit environment is available in help.blackboard.com.
Previous Version
Suggested Path
9.1 SP5
(Build: 9.1.50119.0)
1. Upgrade to 9.1 SP6.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
9.1 SP4
(Build: 9.1.40071.3)
1. Upgrade to 9.1 SP6.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
9.1 SP3
(Build: 9.1.30151.0)
1. Upgrade to 9.1 SP4.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP6.
3. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 45
Installation and Upgrade Information
Previous Version
Suggested Path
9.1 GA, SP1, SP2
1. Increment through the service packs to 9.1 SP4.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP6.
3. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
9.0 GA, SP1, SP2,
SP3, SP4, SP5, SP6
1. Increment through the service packs to 9.0 SP7.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
8.0 GA, SP1, SP2,
SP3, SP4, SP5, SP6
1. Increment through the service packs to
8.0 SP7 HF2.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8
7.3 SP2
1. Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
2. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
7.3 SP1
1. Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
2. Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
3. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
7.3 GA
1.
2.
3.
4.
7.2 SP1
1. Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
2. Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
3. Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
7.2 GA
1.
2.
3.
4.
Upgrade to 7.2 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
7.1 SP2 or later
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Upgrade to 7.3 GA.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
Page 46
Installation and Upgrade Information
Previous Version
Suggested Path
7.1 GA and SP1
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Upgrade to 7.1 SP2.
Upgrade to 7.3 GA.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
7.0.x
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
Upgrade to 7.0 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.1 SP2.
Upgrade to 7.3 GA.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
6.3.x
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Upgrade to 6.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 7.0 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.1 SP2.
Upgrade to 7.3 GA.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP1.
Upgrade to 7.3 SP2.
Upgrade to 8.0 SP7 HF2.
Upgrade to 9.1 SP8.
Paths for Importing and Restoring Courses
The following table identifies the supported paths for importing or restoring a Course that was
exported or archived from Blackboard Academic Suite. Certified paths are fully tested and
supported by Blackboard. Compatible paths are not fully tested but should function correctly
based on past performance.
Note: Paths for importing and restoring Courses are not backward compatible. Courses may
be imported or restored to a newer version, but Courses from a newer version may not
be imported or restored to an earlier version.
Source
Support
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1
Certified
Blackboard Learn Release 9.0
Certified
Blackboard Academic Suite Release 8
Certified
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
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Installation and Upgrade Information
Source
Support
Blackboard Academic Suite Release 7
Certified
Blackboard Academic Suite Release 6
Certified
Blackboard ML
Certified
Blackboard 5.5*
Certified
Blackboard 5.0*
Compatible
CourseInfo 4
Not Supported
Blackboard Vista and CE 8.0.5 or higher
Certified
Blackboard Campus Edition 4.1.7
Certified
ANGEL LMS 7.3
Not Supported
ANGEL LMS 7.4
Certified
ANGEL LMS 8.0
Certified
*Blackboard 5 and Blackboard 5.5 did not include an Archive and Restore function. Courses
from these releases may be imported but Courses cannot be restored with user data and
interactions intact.
Upgrading Server Software
Upgrading server software must follow certain steps and meet certain requirements before
installing Blackboard Learn.
•
The database is run on a separate server when using two or more servers. In a
Windows environment, the appropriate client tools for the database must be installed on
the Application server or servers when using a configuration with two or more servers.
For Linux and Solaris configurations, the database client tools are shipped with the
application and must not be installed separately.
•
If running on Windows, when installing the Java SE Development Kit (JDK), make sure
that both the JDK and the JRE components are installed to different locations. Also,
ensure that there are no spaces in the path name to either the JDK or the JRE.
•
If running on Windows, support for .NET APIs and .NET Building Blocks has been
removed from Blackboard Learn in Release 9.1. If you are using .NET APIs and
Building Blocks, they will not work in Release 9.1. Replace them with comparable Web
Services and Java Building Block APIs. For more information about the available APIs,
see the API documentation available on http://www.edugarage.com.
•
If running on Solaris, ensure that the Swap space for the operating system is 0.5 – 1.5
times the amount of physical RAM on the server. For more information, see
http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/content/submitted/swap_space_impact.jsp.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Installation and Upgrade Information
•
For all platforms operating in a load-balanced environment, the Blackboard Application
must be shut down on all the Application Servers for all upgrades. Upgrading one
Application Server while another is running can cause database corruption on all
platforms.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
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Installation and Upgrade Information
Before Running the Updater
Pre-Upgrade Utility for Linux and Solaris Platforms with an Oracle Database
Part of the 9.1 SP6 upgrade applies a change to the gradebook_log table, which may take a
long time on large Oracle databases. To reduce the required downtime, Blackboard has
developed a Pre-Upgrade Utility that can be run on the live production system before taking it
down for the 9.1 SP6 upgrade. If you are upgrading from 9.0 or 8.0, or if you must upgrade to
9.1 SP6 or 9.1 SP7 before upgrading to 9.1 SP8, you may wish to use the Pre-Upgrade Utility to
avoid extended upgrade downtime.
Blackboard recommends that all institutions on Linux and Solaris platforms with an Oracle
database containing more than 5 million records in their gradebook_log table run this utility.
The utility can also be run on systems with fewer records. Running the utility will save significant
downtime during the upgrade process. This utility does not apply to institutions running on a
Windows platform with an SQL Server database.
To find out how many records you have in the gradebook_log table, follow these steps:
1. Log in to SQL*Plus as bblearn (or bb_bb60).
2. Run the query select count(1) from gradebook_log;
Blackboard recommends that this utility be run during a period of lower system activity, as it will
update every row in the gradebook_log table. For customers with more than 5 million records
in the gradebook_log table, this utility may take over an hour to complete. For users with 100
million records, the process may last over 24 hours.
For Managed Hosting clients, Managed Hosting will assess the need to run the utility and will
coordinate with you appropriately.
For self-hosted clients, more information can be found in the Pre-Upgrade Utility README or
the Pre-Upgrade Utility Download page. You will need to be on one of the direct upgrade paths
to the latest 9.1 release to run this utility.
While the utility is running, the number of Oracle archived redo logs will increase.
The "ORA-01555: snapshot too old: rollback segment number ... too small" error may occur
while the utility runs. Work with your local Oracle database administrator to ensure there is
enough space in the UNDOTBS tablespace. An article, "How To Size UNDO Tablespace For
Automatic Undo Management", is available on the Oracle Metalink.
Oracle Bug 6970071 affects Oracle 10.2.0.4 with the recycle bin active. The best approach is to
apply 10.2.0.5, where the fix is included.
Complete instructions for running the utility are available in the README.TXT file.
As with any upgrade activity, running the utility on a test system first is recommended.
Note: If the utility is not used, the 9.1 SP6 upgrade will work, but it may take hours or days to
complete
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
©2011 Blackboard Inc. Proprietary and Confidential
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Installation and Upgrade Information
Windows Server 2008 IIS 7 Roles and Features Configuration
Windows Server 2008 uses IIS 7. Before installation of Blackboard Learn 9.1, IIS 7 needs to be
configured with specific Role Services and other settings.
3. Install the IIS 7 Role in Windows Server 2008 Server Manager and configure Role
Services:
A. Click Start and select Administrative Tools then select Server Manager.
B. Click Roles, and under the Roles Summary heading, click Add Roles.
C. From the list of displayed roles, select Web Server (IIS).
D. Click Next.
At a minimum, the following five (5) role services must be installed under Web Server
(IIS) in addition to the default role services:
•
•
•
•
•
Role Services > Web Server > Application Development > ISAPI Extensions
Role Services > Web Server > Application Development > ISAPI Filters
Role Services > Management Tools > IIS 6 Management Compatibility > IIS 6
Metabase Compatibility
Role Services > Management Tools > IIS 6 Management Compatibility > IIS 6
WMI Compatibility
Role Services > Management Tools > IIS 6 Management Compatibility > IIS 6
Scripting Tools
Special Note: WebDAV Publishing should not be selected.
To enhance performance, troubleshooting, and offer additional web server
configuration options, Blackboard recommends that the following role services also
be installed under Web Server (IIS):
•
•
•
•
•
Role Services > Web Server > Common HTTP Features > all five (5) role
services enabled
Role Services > Web Server > Application Development > all seven (7) role
services enabled
Role Services > Web Server > Security > all eight (8) role services enabled
Role Services > Management Tools > all three (3) role services enabled
Management Tools > IIS 6 Management Capabilities > all four (4) role services
enabled.
Of the role services listed under Web Server (IIS) the following will be of the most
interest:
•
•
Role Services > Common HTTP Features > HTTP Redirection (to allow for HTTP
redirection, in the event that the site is renamed)
Role Services > Security > Windows Authentication (to allow for Active Directory
integrated authentication)
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Installation and Upgrade Information
•
•
Role Services > Security > IP and Domain Restrictions (to allow for greater
control of web server access)
Role Services > Performance > Dynamic Content Compression (to allow for
enhanced performance)
E. Select Windows Process Activation Service (.NET Environment), and then
click Add Required Role services.
4. Disable the Default Web Site:
A. Click Start select Administrative Tools then select Server Manager.
B. From the left menu, click the plus sign next to Roles to expand the tree.
C. Click the plus sign next to Web Server IIS, and then click Internet Information
Services (IIS) Manager.
D. Under the Connections heading, click plus sign next to the %HOSTNAME%,
and then click the plus sign next to Sites.
E. Right-click Default Web Site and from the drop-down menu select Manage Web
Site, then select Stop.
5. Back up the current IIS 7 configuration and verify.
A. %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe add backup "Blackboard PreChange"
B. %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe list backup
6. Modify the IIS 7 configuration to permit double escaping within URLs (applies to all
sites).
A. %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd set config
/section:system.webServer/Security/requestFiltering allowDoubleEscaping:True
7. Modify the IIS 7 configuration to allow upload files greater than 20MB in size, specified in
bytes (applies to all sites).
A. %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd set config section:requestFiltering requestLimits.maxAllowedContentLength:104857600
8. Back up the current IIS 7 configuration and verify.
A. %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe add backup "Blackboard PostChange Backup"
B. %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe list backup
9. Restart the IIS service.
A. Click Start and select Administrative Tools then select Server Manager.
B. From the left menu, click the plus sign next to Configuration and then click
Services.
C. From the list of services, right-click World Wide Web Publishing Service and
select Restart.
IIS Configuration Editing Notes
Blackboard recommends that you do not manually edit the
%windir%\system32\inetsrv\config\applicationHost.config file to configure
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Installation and Upgrade Information
these options. This will result in errors that require a backup and restore of the last known good
backup of the IIS 7 configuration that was managed by the IIS.
If you manually backed up the applicationHost.config file, restoring this manual backup
and restarting IIS 7 will not fix errors generated by manually editing this file to configure IIS 7.
By default, IIS 7 will check every two minutes for changes to the configuration files and will
automatically create backups of them, maintaining a history of ten backups. Use the oldest of
these backups to restore IIS 7 to a working state.
%windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe list
backup%windir%\system32\inetsrv\appcmd.exe restore backup
"CFGHISTORY_0000000021"
Once the configuration has been restored and verified through web browser access, use the
appcmd utility to configure the necessary features of IIS 7 as described in the section above.
If this approach does not solve the problem with IIS 7 generating errors, remove and then
reinstall the IIS 7 Role.
If you need to reinstall the IIS 7 Role, you can use the
%BLACKBOARD%\tools\admin\WebsiteReinstall.bat command to re-establish the
Blackboard Web site within IIS. Then install the IIS 7 Role in Windows Server 2008 Server
Manager and configure Role Services.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
Upgrade Documentation
Blackboard provides Upgrade documentation for each of the following products in Blackboard
Help for Administrators:
•
Blackboard Learn Release 9.0
•
Blackboard Academic Suite 8.0
•
CE 4
•
CE 8
•
Vista 8
Provide New License
Contact Blackboard Client Operations to request a new license key file (bb-license.xml) for
Blackboard Learn Release 9.1. Make sure to do so well in advance of the upgrade. It is
important to obtain a new license file to ensure the upgrade includes new features and
functions.
Save the new license file in the same directory as the updater. Be sure not to confuse the new
license with the old license file.
During the upgrade, when the installation prompt presents the following options: Update,
Provide new License file, Uninstall Blackboard Learn, and Uninstall appserver, select Provide
new License file.
Warnings and Tips for Upgrading
Warning for Customizations and Configuration
Running the Updater on an existing system will reset many back-end and user interface
customizations. Examples and warnings describing specific known issues are included here.
Examples of affected back-end settings include:
•
JAVA_HOME system environment variable
•
SSL and custom authentication settings
•
Settings in the bb-config.properties, authentication.properties, and
wrapper.conf files
Examples of affected user interface settings and other affected areas include:
•
Course Settings (which control the Course Menu)
•
Building Block availability
•
API hosts information
•
Module and Tab availability, role settings, and custom layouts
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
Customizations will need to be reapplied after the upgrade. To make this process easier, create
a detailed document outlining all existing customizations.
Note: Any configuration files removed by the upgrade will be placed in the
blackboard_directory>/backups/<upgrade_timestamp> directory. Use these files as a
guide when updating the new configuration files to reapply your previous customizations.
Mashups, Building Blocks, Blackboard Mobile and Firewall Warning
Bidirectional communication to Web Services that control the APIs for Mashups, some Building
Blocks, and Blackboard Mobile is required. If you are running Blackboard from behind a firewall
as a test server or for security reasons, you will need to open the firewall to use these features.
To open bidirectional communication to Web Services, you must configure your firewall to allow
responses from the API hosts. Information from the hosts is available at these locations. Known
ports are listed.
•
Flickr – http://www.flickr.com/services/api/
•
YouTube – http://gdata.youtube.com
•
SlideShare – http://www.slideshare.net
•
•
•
•
Blackboard Mobile – http://mlrs.medu.com and http://mlcs.medu.com Ports 80 and 443
SafeAssign – http://www.safeassign.com Ports 80, 443, 8080 and 8443
McGraw-Hill Connect – 204.8.135.97 and 198.45.24.170
Blackboard Software Updates – http://handle.blackboard.com and
http://softwareupdates.blackboard.com Ports 80 and 443
Acxiom Warning
The IdentifyX Building Block is no longer bundled with Blackboard Learn. Clients who are
upgrading from Blackboard Academic Suite 8.0 or Blackboard Learn 9.0 and then upgrade to
Blackboard Learn SP8 must deactivate IdentifyX v1.1.3 prior to upgrading. After upgrading,
download and install the newest version of IdentifyX, v1.1.6 available from Blackboard
Extensions. Clients that upgrade from a Learn 9.1 release are already using IdentifyX, v1.1.6.
Echo 360 Warning
The Echo 360 Building Block supporting the free, limited-use access to EchoPersonal capture
and publishing capability is no longer be bundled with Blackboard Learn. Those institutions that
have downloaded this Echo360 Building Block previously and are actively using it may continue
to do so with support from Echo360. However, no new instances will be permitted or supported.
Echo360 recordings can still be integrated into a Learn course using links. For clarification,
Echo360 will continue to integrate with this and prior Blackboard Learn releases so learning
content captured with a paid version of the Echo solution will accessible using Blackboard
solutions. To learn more about how your school can work with Echo360’s Lecture Capture
solutions, visit their website at www.echo360.com.
New York Times Warning
New York Times content modules will no longer be bundled with Blackboard Learn Community
Engagement.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
SafeAssign Warning
Institutions choosing to archive courses from a legacy production installation and then restore
the courses to a new 9.1 instance will lose some of the data associated with SafeAssign,
specifically SafeAssignments in restored courses and the student submissions to those
SafeAssignments will be inaccessible. In addition, this option could potentially create a privacy
issue where some students would be able to see submissions that are not their own.
To avoid these issues, when SafeAssign is heavily used, Blackboard recommends that one of
the other two upgrade paths be selected: In-Place Upgrade or Fresh Install – Data Migration.
If your institution chooses the archive/restore option, you will need to have the existing
SafeAssign institution database copied from the previous installation to the new installation.
Please open a ticket with Client Support to request this copy after the new production
installation is complete.
Custom Themes Warning
Significant changes were made to the application markup and CSS in Release 9.1 to support
new features and accessibility standards. These changes can cause customized themes and
color palette changes created in earlier releases to malfunction as well as fail to apply styles to
new features.
Comments have been added to the CSS files to make them easier to read and understand.
These comments identify new elements and elements that are no longer used. Extraneous
sectors have been removed.
There are several html documents contained in this zip file, 9.1 SP8 CSS Diff Files. There is a
document for each pre-existing theme from the prior release. In order to assist anyone
transitioning from 9.1 SP6 or 9.1 SP7 to SP8, the differences from both are provided. Refer to
the table below to identify which diff file(s) are applicable.
Theme
From 9.1 SP6 to 9.1 SP8
From 9.1 SP7 to 9.1 SP8
Learn 2008 (Bb Learn)
SP6 to SP8-Learn2008
SP7 to SP8-Learn2008
Bb Classic
SP6 to SP8-Classic
SP7 to SP8-Classic
Bb Schoolhouse
SP6 to SP8-Schoolhouse
SP7 to SP8-Schoolhouse
Brushed Metal
SP6 to SP8-Metal
SP7 to SP8-Metal
WebCT Classic 1
SP6 to SP8-Vista
SP7 to SP8-Vista
WebCT Classic 2
SP6 to SP8-CE4
SP7 to SP8-CE4
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
Important Note about Adaptive Release
To ensure that Adaptive Release rules function correctly, additional steps may be required for
courses created prior to Blackboard Learn Service Pack 6.
In the majority of cases it’s sufficient to remove these permissions manually from the Course
Files. Instructors can perform this on a file-by-file basis where adaptive release control is
required only on a small number of files, or permissions can be reset for the entire course.
Resetting all permissions to default using the user interface involves briefly permitting all course
users access to the files in order that permissions can be revoked on all sub-directories and files
in one step. In a course requiring adaptive release control of large numbers of files:
1. In the course Control Panel, go to course Files.
2. At the top of a page, access the drop-down menu for the course files directory. It will be
labeled ‘Files: <courseid>’
3. Click Permissions from the drop-down menu.
4. Click Add Course User List.
5. Select All Course Users.
6. Select Read permission.
7. Check the box to Overwrite the existing permissions.
8. Click Submit.
9. Find the newly created All Course Users list, and click Delete from the drop-down
menu. Click OK to remove permissions from all sub-folders and files.
10. You should be left with three user list permissions (unless you have previously created
any custom instructor roles, in which case there will be more than three). Course Builder,
Instructor and Teaching Assistant all with full manage permissions.
These instructions will be slightly different if you have licensed the Content Collection.
Note: In rare cases, additional steps may be required. The adaptive release functionality
requires file links to exist in a table called cms_resource_link. Depending on your Learn
version history, in some cases, these rows may not exist and so a course copy or an
archive/restore will be required for all content items to function properly with adaptive release.
Previous Content Management Clients Warning
If your institution is planning to upgrade directly from Blackboard Learn 9.0 or earlier please be
aware of possible complications with Content Management. Clients who have previously
licensed the Content Management module, but no longer have such a license, may encounter
problems when upgrading to Release 9.1. This occurs because of lingering schemas in the
database that require a Content Management license. Because of these lingering schemas, the
installer is unable to upgrade the database properly and will fail.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
If your institution’s database has lingering schemas from a previous Content Management
license you must obtain the appropriate uninstaller script from Blackboard Client Support to
remove these schemas before upgrading to 9.1.
Load-Balanced Systems Warning
The Updater must be run on each Application server and the Collaboration server on a loadbalanced system. After running the Updater the first time, choose the Update an App Server for
all other Application servers and the Collaboration server. This option will upgrade the
application files without making any of the database changes.
For all platforms operating in a load-balanced environment, the Blackboard Application must be
shut down on all the Application Servers for all upgrades. Upgrading one Application Server
while another is running can cause database corruption on all platforms.
•
Upgrades may fail if Port 80 is being used. The installer validates that it can complete
installation and start services without conflict by verifying that the ports configured for
Blackbaord are not in use to avoid starup failures. The ports are checked against the
load-balanced hostname bbconfig.webserver.fullhostname, where the loadbalancer may still be responding during the upgrade. To avoid this error:
•
Make sure no other service is running on the Application Server and keeping Port
80 open.
•
Make sure the installer is not validating against another server or load-balancer.
See KB article Upgrade Fails with Port 80 Already in Use for more details.
Language Pack Changes Warning
To ensure consistency across releases, the Blackboard Learn Updater will compare the existing
en_US language pack against the version that is being installed. The differences are noted and
output in a file called bundle_diff.txt. This file is added to the
blackboard/backups/<updater_time_stamp> directory. Use this file to review the text
differences between releases and make upgrades to any custom Language Packs.
Note: For Blackboard Learn SP8, the bundle_diff.txt will be much larger than in previous
releases due to the addition of Course Themes, Course Structures, Sample Content, and the
Course Wizard. This may cause uploading and downloading a language pack through the
language pack editor to take longer than usual.
Changed Privilege for System Support Role Warning
In 9.1 SP8, the privileges given to the System Support role by default were changed. The
System Support role no longer has the course.quick-enroll entitlement. New users with a
System Support role cannot Quick Enroll in a Course or Organization. However, existing users
with the System Support role will keep the Quick Enroll privilege. The upgrade process will not
change the entitlements of existing users.
Blackboard recommends that administrators manually remove the Quick Enroll privilege from
existing users with the System Support role. This is optional, but can be performed with the
following steps:
1. Navigate to the System Admin panel.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
2. Under Users click System Roles.
3. Click the chevron next to System Support and choose Privileges.
4. Search for “quick enroll”
5. The search results should return the Course/Organization Control Panel > Quick
Enroll privilege. Check the box, click the Privileges button at the top of the page, and
choose Restrict Privileges.
6. A success message will indicate that the privilege was successfully restricted.
Oracle 11gR2 Errors
Oracle 11gR2 contains two bugs that cause errors.
The first bug displays errors when importing content or restoring course packages. To prevent
this error, as an Oracle user, run the following command:
alter system set "_optimizer_push_pred_cost_based"=false scope = both;
alter system set cursor_sharing=EXACT scope=both;
The second bug returns an error that reads:
ORA-00918: COLUMN AMBIGUOUSLY DEFINED
To prevent this error, apply the Oracle patch bundle 11.2.0.1 number 9259407. This issue is
resolved in Oracle 11.2.0.2.
Oracle 10g Errors
When an administrator performs an advanced content search a database error occurs in the
system log file for Oracle versions 10.2.0.5.0, 10.2.0.4.0:
java.sql.SQLDataException: ORA-01424: missing or illegal character following
the escape character
This is believed to be an Oracle bug. Apply the following workaround to avoid the error:
Enter the following command from the sqlplus Oracle database client:
SQL> Alter system Set "_optim_peek_user_binds"=false scope = both;
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
Running the Updater on Windows
Follow these steps to run the Updater on Windows:
1.
Make sure that the JAVA_HOME system environment variable points to a full Java SDK,
version 1.6.0u26 or later. The path cannot contain spaces. For example: C:\JDK6.
2.
Place the Updater file in the desired location, and then double-click the Updater file to
launch the Updater.
A welcome message appears with a reminder to read the release notes and the
installations instructions completely before updating.
3.
Click Next to continue.
4.
Confirm the installation and content directories for your environment, and then click Next.
Load-balanced systems should use the correct UNC path for your content directory.
For those clients with Content Management and the /courses area turned off, a warning
appears displaying a message that the /courses content area must be turned on to
successfully upgrade. Although not recommended, the /courses area can be disabled
again after upgrade, but it must remain on during upgrade.
5.
At the next prompt, select Provide new license file, and then click Next.
6.
If the server does not already have a Server Type value, the Server Type screen
appears. Properly categorize the server and click Next.
7.
When a message appears displaying the changes that will be made when the Updater
runs, carefully verify the changes. You will not be able to undo the changes after you start
the upgrade.
8.
Click Next to start the upgrade.
WARNING! If you launched the Updater from the command line, do not close the command
line window or any of the other windows that pop-up during the upgrade as this will cause the
Upgrade to fail and may leave the database in an indeterminate state.
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Upgrading to Blackboard Learn 9.1 SP8
Running the Updater on UNIX (Red Hat and Solaris)
Follow these steps to run the Updater on UNIX.
1.
Make sure that the $JAVA_HOME system environment variable points to a full Java SDK,
version 1.6.0u26 or later. The path cannot contain spaces. For example: /usr/jdk6.
2.
Place the Updater file in the desired location.
3.
Open a command-line prompt as the root user and navigate to the directory that holds the
Updater.
4.
Issue the following command to launch the Updater:
$JAVA_HOME/bin/java -jar <updater_file>
If using the X Windows System (X11) or a similar GUI solution and the DISPLAY variable
is properly configured, the Updater will launch in GUI mode.
Note: The following steps assume that the command-line Updater is used.
5.
A welcome message appears with a reminder to read the release notes and the
installations instructions completely before updating.
6.
Press ENTER to continue. Instructions appear for navigating through the Updater
prompts. The Updater, in most cases, will provide a default value in brackets.
7.
Press ENTER to accept the default and continue, or enter a different value. Press ENTER
to continue after entering a new value.
The first Updater prompt asks for the directory where Blackboard will be found.
8.
Press ENTER to accept the default, or enter a new value and then press ENTER.
If Blackboard Learn is not found in the directory provided, the Updater attempts to install
at the given location.
9.
At the next prompt, type 1 for “1 – Upgrade and Convert” and press ENTER.
For those clients with Content Management and the /courses area turned off, a warning
appears displaying a message that the /courses content area must be turned on to
successfully upgrade. Although not recommended, the /courses area can be disabled
again after upgrade, but it must remain on during upgrade.
10. If the server does not already have a Server Type value, the Server Type screen appears.
Properly categorize the server and press ENTER.
11. When a message appears displaying the changes that will be made when the Updater
runs, carefully verify the changes. You will not be able to undo the changes after you start
the upgrade.
12. Press ENTER to start the upgrade.
Release Notes for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Service Pack 8 (9.1.82223.0)
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