Release Notes 2019 | Blackboard Help

Release Notes for Learn SaaS - 2019

Learn SaaS release 3700.16.0: Partial delay for Continuous Delivery release to Production environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.16.0 | Release to Production 5 December 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re delaying the Blackboard Learn SaaS 3700.16.0 Continuous Delivery release to client Production servers for US East customers, previously scheduled for December 5, 2019. All Continuous Delivery client Production servers will receive an updated version of the 3700.16.0 release during off-hours on Wednesday, December 18, 2019.

More information on the delay available on Behind the Blackboard

Updates in this version include:

Students and instructors using the Ultra Course View couldn’t download file submissions. We’ve fixed the issue.
Some instructors couldn’t access Message attachments in the Original Course View. We’ve fixed the issue.
In the Ultra Course View, when an instructor graded one assignment and moved on to the next, the first assignment displayed again instead of the next one. We’ve fixed the issue.
Instructors couldn’t copy more than 50 questions into a new test in the Ultra Course View. We’ve fixed the issue.
The Rustici fix for Chrome was included in 2017.1.67. This version was applied to 3700.16, 3700.0.5, 3500.0.9, 3400.0.14 versions of the Learn product. Customers that upgrade to these versions won't be impacted by the future Chrome release.

Learn SaaS release 3700.16.0: Addition to client Production release

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.16.0 | Release to Production 5 December 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, the scheduled Production release of 3700.16.0 (full release number 3700.16.0-rel.33+fdffbe0) during off-hours on Thursday, December 5, 2019 will include an additional update.

Users of some LTI tools couldn’t create LTI content or use services because the tools weren’t properly validated. We've fixed the issue.

Learn SaaS release 3700.16.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.16.0 | Release to Production 5 December 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.16.0 (full release number 3700.16.0-rel.25+b897566) to client Test/Staging servers during off-hours on Tuesday, November 26, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Some users got an error message when they downloaded student submissions in certain file formats. We've fixed the issue.
Some LTI 1.3 workflows didn't launch from Partner Cloud Settings. We've fixed the issue.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.16.0 | Release to Production 5 December 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

You can view maintenance items in Behind the Blackboard. Our Known Issue articles provide information for individual bug fixes, and may include bug descriptions and which Learn versions were affected. You can filter bug fixes by SaaS release for easier navigation. View the 3700.16.0 maintenance issues on Behind the Blackboard.

Account lockout

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.14.0 | Release to Production 7 November 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q4 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

In this release, by default Learn will lock user accounts after 5 failed login attempts. Administrators can disable the feature or edit its limits by selecting Account Lock Settings in the Administrator panel. Administrators can decide the maximum failed attempts allowed within a specified period. They can also choose how long accounts remain locked and whether accounts unlock automatically if users reset their passwords.

More on configuring Account Lock Settings

Student help with account lockout

Instructor help with account lockout

Guest Account can't be enrolled in courses

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.14.0 | Release to Production 7 November 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q4 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

Previously, when an unauthenticated user accessed Blackboard Learn and the "Enable Guest" property was enabled they were associated with the "Guest" account. Instructors were able to enroll this "Guest" account in courses and organizations, circumventing application entitlement handling.

This account is a unique Blackboard System Level account that was never intended to be enrolled. Allowing this account to be enrolled meant possible data exposure to unauthenticated users as multiple un-authenticated users could be associated with the account.

Therefore, in this release we removed the ability for the "Guest" account to be enrolled in courses stopping potential data exposure concerns between unauthenticated users. Existing "Guest" account enrollments will remain and be visible to instructors and administrators so they can clean up these existing enrollments through the user interface.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.14.0 | Release to Production 7 November 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

System administration notification settings

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.14.0 | Release to Production 7 November 2019
Ultra Experience

Learn Ultra has always been designed with the end user in mind, and that includes flexibility and personalization of Notifications. Feedback from the wider Blackboard Community outlined that although this is positive, offering levels of control for an institution to support and manage notifications is an important. Blackboard listened to this client feedback, and we're pleased to outline our support for System Administration Notification Settings in Ultra.

Ultra administrators can change notifications at the system level, configure digest functionality, and set up default notification settings. In the Administrator Panel, select Notification Settings. For every available notification type and source, administrators can select whether notifications are on or off by default. Administrators can also decide whether users can change the default setting in their individual preferences.

UPDATE: Upcoming changes to Open JDK and impact to Building Blocks in Learn SaaS deployments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

To address recent changes in Oracle’s Java support model, Blackboard Learn is transitioning to adopt a more recent version of Java, Java 11 JDK. Our new target for adopting Java 11 is 3800.0.0. Please confirm release dates with the SaaS release schedule.

We strongly encourage all clients and partners who use Building Blocks to test them with Java 11. Partners and clients can access early builds of Learn with Java 11 by requesting to join the Learn SaaS Technical Preview program.

As part of this change, we are transitioning from the Oracle-supported version of Java 11 to the AWS-supported version of Java 11 called Corretto. This does not impact SaaS or Managed Hosting clients. Operational changes for self-hosted clients are minimal.

For further details on Java 11 Technical Preview testing with Building Blocks and Corretto changes for self-hosted clients, see the following articles:

View the Behind the Blackboard announcement

Join the conversation on Blackboard Community

We previously announced this change to Java 11 to be part of Blackboard Learn release 3600.0, scheduled for April 2019. Later, we'd communicated a new target of June 2019 followed by September 2019. Based on the results of testing with Technical Preview participants and our partners, we concluded that Java 11 adoption should be delayed further.

Previous announcements:

To address recent changes in Oracle’s Java support model, Blackboard Learn is transitioning to adopt the latest version of OpenJDK as it’s released. We previously announced this change with the introduction of OpenJDK 11 as part of Blackboard Learn release 3600.0, and later announced a new target of June 2019. Based on the results of initial testing with Technical Preview participants and our partners, we concluded that Java 11 adoption should be removed from those target releases due to compatibility issues with extensions. The delay allowed for continued testing to uphold the user experience and minimize disruptions.

For developers, partners, and institutions, testing Building Blocks for compatibility is highly recommended because libraries may have changed. For developers, recompiling Building Blocks using the updated Java libraries is also a best practice and should be performed for Java 11.

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We’re changing the way we adopt Java updates in Blackboard Learn. These changes start with Blackboard Learn SaaS release 3600.0 with the adoption of Open JDK 11.

While we expect that building blocks will continue to work as is, Blackboard is aware that some fundamental library changes could affect compatibility. To help ensure that you’re able to thoroughly test for these upcoming changes, we’re introducing a Learn SaaS Technical Preview program.

Partners in the Blackboard Developers’ Network (BbDN) should enter a support case requesting to participate in the program.

Learn SaaS release 3700.9.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.9.0 | Release to Production 5 September 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.9.0 (full release number 3700.9.0-rel.23+e0c105e) to client Test/Stage servers during off-hours on Tuesday, September 3, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Some mobile users saw an error message in the Activity Stream. We’ve fixed the issue.
Some users couldn't customize their default brand in the Ultra Experience. We’ve fixed the issue.
Users couldn't create new accounts on Open Education. We’ve fixed the issue.
Some users had trouble logging out in the Original Experience. We’ve fixed the issue.

Learn SaaS release 3700.9.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.9.0 | Release to Production 5 September 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience, Ultra Course View

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.9.0 (full release number 3700.9.0-rel.16+4fb2947) to client Test/Stage servers during off-hours on Tuesday, August 27, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Users encountered an error message when saving changes to their default brand in the Ultra Experience. We’ve fixed the issue.
Open Education pages returned errors site-wide. We’ve fixed the issue.
Assessments took longer than usual to load in the Ultra Course View. We’ve fixed the issue.
For users preparing to migrate to a SaaS deployment, the Move Legacy Content tool caused problems with Turnitin feedback. We’ve fixed the issue.

Learn SaaS release 3700.9.0: Delay for Continuous Delivery release to Test/Stage environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.9.0 | Release to Production 5 September 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re delaying the Blackboard Learn SaaS 3700.9.0 Continuous Delivery release to client Test/Stage servers, previously scheduled for August 13, 2019. The new release date is August 15, 2019, two days later than previously announced. The release schedule has been updated to reflect this change.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.9.0 | Release to Production 5 September 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

Learn SaaS release 3700.7.0: Update to client Production environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.7.0 | Release to Production 12 August 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.7.0 (full release number 3700.7.0-rel.31+c948a62) to client Production servers during off-hours on Friday, August 30, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Users couldn't create new accounts on Open Education. We’ve fixed the issue.
Open Education pages returned errors site-wide. We’ve fixed the issue.

Learn SaaS release 3700.7.0: Update to client Production environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.7.0 | Release to Production 12 August 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

UPDATE: We have resolved the AWS resource issue affecting EU clients. All Learn SaaS Production instances should now have received the updated 3700.7.0 version.

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.7.0 (full release number 3700.7.0-rel.27+ce363ca) to client Production servers during off-hours on Wednesday, August 14, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Users experienced extremely slow response times during the upgrade. We’ve fixed the issue.
The banner thumbnail image caused a large number of temporary files to fill the root file structure. We’ve fixed the issue.

Additional updates in the user interface

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.7.0 | Release to Production 12 August 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q4 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

When students open an assessment in the Ultra Course View, the Submit button is disabled until they add content or answer at least one question.
When a student or instructor uses Box View in an assignment, it opens by default and displays using more screen space.
We've added a display warning to help administrators identify when they are enabling a feature that may send data outside the specified compliance boundary. This allows administrators to make more informed decisions about the features they enable.
We've changed the height of the Institution Page banner image to 160 pixels. Because screen size width varies on wider screens, the banner image crops the top and bottom of the image as the content area gets wider.

Create Ultra Organizations

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.7.0 | Release to Production 12 August 2019
Ultra Experience

In this release, we've brought Ultra Organizations to life. Administrators can now create Ultra Organizations, which have the same functionality and workflow as Ultra courses. Administrators can choose to create Original Organizations, Ultra Organizations, or let users choose. Administrators can import and export existing courses and organizations.

Create Ultra Organizations using the same workflow as Ultra Courses. You can create groups, make the organization private or visible to students, and create content within the organization.

Updates to branding

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.7.0 | Release to Production 12 August 2019
Ultra Experience

In this release, we've included the ability to filter brands by roles or host names from the brands listing page and view which brands were just created. We included a notification if a custom login is specified but won't be visible to users based on brand associations. Administrators can choose to allow the navigation logo area to be filled with a theme color, like the base navigation area.

In the Brands listing page, an Administrator can now view the Host and Role Associations assigned to any specific brand and search those brands by clicking the Find a Brand function to filter the list based on the Brand Name or Host Association.

Additional updates in the user interface

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.5.0 | Release to Production 11 July 2019
Ultra Experience

To ensure privacy, only instructor names—not instructor usernames—appear to students throughout the Ultra experience.
Building on the URL and role branding feature released earlier, administrators can see a brand’s host and role associations from the Brands page.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.5.0 | Release to Production 11 July 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

Office 365/G Suite Integration: Individual authentication

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.5.0 | Release to Production 11 July 2019
Ultra Experience

The ability to support institutionally managed access to cloud storage alongside personal storage is an important major request we hear from our clients. This release provides the ability for institutions and schools who leverage Microsoft or Google to select their preferred solution and allow users to access their institutional cloud storage account from within their profile or directly upload content in the Ultra Course View.

Allow your instructors and students to access Office365 or Google accounts from Blackboard Learn. Users can access cloud storage from their Ultra courses, profile, and the Tools page. Multiple entry points make it easier to get to the files they want when they want it. Administrators must configure the institution account to turn on instructor and student access. On the Administrator panel, go to Institution Cloud Storage to set up the integration.

New updates for Ally customers

Ally 1.31 | Release to Production 18 June 2019
Updated features

The latest release of Ally (v. 1.31) contains improvements that may apply to your product. Visit the Ally release notes to learn more. Don't have Ally? Learn more about Ally.

Learn SaaS release 3700.3.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.3.0 | Release to Production 6 June 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.3.0 (full release number 3700.3.0-rel.7+29b16e7) to client Test/Staging servers. Your instance may be updated starting at 5:00AM EST on May 31, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

When a student submitted multiple attempts on a test in quick succession, the system's responsiveness would slow or stop. We've fixed the issue.
On the Courses page in the Ultra experience, longer course names were appearing with unexpected symbols. We've fixed the issue.
A few improvements for custom themes in the Ultra experience:
- We've improved how custom themes are created and updated on the backend in the Ultra experience to improve performance.
- Deleted custom brands weren't being removed from the database properly, leading to unexpected behavior. We've fixed the issue.
- When an administrator uploaded a custom navigation logo, the custom login logo was cleared. We've fixed the issue.
- Some users reported losing the ability to upload a logo to the Institution Page. We've fixed the issue.
- The Institution Page associated with a custom brand wasn't available for administrators if modules weren't visible. We've fixed the issue.

Add external calendars in Blackboard Learn

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.3.0 | Release to Production 6 June 2019
Ultra Experience

Instructors and students often use calendars to organize and keep track of events. Access to a course calendar is crucial to meeting deadlines and overall success. Having access to all events—both personal and academic—in one place helps keep everyone on track. In this release, users can synchronize external calendars with Blackboard Learn, building on the previously released capabilities.

On the Calendar page in the base navigation, open Calendar Settings and select Add Calendar. Drag and drop or click to upload your calendar file in ICS format. When you connect your external calendar to Blackboard Learn, all course events appear one year in the past and into the future.

More on how to add calendar files in Learn

Additional updates in the user interface

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.3.0 | Release to Production 6 June 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q4 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

Previously, the Courses page in the Ultra experience listed a user's oldest courses first. The order has been flipped and now the newest courses are listed first. If a user designates any courses as favorites, those courses still appear first in the list.
To improve performance for system tasks, we’ve introduced new retention settings. You can configure how long your system retains information on asynchronous system tasks, including “complete,” “error,” and “incomplete” tasks. Find these options in Administrator Panel > Logs > System Tasks Status > Retention Settings.
We’ve updated file behavior for Portfolios to improve performance. When a user downloads a portfolio, the assets will reference assets stored on Blackboard's content delivery network (CDN). File names will use https://learn.blackboardcdn.com/. Related updates are described on Behind the Blackboard.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.3.0 | Release to Production 6 June 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

Update to the Organizations and Courses pages in the Ultra experience

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.3.0 | Release to Production 6 June 2019
Ultra Experience

In this release, we've updated the Courses and Organizations pages in the Ultra base navigation.

We've brought the Ultra design language to the Organizations base page. Courses and organizations also now include the ability to add images. You can also view the Courses and Organizations pages as either a list or a grid, where banner images are on display. The Organizations page contains the same functions and workflows as the Courses page.

URL and role branding for the Ultra experience

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.3.0 | Release to Production 6 June 2019
Ultra Experience

Institutions want to be able to express their own brand and identity within the learning management system, and this often extends to specific branding for their faculties or affiliations. With the introduction of URL and role branding in the Ultra experience, institutions can now create their own domain and role specific Ultra brands, providing a sense of personalization for instructors and students.

Create a new brand from the Brands link on the Administrator Panel. You can customize the login logo, navigation and login icon, color selection, and Institution Page for a brand. Associate the brand to a new host/domain name and/or institution role in the Ultra experience.

Learn SaaS release 3700.0.0: Update to client Test/Stage and Production environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.0.0 | Release to Production 3 May 2019
Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.0.0 (full release number 3700.0.0-rel.23+4c6d4de) to client Test/Stage and Production servers.

Your Production instance may be updated starting on May 9, 2019. Your Test/Stage instance may be updated starting on May 10, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

An issue introduced with the 3700.0 release caused Learn Ultra to frequently query the entire content management resource link. This caused extreme garbage collection and out-of-memory issues across application servers leading to system instability and eventual outage. We've fixed the issue, restoring environment stabilization and operations. More information on Behind the Blackboard.

Learn SaaS release 3700.0.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.0.0 | Release to Production 3 May 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3700.0.0 (full release number 3700.0.0-rel.10+745b49a) to client Test/Staging servers. Your instance may be updated starting at 5:00AM EST on April 15, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

System and course role privileges weren't appearing in the user interface as expected. We've fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.
A critical security vulnerability has been internally identified and we have fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.0.0 | Release to Production 3 May 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

Additional updates in the user interface

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3700.0.0 | Release to Production 3 May 2019
Ultra Experience

On the Details & Action panel of the Ultra Course View, the Collaborate link has been updated to say Blackboard Collaborate. It previously said Course Room. We've also updated the link text in this menu.
Previously, assessment descriptions weren’t properly converted to plain text when a course was converted to the Ultra Course View. Assessment descriptions are now converted to plain text like other content descriptions in Ultra.

Learn SaaS release 3600.0.0: Update to client Production environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3600.0.0 (full release number 3600.0.0-rel.11+318243c) to client Production servers. Your instance may be updated starting in the early evening hours on April 13, 2019 based on your region and timezone.

Updates in this version include:

A critical security vulnerability has been internally identified and we have fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.

Learn SaaS release 3600.0.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3600.0.0 (full release number 3600.0.0-rel.9+22b493d) to client Test/Staging servers. Your instance may be updated starting at 6:00AM EST on April 1, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Instructors and students were unable to view portfolio submissions after a recent upgrade. We've fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.
In the Original Course View, the breadcrumb navigation bar at the top of the browser window appeared twice. We've fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.
In the Ultra Course View, we've removed the new Student Preview feature to address quality concerns. It will be included in an upcoming release.

Course role for facilitators

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

Facilitation privileges have been long requested functionality in Blackboard Learn's Original Experience. We’re excited to bring this ability to both the Original and Ultra Experiences.

3600.0.0 marks the culmination of previous content lockdown releases with the introduction of the Facilitator role. This course role contains a set of default privileges regarding course calendar, discussions, gradebook, announcements, materials, and groups. Course members can be granted this role to help maintain the pace of the course throughout the term or as needed.

This release includes two new privileges to grant a user the ability to create or delete a discussion in the Ultra Course View.

Additionally, the privileges list shows when certain entitlements are inherited by other privileges. For example, the Course/Organization (Content Areas) > Edit Material Availability privilege is automatically granted to a user who also has the Course/Organization (Content Areas) > Edit Materials privilege. We’ve made this association clearer in the user interface.

If your environment already contains a custom course role with FACILITATOR as the Role ID, you may notice errors after the 3600.0.0 update. We're working on addressing this issue before the release reaches Production servers. To troubleshoot, copy your custom role, rename it to eliminate FACILITATOR, apply it to the appropriate users, and remove the old custom role.

Improvements to how the Activity Stream shows external content

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Ultra Experience

The Activity Stream is the go-to place for instructors and students to understand what’s happening in a course. We’ve improved reporting behavior so third-party content due dates appear in the Activity Stream in a more dynamic way.

Previously, instructors and students could see an upcoming due date for this type of content. When the due date passed or the content status changed, the notification in the Activity Stream wouldn’t update. With this release, the Activity Stream more accurately reports on third-party content to keep everyone more up to date. Specifically, LTI and manual grade column notifications will update in the Activity Stream when:

The item transitions from due to overdue
The item’s due date is updated
The item is deleted
The item is graded
The item’s visibility is changed

More on how students navigate the Activity Stream

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

You can view maintenance items in Behind the Blackboard. Our Known Issue articles provide information for individual bug fixes, and may include bug descriptions and which Learn versions were affected. You can filter bug fixes by SaaS release for easier navigation. View the 3600.0.0 maintenance issues on Behind the Blackboard.

Self-service log download and removal of Kibana Building Block

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

We’ve added support for server log storage and access from within the Blackboard Learn user interface. Select Manage Content in the Administrator Panel to access logs.

Server logs are created once every hour and stored in the internal > logs folder. Logs are grouped by year, month, day, and hour. Logs are generated in the same format as those you’re used to viewing in Kibana as a JSON file.

The hour folder uses the Universal Time Coordinated (UTC) hour. Logs are transferred to the local file system once per hour, but on a four-hour delay. For example, if the current hour is 4 then during this hour logs from hour 0 will be transferred.

As part of the 3600.0.0 release, we will remove the Kibana Building Block and stop sending logs to Kibana. All logs will need to be accessed via the new workflow in the user interface.

More on how to download and reformat system logs in Blackboard Learn SaaS

Share calendar with external services

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Ultra Experience

Instructors and students often use calendars to organize and keep track of events. Access to a course calendar is crucial to meeting deadlines and overall success. Having access to all events—both personal and academic—in one place helps keep everyone on track. In this release, users can synchronize their Blackboard Learn Ultra calendars to external calendars.

Generate a URL to share course calendar details with an external service. Share the URL only with trusted sources. When you connect your Blackboard Learn calendar to an external calendar, all course events appear one year in the past and into the future.

More on how to share a Blackboard Learn calendar

Additional updates in the user interface

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3600.0.0 | Release to Production 4 April 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

If your institution uses the Turn It In Building Block, students will no longer receive a Past Due notification when they have submitted an assignment on time.
We’re building more and more content capabilities into the Ultra Course View. In this release, you’ll notice a redesigned menu to accommodate additional options in course content, gradebook, discussions, and documents.
Users who subscribe to email notifications will notice we’ve updated the message format. We’ve reduced Blackboard branding and optimized the format for better appearance on more devices and email clients.
We’ve updated the Global HTML filter to accept .txt files for student submissions
Push notifications in the Ultra experience support Ultra course discussions. Students can receive notifications when someone responds to their discussion, someone replies to their posts, an instructor creates a new discussion, or when participation deadlines are approaching. Instructors can receive notifications for replies to discussion threads or posts they authored.

Learn SaaS release 3500.11.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3500.11.0 (full release number 3500.11.0-rel.10+071f567) to client Test/Staging servers. Your instance may be updated starting at 6:00AM EST on March 4, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

Participants in an Organization saw an "Oops! Something went wrong" message when clicking on Organizations in the Ultra base navigation. We've fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.
Users weren't able to log in to Blackboard Learn with the Ultra experience with Microsoft Edge browser versions 30-41. We've fixed the issue. More information on Behind the Blackboard.

Learn SaaS release 3500.11.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

As part of our commitment to release quality, we’re applying an updated version of 3500.11.0 (full release version 3500.11.0-rel.9+0b3fe2f) to client Test/Staging servers. Your instance may be updated starting at 6:00AM EST on February 22, 2019.

Updates in this version include:

In the Ultra Course View, students with accommodations and assessment exceptions can be granted additional time in timed assessments.
Users can access SCORM content in a copied course. More information on Behind the Blackboard.

Blackboard Learn achieves LTI Advantage certification

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

Learning Tools Interoperability (LTI) is an initiative managed by the IMS Global Learning Consortium to seamlessly integrate learning applications used by instructors into their courses. It includes a standard protocol for establishing a trusted relationship between the tool provider and the Learning Management System (LMS), so that students and teachers can have a seamless, integrated experience of using the tool within the context of their course.

Blackboard Learn is now LTI Advantage certified. Blackboard is among the first edtech companies to meet the rigorous IMS certification requirements for all components of LTI Advantage. LTI Advantage builds on the latest set of IMS standards and provides educational institutions and edtech suppliers with a set of extensions that allow deeper integration and enhanced interoperability between IMS certified tools and LMSs. LTI Advantage also leverages a robust security framework that offers more advanced protection of sensitive student data and adds features to support the delivery of innovative learning tools and applications necessary for digital transformation within an institution.

Content lockdown: Expanded user privileges for course announcements control

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

3500.11.0 contains enhancements for granular entitlements in Original and Ultra course roles in support of the formalized facilitator role. Facilitation privileges have been long requested functionality in Blackboard Learn's Original Experience. We’re excited to bring this ability to both the Original and Ultra Experiences.

The set of privileges contained in this release relate to course announcements. Individuals with these privileges can create course announcements in both course views. Additional entitlements allow users to view draft announcements in addition to posted announcements.

Cross-origin resourcing tool for administrators

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

Administrators may need to allow an external script or third-party application to make direct calls to their Blackboard Learn instance’s REST API. Previously, these requests would be blocked at the browser level. In this release, we introduce a Cross-Origin Resource Sharing (CORS) tool to allow your institution to leverage cloud-based or third-party extensions more fully. Administrators can also use the CORS tool to strictly define the allowed domains within an access control list and headers allowed as part of those requests. This secure, scalable tool lets you explore more integration possibilities using REST APIs.

From the Administrator Panel, select Cross-Origin Resource Sharing in the Integrations menu. Select Create Integration to get started.

More on the CORS tool for SaaS administrators

Granular Activity Stream settings

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Ultra Experience

In this release, Activity Stream notification settings are more granular for students and instructors, giving them the option to choose which information they wish to receive.

Settings have been reformatted so users can select to receive all notifications at a high level, like notifications for new discussions. Users can also choose to see updates about specific events or activity in their Activity Streams. For example, an instructor can choose to be notified when a blog entry is edited.

Existing settings are carried over and saved in the new format. Visual cues display if all, some, or none of the notification types are selected.

More on notification settings for instructors

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

You can view maintenance items in Behind the Blackboard. Our Known Issue articles provide information for individual bug fixes, and may include bug descriptions and which Learn versions were affected. You can filter bug fixes by SaaS release for easier navigation. View the 3500.11.0 maintenance issues on Behind the Blackboard.

Miscellaneous updates

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.11.0 | Release to Production 7 March 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

Instructors at institutions based in the EU/UK will be able to use the recording feature in assessment feedback. This feature will be enabled in the eu-central-1 region when this release reaches Production servers. More on recording creation for administrators.
A word count appears when drafting responses and replies in discussions in the Ultra Course View.
The Messages page in the Ultra Course View wasn’t responsive for users on mobile devices. We’ve made it responsive.
Instructors can now rename an LTI link from the gradebook in the Ultra Course View.
Users enrolled in a demo environment may have noticed their SMS notifications were overwritten when upgrading to the 3500.9.0 release. We fixed this issue before the release reached Production servers.
In a previous release, some institutions may have noticed the CAS authentication provider threw errors. We fixed the issue.
When an administrator sought to delete all users not enrolled in a course, the system didn’t correctly list the number of users it would remove in the operation. We’ve fixed the issue.
When copying an Ultra course using SIS, the new course duration was overwritten by the source course. We’ve fixed the issue by excluding a duration on the course copy.
Users may have received an error message when attempting to connect to OneDrive for Business through Blackboard Learn. The vendor has fixed the issue.
Group submissions in the Ultra Course View weren’t appearing consistently in the gradebook. We’ve fixed the issue.
Instructors may have received an error message when saving course reports to the Content Collection. We’ve fixed the issue.
A synchronization issue caused unexpected behavior in custom language packs. We’ve fixed the issue.
Course messages with attachments sometimes resulted in an error message asking the user to contact their system administrator. We fixed the issue.
SafeAssign Originality Reports weren’t loading correctly for users with Korean language packs enabled. We’ve fixed the issue.
SafeAssign Originality Reports weren’t loading for users after a system update to the 3500.7.0 release. We’ve fixed the issue.
Unenrolled users can view announcements in unavailable courses.

Content lockdown: Expanded user privileges for course calendar control

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.9.0 | Release to Production 31 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

3500.9.0 marks the third release containing enhancements for granular entitlements in Original and Ultra course roles. Our next and final release of this feature will include the formalized facilitator role. Facilitation privileges have been long requested functionality in Blackboard Learn's Original Experience. We’re excited to bring this ability to both the Original and Ultra Experiences.

The set of privileges contained in this release relate to course calendar events. Individuals with these privileges can add, edit, and delete course calendar events in both course views. In the Ultra Course View, individuals with these privileges can also add, edit, and delete office hours and course schedules.

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.9.0 | Release to Production 31 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

You can view maintenance items in Behind the Blackboard. Our Known Issue articles provide information for individual bug fixes, and may include bug descriptions and which Learn versions were affected. You can filter bug fixes by SaaS release for easier navigation. View the 3500.9.0 maintenance issues on Behind the Blackboard.

Miscellaneous updates

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.9.0 | Release to Production 31 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

To improve performance times and user experience, course messages no longer appear in the activity stream.
Instructors are now prompted to name content they create in the Ultra Course View.
We’ve made several AX improvements in Ultra:
- Improved the color contrast ratio for reorder and move icons on the Course Content page.
- Added a stroke around the panel close button to comply with color contrast ratios.
- Improved the hover and keyboard states for active elements to be more visually significant.
We’ve updated gradebook entitlements to address security concerns. Visit Behind the Blackboard for more information and guidance. The solution listed in the article will be included in 3500.9 when it reaches Production servers.
In the Original Course View, we’ve updated the color key in the Course Coverage report to match the legend more accurately.
When an instructor attached a file as feedback on a graded discussion, students encountered errors trying to download it. We’ve fixed the issue.
When an unread discussion post appeared as a link in the What’s New module, users encountered errors when opening it. We’ve fixed the issue.
Calculated questions using exponents in answers in the Original Course View were marked incorrect when students input an acceptable answer. We’ve fixed the issue.
Instructors encountered an error when trying to use anonymous grading for attempts still in progress. We’ve fixed the issue.
We’ve improved the logic for grading multiple choice questions when a student selects both correct and incorrect answers in the Ultra Course View.
We’ve removed the ability for students to edit graded group discussion forum titles and descriptions.
We’ve fixed a CSS error that caused text tagged with <em> HTML to appear on separate lines.
We’ve improved the course import feature to preserve the content package’s folder structure.

Push notifications to Blackboard App

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.9.0 | Release to Production 31 January 2019
Ultra Experience

Many students use push notifications on their devices to check and engage with content. Push notifications for Learn Ultra will allow students to gain direct insight via this notification modal. Notifications may help students stay on top of new content added to their courses, new grades and feedback that have been created for assessed items, and due date reminders for upcoming assessments that need to be completed and submitted.

Push notifications further the integration between the Blackboard Learn Ultra experience and the Blackboard mobile app for students. In this release, users on the Ultra experience can select which push notifications they’d like to receive. In the app, they’ll see notifications for due date reminders and new grades and feedback. Push notifications for new content will be available in the app in the coming months.

Select theme colors

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.9.0 | Release to Production 31 January 2019
Ultra Experience

Institution branding is an easy way for institutions to differentiate their learning management system and adds an element of personalization at an institution level. Many institutions have requested to move away from the default purple in Ultra to express institution colors as part of their user experience. This functionality covers three highly used areas but will be expanded to further the institution’s color schema to more locations over time.

To customize the theme color, go to the Institution Page. Select the gear icon to open the settings panel. Enter a hex code to find your precise color or use the color picker. A preview appears to show you how the new color would look to all users. Don’t like what you see? You can revert your choice back to the default.

Blackboard SOAP Web Services deprecation

Blackboard Learn 9.1 Q2 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.9.0 | Release to Production 31 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

With the release of Blackboard Learn Q2 2019, Blackboard is deprecating our SOAP APIs. We recommend that if you use Blackboard's SOAP APIs as an external application or as part of a Building Block, you should immediately refactor your integration using our Blackboard REST APIs.

Blackboard SOAP APIs will become unavailable with the release of Blackboard Learn 9.1 Q2 2020.

Visit Behind the Blackboard for more information on SOAP web services deprecation and guidance on migrating to REST APIs.

Caliper 1.1 update for Blackboard Learn Telemetry Service

Blackboard Learn 9.1
Blackboard Learn SaaS | Release to Production 3 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

Blackboard is pleased to announce updated support for the Caliper Analytics® standard in Blackboard Learn. Caliper is a specification from the IMS Global Learning Consortium® that defines a standard for the exchange of user activity information. Blackboard Learn supports this standard, giving institutions the option to emit near-real-time and batch user event data to an event store system for further analytics and reporting.

The centralized service that processes the Learn telemetry stream into Caliper events data currently uses the Caliper 1.0 specification. On January 3, 2019 this service will change to use the Caliper 1.1 specification.

For more information about how this update affects your Blackboard Learn environment, visit Behind the Blackboard

More on Caliper event configuration is available on the Developer Community

Maintenance items

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.7.0 | Release to Production 3 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Ultra Experience, Original Experience

You can view maintenance items in Behind the Blackboard. Our Known Issue articles provide information for individual bug fixes, and may include bug descriptions and which Learn versions were affected. You can filter bug fixes by SaaS release for easier navigation. View the 3500.7.0 maintenance issues on Behind the Blackboard.

Miscellaneous updates

Blackboard Learn SaaS Continuous Delivery v3500.7.0 | Release to Production 3 January 2019
Blackboard Learn SaaS Flexible Deployment Option Q2 2019
Original Experience, Ultra Experience

This release resolves an issue where the Blackboard app and Blackboard Instructor app weren’t compatible with Session Fingerprint settings. Session fingerprint settings to Create New Session When Fingerprint Changes are now compatible with the mobile apps’ mBaaS architecture.
When you access individual students' attendance record in the Ultra Course View, the date column has been renamed Meeting and now appears first.
An updated version of the Vital Source Building Block (v3.101.2018040483) is bundled with this release.
To accommodate Microsoft Azure SAML requirements, we’ve added the option to keep the SAML session age unlimited.
When viewing assessments that were graded using a rubric more than a year ago, users may have noticed a discrepancy between rubric totals and the grade displayed in the Grade Center. Raw data was not affected. We fixed the issue.
Grade Journey wasn’t consistently displaying optional data when the extraction was initiated from merged courses. We fixed the issue.
Users may have encountered an error when attempting to download a file package in the Content Collection. We fixed the issue.
When a student submission was deleted, attached files were orphaned and retained in storage, sometimes unnecessarily. We fixed the issue.
When an Ultra assessment was set to assign automatic zeros, the system wouldn’t log a zero score in the gradebook when a student had saved a draft but not submitted work. We fixed the issue.
Importing a Canvas course to the Ultra Course View resulted in missing content. We fixed the issue.

Release Notes for Learn SaaS - 2019

Learn SaaS release 3700.16.0: Partial delay for Continuous Delivery release to Production environments

System administration notification settings

UPDATE: Upcoming changes to Open JDK and impact to Building Blocks in Learn SaaS deployments

Previous announcements:

Create Ultra Organizations

Updates to branding

Additional updates in the user interface

Maintenance items

Office 365/G Suite Integration: Individual authentication

New updates for Ally customers

Learn SaaS release 3700.3.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Add external calendars in Blackboard Learn

Maintenance items

Update to the Organizations and Courses pages in the Ultra experience

URL and role branding for the Ultra experience

Learn SaaS release 3700.0.0: Update to client Test/Stage and Production environments

Learn SaaS release 3700.0.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Maintenance items

Additional updates in the user interface

Learn SaaS release 3600.0.0: Update to client Production environments

Learn SaaS release 3600.0.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Course role for facilitators

Improvements to how the Activity Stream shows external content

Maintenance items

Self-service log download and removal of Kibana Building Block

Share calendar with external services

Additional updates in the user interface

Learn SaaS release 3500.11.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Learn SaaS release 3500.11.0: Update to client Test/Staging environments

Blackboard Learn achieves LTI Advantage certification

Content lockdown: Expanded user privileges for course announcements control

Cross-origin resourcing tool for administrators

Granular Activity Stream settings

Maintenance items

Miscellaneous updates

Content lockdown: Expanded user privileges for course calendar control

Maintenance items

Miscellaneous updates

Push notifications to Blackboard App

Select theme colors

Blackboard SOAP Web Services deprecation

Caliper 1.1 update for Blackboard Learn Telemetry Service

Maintenance items

Miscellaneous updates

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