Ally 2.14.4 | Release to production: July 3, 2025
Alternative Text for Standalone Images Travels with the Blackboard Export/Import Process
Alternative text added to standalone images in Blackboard through Ally's Instructor Feedback will now follow the images during the Blackboard export and import process for new courses. This update helps to ensure Instructor efforts towards adding alternative text are not lost when exporting and importing a new course.
Upon importing a Blackboard Course Export Package, Ally will identify the source CourseID and align the alternative text saved in the Ally database with the new course without requiring any additional steps from the instructor. After a few minutes (so that Blackboard and Ally can process the import), instructors will see the red indicator change to green on the image and should see their previously entered alternative text applied. (It is important to remember that this wait time may be longer or shorter depending on Blackboard processing time.)
Image 1: Blackboard Import Content Interface
For Blackboard Admins, this release has been timed to coincide with the July 3rd Blackboard v3900.121.0 Release to take advantage of backend improvements to allow Ally to pick up on course import/export events to facilitate this process.
This most recent update now allows Ally to provide better handling for Blackboard as a follow-up to our previous 2.14 release covering Canvas. D2L Brightspace and Moodle impacts are to be determined based on additional analysis.
Bug Fixes and Improvements
- Fixed an issue in the Ultra Checker Powered by Ally where in some cases the wrong text was shown within the Instructor Feedback when Ally identified incorrect heading levels in the rich content.
- Improved the Download Original File feature for Blackboard students to ensure the availability of Download Original File respects document level permissions set by the instructor.
- Fixed a bug within our alternative format conversion where in some cases elementary and polynomial math equations caused an error in the Beeline Reader format.
- Improved the wording within the Alternative Formats Download modal when turning on/off Alternative Formats for a specific content item to use more usability focused language.
- Fixed a minor wording issue within the Instructor Feedback panel where the success message incorrectly left off the letter “y” in the word “successfully”.