[RESOLVED] Error Message When Hosting WebEx Meetings in D2L

RESOLVED: The WebEx integration with Desire2Learn should now be functioning correctly. Users should no longer receive a “Missing blockname parameter” error message when launching a WebEx meeting through D2L. Any questions or concerns should be sent to UW-W Desire2Learn Support.

ORIGINAL MESSAGE: Users have reported issues when trying to access WebEx meetings hosted in D2L. Users are able to schedule meetings, but when hosts click the “Prepare” or “Host” buttons to start a WebEx session, an error message that says “Missing blockname parameter” appears.

This issue has been reported, and technicians are actively working to resolve the situation as soon as possible. The current workaround is to schedule meetings using the web-based Cloud version of WebEx. Meetings can be scheduled by logging into http://uww.webex.com.

We will update this announcement once the issue has been resolved.  If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the Learning Technology Center.

Welcome to the Fall 2015 Semester!

Welcome back to the Fall 2015 Semester!  While there was not a big Desire2Learn (D2L) upgrade this summer, we were busy with a number of changes.

Amy Williams is now the new Desire2Learn Site Administrator.  She will be available to help answer any questions and support issues.  Please continue to use the D2L Support Form to report your problems.

There were also a few significant fixes for D2L:

  • Content items made in files such as Articulate, Adobe Captivate, iSpring, and Adobe Presenter now display correctly. Service Pack 20 corrected an issue where these files displayed very small.
  • Images saved to discussion posts no longer appear as broken links.
  • YouTube videos are now able to be embedded into HTML Content pages using the Insert Stuff tool.

For a full list of fixes from the summer, see: D2L Service Update (6/25).

The following new service offerings and enhancements are also available:

  • Cisco WebEx: D2L Integration
  • Important/Exporting Calendars.  Documentation on both importing and exporting on our Instructional Resources wiki.
  • A detailed explanation of what integrations with D2L are available, and how to request new integrations can be found at: D2L Integrations.
  • The D2L homepage now contains an “Instructor Tutorials” widget underneath the “Instructor Resources” widget. Here you can find links to new and updated tutorials found on our Instructional Resources wiki.

We have numerous resources available if you need assistance with D2L.

If you have not already done so, don’t forget to request for your Fall 2015 Courses!  Courses requested by 3pm on business days will be available the following morning.

Good luck with the beginning of the semester! If you have any questions or concerns regarding any of these points, please do not hesitate to contact UW-W Desire2Learn Support.

Turnitin Service Outage (8/15)

Turnitin services, including Originality Check, Peermark, and Grademark, will be mostly unavailable during a scheduled maintenance period on Saturday, August 15, 2015, from 9:00 AM to 1:00 PM (CT).

During this outage window, students should not submit files to a Dropbox folder that has Turnitin enabled, and instructors should not create new Dropbox folders with Turnitin enabled.

An announcement will appear to users within Turnitin in advance of when the system will be unavailable for the scheduled maintenance.

Instructors are encouraged to modify assignment due dates either before or at least several hours after the scheduled maintenance window. If possible, it’s also advised that instructors change the end date on all Dropbox folders that are utilizing Turnitin so that students won’t inadvertently submit during the outage window.

Please note, any Dropbox folders in a D2L course that are currently NOT utilizing the Turnitin Originality Check, ending before the outage window, or starting after the outage window do NOT have to be altered.

If you have any questions or concerns about this outage, please contact UW-W D2L Support.

D2L Service Update (6/25)

On Thursday, June 25, Desire2Learn deployed Service Pack 20 to our D2L Learning Environment. In this latest update, the following fixes and enhancements were included:

Classlist

  • Fix: In some cases, when using the Classlist tool to print a list of users, a blank page is printed instead of the list. Users can now successfully print a list from their browser.

Content

  • Fix: In some cases, when you view a content topic in a new window without the navigation pane, you might not be able to use the vertical scroll bar to scroll to content further down the page. Content viewed in a new window now can use the vertical scroll bar as expected.
  • Fix: In some cases, Adobe SCORM content displayed significantly smaller than expected. Content now displays as expected.
  • Fix: In some cases, content topics made in Adobe Captivate appeared to flicker as a result of changes in the rendering height and width. Content topics made in Adobe Captivate now display without any rendering issues and without any flicker.

Copy Components

  • Fix: Some SCORM objects lost their association to a grade object during Copy Course Components. SCORM objects no longer lose that association.
  • Fix: Some release conditions based on learning objective achievements were not correctly copied as a part of course components; however, the course copy status indicated that the copy was successful. You can now successfully copy these release conditions to other courses.

Discussions

  • Fix: In some cases, images successfully saved to discussion posts appeared as broken links. Images are now saved to a separate course files directory rather than the temp directory.
  • Fix: If you created a new Group Category in the Groups tool with the discussion or forum visibility set to hidden, you were still able to configure the group to auto-create discussion topics. The links no longer cause a group error if group discussions are hidden.
  • Fix: In some cases, it was possible to create discussion posts without a subject. These posts without a subject were not accessible from the Reading View because there was no link. These posts now appear as <No Subject> in the Reading View with a valid link you can click to open the discussion.

Email

  • Fix: If Quicklinks were used in emails, these links are relative and do not work for users receiving emails in external accounts. These relative links are replaced with full links so that users receiving email to external accounts are able to click the links as expected.

Quizzes

  • Fix: When an Internet Explorer 11 user entered a lengthy answer in a quiz, a horizontal scroll bar appeared on the text field. Lengthy answers now wrap several lines without the horizontal scroll bar.

If you have any questions or concerns about the service pack updates, please contact UW-W D2L Support.

Desire2Learn Service Update (6/4)

On Thursday, June 4, Desire2Learn deployed Service Packs 18 and 19 to our D2L Learning Environment. In this latest update, the following fixes and enhancements were included:

Calendar

  • Fix: In the Upcoming Events area in the Content tool, future events no longer appear in the Today section.

Competencies

  • Fix: Improvements have been made to the copy process for Competencies to prevent database deadlocks.

Content

  • Fix: Dropboxes in Content were fixed so that learners’ rubric assessments are no longer visible to them before their assessment is published. The rubric link will show the preview of the rubric levels and criteria until the assessment is published.
  • Fix: Performance improvements were made to the copy course process when copying Content to new courses to prevent database deadlocks.

Copy Components

  • Fix: Final grade formulas are now successfully copied through the batch course copy process.
  • Fix: Performance improvements were added for the process of copying all release conditions in a course.

Discussions

  • Fix: If users have saved drafts of discussion posts, they are now accessible when the topic has the “Users must start a thread before they can read and reply to other threads” option enabled. Previously, users could not access saved drafts until they had posted to the topic successfully and unlocked the restrictions.
  • Fix: Images inserted into discussion posts in the Reading View are successfully stored with the course and will persist. Previously, these images may have been stored in temporary folders.

Dropbox

  • Fix: When using the “Add Feedback files” button to upload multiple feedback files at once, feedback files can now successfully be added to multiple users’ submissions. Previously, files were not successfully attached even when the workflow appeared to complete.
  • Fix: When users view dropbox feedback from the Content tool, the feedback is successfully saved as read and instructors can see the date and time the feedback was first read from the Dropbox tool.
  • Fix: Silent errors are no longer logged when Notifications for dropboxes with due dates are rendered.
  • Fix: Users no longer receive an error in the Groups tool when navigating to a group dropbox folder. Previously, if a submission existed in the dropbox folder, but had not yet been evaluated, navigating to this page caused an error.

Homepage

  • Fix: When creating a homepage, the Custom Header field now correctly handles unicode characters and displays them on the homepage.

Manage Files

  • Fix: When a user unzips a large file in the Manage Files area for a course, a message now notifies them that the operation is happening in the background and that they will be notified when it is complete. This allows the user to perform other tasks while waiting for the operation to complete. Previously, unzipping a large file was unsuccessful, requiring the user watch the operation time out after approximately two minutes.

News

  • Fix: Improvements have been made to the copy process for News items to prevent database deadlocks.

Question Library

  • Fix: In the Question Library, questions imported from another collection now retain their original sort order.
  • Fix: Improvements were made to the Question Library when importing questions from another collection. Questions within sections will now maintain their section parent.

Quizzing

  • Fix: Improvements have been made to the course copy (and bulk course copy) service to alleviate deadlocks when copying quizzes and question libraries.
  • Fix: Improvements were made to the Question Library import functions for importing sections and subsections of questions from existing quizzes or collections.

User Profile

  • Fix: The “Tagline” field no longer displays HTML to users editing their profile. All users now see the same text after the profile is saved. To provide users with the ability to add a web page link to their profile card, they can use the Homepage field.

User Progress

  • Fix: Users can now correctly view User Progress (such as scores or feedback given) for Dropboxes that are not currently open to students. Previously, an error would prevent uploading of the Dropbox section in User Progress.
  • Fix: User Progress was modified to make use of all available space when displaying a user’s full name, reducing the frequency in which a long first and/or last name is truncated.
  • Fix: When using a Weighted System for Grades, the “Student View Display Options” configured through the Grades “Org Unit Display Options” are now respected when accessing User Progress for a course from the Course and Organization.
  • Fix: When using a Points System for Grades, the “Student View Display Options” configured through “Org Unit Display Options” are now respected when accessing User Progress for a course from the Organization level.
  • Fix: The setting of “Display how final grade was calculated to users” from “Grades > Settings > Org Unit Display Options” is now respected when accessing User Progress from the Organization level.
  • Fix: Grade Color Indicators configured in User Progress when “Grade Scheme Color” is enabled from “Grades > Settings” are now respected when accessing User Progress for a course from the Organization level.
  • Fix: When using a weighted system for grades, grade display option overrides for grade weight are now respected when viewing user progress from the course and org level. These settings override the settings set at the org unit level. When weight calculation is selected, the points override is displayed in Grade Category and Final Grade.
  • Fix: For courses with a Weighted grading system, Formula and Calculated grade types no longer include a weight percentage within User Progress.
  • Fix: For courses with a Weighted grading system, Final Adjusted/Final Calculated Grades no longer include a weight of 0% within User Progress.

Widget

  • Fix: The “Search My Courses” page now shows the “Semester” and “Department” filters for searching.
  • Fix: Users are no longer kicked out of their Role Switch action when encountering some hidden errors.

If you have any questions or concerns about the service pack updates, please contact UW-W D2L Support.

D2L eGrading Process Available for Spring 2015

The D2L eGrading process is now available for the Spring 2015 semester.  This process allows instructors to transfer final grades from their Desire2Learn Gradebook directly to their WINS Grade Roster.

If you prefer step by step documentation, that can be found at: WINS eGrading Overview.

If you have any questions or concerns with the eGrading process, please contact UW-W Desire2Learn Support.

Desire2Learn Service Update (4/2)

On Thursday, April 2nd, Desire2Learn deployed Service Pack 17 to our D2L Learning Environment. In this latest update, the following fixes and enhancements were included:

Content

  • Fix: Users will no longer receive an error in the Content tool when there were Quiz topics that had Start Dates in the future and Due Dates attached. Users can typically see these “future” topics, but they are not accessible based on their Start Date.
  • Fix: In the Overview section in Content, users can now scroll to the bottom of long HTML files in all supported browsers.

Email

  • Fix: In the Compose Email window, buttons in the confirmation popup now function properly. The confirmation popup appears when a user tries to send an email with no subject or no body.

HTML Editor

  • Fix: The Equation Editor now loads successfully for on‐premise clients that may have different load balancer settings.

News

  • Fix: Cascading course enrollment news items are not pushed to users. Only explicit course enrollment news items are pushed to users. Minibar alerts now also consistently show for new news items. Previously, users with cascading enrollments might have received a high volume of news items instead of news items only for courses they were explicitly enrolled in.

Quizzing

  • Fix: Ordering questions now successfully show response-level feedback in quiz attempts. Previously, only overall question feedback showed, and the response-specific feedback was never displayed to users.
  • Fix: Users can now move questions in the Question Library back into previously-used sections or the collection root successfully.

User Progress

  • Fix: The Maximum Grade and Minimum Grade columns have been renamed Maximum Final and Minimum Final as they represent the maximum and minimum potential final grades a user could receive within their course.
  • Fix: User Progress now shows the full name of the user instead of “Anonymous User” when auditing a user.
  • Fix: The box plot charts within User Progress can now be disabled for a specific course by disabling the new Display box plots of the class grade distribution for graded items setting in User Progress Settings > Progress Report Information Settings area.
  • Fix: The Grades Summary: Grades Received data in User Progress now respects the date filtering which can be applied and shows grades received for the last 7 days, 30 days, or all time.

Widgets

  • Fix: Using Internet Explorer 9 no longer causes JavaScript errors when expanding or collapsing widgets with rounded corners. The closing/opening animation is no longer shown for those users.
  • Fix: The change made in Service Pack 14 to the My Courses widget’s Last Accessed list where users with cascading roles and/or users who have a large number of courses were sorted alphabetically has been reverted. Courses now are listed in order of when they were last visited.

If you have any questions or concerns about the service pack updates, please contact UW-W D2L Support.

Summer 2015 Course Requests Available

Summer 2015 D2L course requests are available in the D2L Course Request Application.

As a reminder, course requests for a semester become available on the first day of priority registration for students, and course shells for D2L need to be requested for every semester you plan on using D2L.

If you have any questions or concerns, please contact UW-W D2L Support.

D2L Training Scheduled for January 15

DSC_3940The Learning Technology Center is pleased to invite faculty and instructional staff to “D2L Day,” a series of hands-on sessions held on Thursday, January 15, 2015 from 9:00 AM to 4:30 PM in McGraw 19B.

This D2L Winterim Workshop includes breakout sessions on D2L tools, such as Quizzes, Discussions, Dropbox, and Content.  These will include a variety of hands-on “How To” sessions for all levels of D2L users. Morning sessions will cover the basics of the most commonly-used tools, and afternoon sessions will cover each tool in more detail as well as discuss some lesser-known tools. Each session will be “hands on” and include some tips and tricks for attendees to become D2L power users.

Participants may register for the all-day workshop or for individual sessions using the signup tool. The workshops are listed under “ICIT-LTC Training”. If you have any questions about this workshop, please contact the Learning Technology Center.

Now Introducing: Lynda.com!

UW-Whitewater recently gained access to Lynda.com. Lynda.com is an extensive and valuable knowledge base of video tutorials for different kinds of technology and software. Topics covered include (but are certainly not limited to) 3D and Animation, Audio and Music, CAD, Design, Photography, Video, Web, and other specific software programs. All UW-W students, faculty, and staff have access to Lynda.com.

lynda_com screenshot

To access Lynda.com, go to http://go.uww.edu/lynda, and log in with your UW-W Net-ID and password.

Once you are logged in, you can browse the Lynda.com library or search for a topic. You can either individually watch one video tutorial at a time on a specific subject or you can watch an entire class. You can view which courses are recommended for you, create playlists of your favorite videos, or view your course history. Lynda.com is a wonderful resource that you can utilize for learning a new technology or brushing up on some rusty skills!