As I stated before, I am trying my best to keep the SOM faculty informed on the Blackboard upgrade process. It appears that any course that contains linked files from the “Content Collection” will have to be “re-linked” manually. Please see the attached email below.

I apologize for stressing the use of the “Content Collection” system, but the Bb admins insisted that any large amount of content be placed in this repository. Their reason for this decision was the fact that UNCG’s server implementation could not handle the automatic backup process for larger courses, such as the ones in the SOM. Also, these larger courses could not be copied properly for similar reasons. These issues still persist which is why some faculty have problems trying to make personal archives of their courses.

Again, I will keep you apprised of this situation. Thanks for your patience.

Brian

To: Brian Thacker BRTHACKE/facultystaff/uncg@uncg
From: Amanda Schipman AKSCHIPM/facultystaff/uncg
Date: 10/26/2007 01:27PM
cc: Ray Purdom RCPURDOM/facultystaff/uncg@uncg, Rob Owens REOWENS/facultystaff/uncg@uncg
Subject: Fw: Content Collection

Brian,

This does mean that any part of a course which links to the content collection will have to have that link re-established. It is my understanding that even if we could migrate the files in the content collection, those links would still be broken because the content collection in Blackboard 7.3 has changed it’s directory structure. The only way we could have avoided this situation is if we would have been able to upgrade our current version of Blackboard to 7.3, but since Blackboard, Inc. said that it was not a possibility for us, we are having to establish a new server with a “fresh” installation of Blackboard 7.3. Unfortunately, there is no way around it.

Amanda K. Schipman
*********************************************
Instructional Technology Specialist &
Faculty Development Coordinator
University Teaching and Learning Center
131 McIver
336-334-5128
amanda.schipman@uncg.edu

—– Forwarded by Amanda Schipman AKSCHIPM/facultystaff/uncg on 10/26/2007 01:16 PM —–

Brian Thacker BRTHACKE/facultystaff/uncg10/26/2007 12:11 PM

To Amanda Schipman AKSCHIPM/facultystaff/uncg@uncg

Amanda,

If you move courses over to the new server that rely heavily on content from the Content Collection, will is completely foobar the course so that the fauclty member will have to recreate it from scratch? Doe that mean all of the links will now be invalid, and we’ll see tons of error messages on the screan? Does that mean most of my faculty will now have to start at ground zero, for some of them the 4th or more time since we started using Bb at this school?

Thanks!
Dr. Brian R. Thacker
Instructional Technology Consultant
School of Music, UNC Greensboro
brthacke@uncg.edu
(336) 256-0164
http://musictech.uncg.edu