Consulting Central Building Block is Now Available for Blackboard Learn 9.1 Q2 2017, Q4 2017, and Q2 2018 Date Published: Jun 11,2018 Category: Version:Learn_9_1_Q2_2017_3200_0_0,Learn_9_1_Q4_2017,Learn_9_1_Q2_2018 Article No.: 000048896 Product: Blackboard Learn Announcement Details: Blackboard is pleased to announce the availability of the Consulting Central Building Block (Version:1.9.3) for the Learn, 9.1 Q2 2017, Q4 2017 and Q2 2018 releases. Consulting Central is aimed to provide platform administrators with a centralized extension and implementation management interface within their LMS platform s environment, in which they will have the ability to easily and intuitively discover, try, subscribe, and deploy capabilities provided in Blackboard s extension catalog. With the release of Consulting Central, System Administrators will now be able to access Blackboard s latest and greatest extensions right from the within their LMS. Before subscribing to an extension, Consulting Central provides Administrators the opportunity to review the business value of each extension, technical details, and screenshots. Once an Administrator discovers an extension, they will have the ability to activate a free trial. A free trial provides immediate and full access to the extension for a limited time. During the free trial the System Administrator will have the opportunity to try the extension and realize its value within their LMS and for its users. At any time, a System Administrator can request a subscription in order to make the extension a core component of their LMS on an ongoing basis. Consulting Central will routinely release new features and enhancements for existing extensions as well as offer new extensions in order to meet the needs of our customers. This release supports the extensions BBOffline, Data Visualization, and Universal Authentication System. Consulting Central System Admin Interface Log in to Learn > System Admin Tab > Cloud Management > Consulting Central
BBOffline Blackboard Offline was designed for users to be able to access content from their Blackboard courses even when they have either limited or no network connectivity. Primarily focused on helping clients that have limited resources in terms of bandwidth, Bb Offline allows users to download content from Learn courses onto their desktop or laptop computers, via a desktop application, which can subsequently be used to access downloaded content and create offline submissions. Data Visualization The Data Visualization extension provides dashboards to students, instructors and administrators that contain data visualizations and other targeted lightweight data showing progress, engagement and completion. The extension allows administrators to monitor faculty engagement, instructors to quickly identify action items and students needing attention, and students to see how where best to spend time in the course to achieve their desired grade. Universal Authentication System (UAS)
This extension will serve to improve the user experience of already implemented Blackboard products by providing a better way to access and navigate across platforms without having to remember or maintain multiple passwords. In addition to unifying passwords, the BbUAS service allows seamless single sign - on across Blackboard products; reducing the number of times a user needs to enter their password also serves to increase user security. Extension Details Users can learn more about the extensions by reading and clicking the descriptions to launch linked videos about the extension. Users can also access more information by navigating to the extension s details via the context menu of each extension.
Free Trial and Subscribe After learning more about the extension, request a Free Trial to gain full access to the extension and enable it immediately or request a subscription. When requesting a subscription, a Bb sales representative will be in touch with you to discuss purchasing options. Extension Settings Once a free trial has been started or a subscription has been activated, the extension settings will be made available. The settings page is where the system administrator can configure the specific extension and manage deployment options.
Availability Clients running Learn, 9.1 Q2 2017 and above will receive the download of this latest building block via Software Updates. The Consulting Central Building Block will appear as an update in the Software Updates module within 24 hours. The Building Block is also available on Behind the Blackboard: Latest Consulting Central Building Block Self-Hosted Clients After updating any Building Block on a server, services will need to be restarted on each server in the environment in a rolling fashion. For recommendations and best practices when upgrading Building Blocks, please see Article # 35604 - "Recommended Building Block Upgrade Order and Best Practices" Managed Hosting Clients Managed Hosting clients should create a case on Behind the Blackboard to schedule the recommended server restarts after Building Blocks are updated. To expedite the scheduling process, please include a desired day and time for the update. SaaS Continuous Delivery and Flexible Deployment Clients No action is required on your part. This Building Block will be included in an upcoming release. As always, please do not hesitate to reach out to us with any questions or concerns you may have about this release.