WebCT 3.7 Campus Edition Known Issues

February 28, 2002

TOOL/FEATURE

DESCRIPTION

Accessibility

Currently, the quality of keyboard navigation within Chat and Whiteboard varies across browsers, but WebCT is working towards resolving this and other accessibility issues.

In Manage Students, the Modify Columns option is not accessible.

When customizing the Global Calendar, Customize Course List form elements are not accessible.

In Internet Explorer 5.5 and 6.0, in the Compose Discussion screen, tabbing through to the Browse button and pressing the Enter key (to click the Browse button) has no effect. Workaround: Press the space bar instead of the Enter key once on the Browse button.

Administrator

In Netscape 6.2, buttons on the User Mgmt toolbar may not display properly.

Term settings are not applied on WebCT's Add Course screen.

When restoring a course over an existing course, Term and Category options can be set. The Term settings, however, do not take effect, so the restored course will remain in the term in which it originally appeared.

Calendar

An internal link to a content page can be created within a public entry in the Calendar. If the content page to which the link refers is deleted, selecting the link will still bring up the (deleted) content page.

CD-ROM

In Internet Explorer, wave files (.wav) cannot be played.

Change Settings

If a designer inserts a space into the Release to field of any Navigation Bar element or Tool, then the element or Tool will not be released to any students. (The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course Menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)

If a designer selects a tool or page for selective release, and sets a start date and time without setting an end date and time, a message appears incorrectly indicating a problem with the start time. Workaround: Set an end date and time, or set a start date only (with no start time). (Note: The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course Menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)

Chat

Users with the same name are not differentiated.

Messages will be sent to all users with the same name.

In AOL 7.0, Chat does not function.

Content Module

If access to Discussions, Mail, or Quiz are available only on a content module's Action Menu, Course News for these tools will not be displayed in myWebCT. Workaround: Add icons to the course Homepage or other organizer pages.

In Netscape, Active Streaming Format videos (.asf) do not display properly.

If a student or TA visits a content page that is an image file (jpg, bmp, etc.), then clicks the Resume Course hyperlink, the breadcrumbs show the last file visited (the image) to be untitled, even if the image actually has a title.

The Resource Bank screen incorrectly indicates student view rather than designer view.

Content pages made available by designer clicking Update Student View will not be visible to a student until the student has cleared the browser cache, if the browser is set to always use cached pages. Workaround: Set browser to either of: Never use cached pages, or Reload the first time to a new page.

An equation inserted into a content page will not be available for viewing if the Edit file screen has been resized. Workaround: Add the file for the content page, then open the file for editing and save it. If the text area requires resizing, first note the file name, then exit. In Manage Files, open the file for editing. Select all and copy. Return to Content Module and open the file for editing. Resize the screen, then delete all content and paste previously copied content. Save the file.

Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed.

Course Backup

In Internet Explorer 5.0, after restoring a course backup, users cannot log out or return to myWebCT. Browser must be shut down and restarted.

Discussions

Expanding or collapsing a thread causes topics that have been selected previously to be deselected.

Deleting an attachment also deletes associated equations created with the Equation Editor, causing an error message related to the equation to appear.

Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed.

The designer's Course ID is displayed rather than their WebCT ID.

Global Calendar

Attempts to add a public entry to the myWebCT Calendar are rejected but do not produce the error message at the appropriate time.

Link WebCT does not retrieve Calendar or Global Calendar entries the first time a hot sync is performed. Workaround: Edit an existing entry or create a new entry in the calendar, then perform the hot sync again.

Homepage

If a designer selects a tool or page for selective release, and sets a start date and time without setting an end date and time, a message appears incorrectly indicating a problem with the start time. Workaround: Set an end date and time, or set a start date only (with no start time). (Note: The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)

IMS API

For courses without an assigned designer, exporting a snapshot causes errors.

Memory leaks occur during the importing of large files via the command-line interface.

Logon

Designers changing student passwords are not done via the secure server.

Mail

If the administrator setting allows the display of names only, Mail messages cannot be sent to users with the same name.

A comma used in a designer's name (e.g. John Smith, PhD), causes duplicate Discussions topics to be sent to the designer.

If downloading a text or HTML attachment, clicking Cancel from the File Download dialog box and then clicking Download from the Attachments window, causes the attachment to be displayed in the right frame of the Attachments window.

Deleting an attachment also deletes associated equations created with the Equation Editor, causing an error message related to the equation to appear.

In Internet Explorer 6.0, attempting to download mail attachments may sometimes cause the Save As prompt to freeze, keeping the download from succeeding.

Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed.

Designer's Course ID is displayed rather than their WebCT ID.

Manage Course

If the browser is set to warn the user before sending unencrypted form data, a browser-initiated dialog box will appear with a warning notice when unencrypted form data is about to be sent. Clicking Cancel on the dialog box may cause errors.

Manage Students

In letter grade columns, an upper limit percentage of zero (0) causes the corresponding range percentage be deleted.

If a student has deleted a course from their myWebCT, their record cannot be deleted from the course database by the designer.

Menu Bar

On Macintosh, when the Menu Bar is set to be compressed (through the administrator course settings), and the left-hand navigation bar is hidden, the drop down Control Panel will not display.

myWebCT

Course News link for Assignments remains after an assignment has been submitted.

Navigation Bar

In rare instances, in Netscape 6.2, the Navigation Bar may not be displayed when users first access a course.

Netscape Navigator 6

In Netscape 6, when configuring WebCT to run within an integrated frameset, the page generating the top level HTML must be on the same server as WebCT. If it is not, a security violation will occur when the top level HTML page is to be displayed, and only the top frame of the page will appear.

Quiz

In Internet Explorer, for quizzes set to deliver one question at a time with no review, using the backspace key to invoke the browser's back function causes the current quiz question to be skipped, preventing the user from answering the skipped question.

In Netscape, after the user saves their quiz answer, resizing the window causes a warning message to be displayed. Note: User can proceed to the next question by clicking OK.

If multiple .mov files are embedded in a quiz question, only the first .mov file is displayed correctly.

In Internet Explorer, using the backspace key causes quiz questions to be skipped, preventing the user from answering the skipped questions.

In Netscape, after the user saves their quiz answer, resizing the window causes a warning message. Workaround: User can proceed to the next question by clicking OK.

In the Edit Categories screen, the same category title can be used multiple times.

If a Quicktime Movie clip located on an external streaming server is embedded in a quiz question, the link to the movie will be broken. This is because the link to the external server will be re-parsed in such a way that the link will no longer be valid. Workaround: Put in an extra qtsrc statement in the html code, as in this example:

Original html code:

<EMBED src="htpp://www.arts.someuniversity.edu/QT4Required.mov" qtsrc="rtsp://streaming1.osu.edu:7070/media/music141/piece1.mov" width=400 height=330 autoplay=fale controller=true loop=false pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/">

Revised html code (with extra qtscr statement in bold):

<EMBED src="http://www.someuniversity.edu/QT4Required.mov" qtsrc="rtsp://streaming1.osu.edu:7070/media/music141/piece1.mov" qtsrc="rtsp://streaming1.osu.edu:7070/media/music141/piece1.mov" width=400 height=300 autoplay=false controller=true loop=false pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/">

In the Question Database, searching by category does not work correctly.

Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed.

Selective Release Feature

The note "Conditional" indicating that a link is selectively-released does not appear in the teaching assistant interface.

Standard API

Deleting a non-existent user record from the student database produces a success message.

Student Presentations

Students who are deleted from the course by the WebCT administrator are not deleted from their presentation groups.

Track Pages

For quizzes used as Content Module pages, hits to the page and posts from the page are not tracked correctly.

Track Students

Using the sort function will result in all student records being displayed.

Welcome Page

If a designer selects a tool or page for selective release, and sets a start date and time without setting an end date and time, a message appears incorrectly indicating a problem with the start time. Workaround: Set an end date and time, or set a start date only (with no start time). (Note: The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)

Whiteboard

Clicking the Apply button in the font editor causes text to be temporarily hidden. Workaround: To display text again, click the Whiteboard drawing area.

Drawing new lines may delete previously-drawn lines.

If the Whiteboard page has not loaded completely, Whiteboard cannot be started. Workaround: Wait for the Whiteboard page to load completely.

On Macintosh, uploaded images cannot be viewed.

On Macintosh Internet Explorer and Netscape, the Whiteboard's accessible interface is not available.

In AOL 7.0, Whiteboard does not function.

Top

TOOL/FEATURE	DESCRIPTION
Accessibility	Currently, the quality of keyboard navigation within Chat and Whiteboard varies across browsers, but WebCT is working towards resolving this and other accessibility issues. In Manage Students, the Modify Columns option is not accessible. When customizing the Global Calendar, Customize Course List form elements are not accessible. In Internet Explorer 5.5 and 6.0, in the Compose Discussion screen, tabbing through to the Browse button and pressing the Enter key (to click the Browse button) has no effect. Workaround: Press the space bar instead of the Enter key once on the Browse button.
Administrator	In Netscape 6.2, buttons on the User Mgmt toolbar may not display properly. Term settings are not applied on WebCT's Add Course screen. When restoring a course over an existing course, Term and Category options can be set. The Term settings, however, do not take effect, so the restored course will remain in the term in which it originally appeared.
Calendar	An internal link to a content page can be created within a public entry in the Calendar. If the content page to which the link refers is deleted, selecting the link will still bring up the (deleted) content page.
CD-ROM	In Internet Explorer, wave files (.wav) cannot be played.
Change Settings	If a designer inserts a space into the Release to field of any Navigation Bar element or Tool, then the element or Tool will not be released to any students. (The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course Menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.) If a designer selects a tool or page for selective release, and sets a start date and time without setting an end date and time, a message appears incorrectly indicating a problem with the start time. Workaround: Set an end date and time, or set a start date only (with no start time). (Note: The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course Menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)
Chat	Users with the same name are not differentiated. Messages will be sent to all users with the same name. In AOL 7.0, Chat does not function.
Content Module	If access to Discussions, Mail, or Quiz are available only on a content module's Action Menu, Course News for these tools will not be displayed in myWebCT. Workaround: Add icons to the course Homepage or other organizer pages. In Netscape, Active Streaming Format videos (.asf) do not display properly. If a student or TA visits a content page that is an image file (jpg, bmp, etc.), then clicks the Resume Course hyperlink, the breadcrumbs show the last file visited (the image) to be untitled, even if the image actually has a title. The Resource Bank screen incorrectly indicates student view rather than designer view. Content pages made available by designer clicking Update Student View will not be visible to a student until the student has cleared the browser cache, if the browser is set to always use cached pages. Workaround: Set browser to either of: Never use cached pages, or Reload the first time to a new page. An equation inserted into a content page will not be available for viewing if the Edit file screen has been resized. Workaround: Add the file for the content page, then open the file for editing and save it. If the text area requires resizing, first note the file name, then exit. In Manage Files, open the file for editing. Select all and copy. Return to Content Module and open the file for editing. Resize the screen, then delete all content and paste previously copied content. Save the file. Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed.
Course Backup	In Internet Explorer 5.0, after restoring a course backup, users cannot log out or return to myWebCT. Browser must be shut down and restarted.
Discussions	Expanding or collapsing a thread causes topics that have been selected previously to be deselected. Deleting an attachment also deletes associated equations created with the Equation Editor, causing an error message related to the equation to appear. Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed. The designer's Course ID is displayed rather than their WebCT ID.
Global Calendar	Attempts to add a public entry to the myWebCT Calendar are rejected but do not produce the error message at the appropriate time. Link WebCT does not retrieve Calendar or Global Calendar entries the first time a hot sync is performed. Workaround: Edit an existing entry or create a new entry in the calendar, then perform the hot sync again.
Homepage	If a designer selects a tool or page for selective release, and sets a start date and time without setting an end date and time, a message appears incorrectly indicating a problem with the start time. Workaround: Set an end date and time, or set a start date only (with no start time). (Note: The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)
IMS API	For courses without an assigned designer, exporting a snapshot causes errors. Memory leaks occur during the importing of large files via the command-line interface.
Logon	Designers changing student passwords are not done via the secure server.
Mail	If the administrator setting allows the display of names only, Mail messages cannot be sent to users with the same name. A comma used in a designer's name (e.g. John Smith, PhD), causes duplicate Discussions topics to be sent to the designer. If downloading a text or HTML attachment, clicking Cancel from the File Download dialog box and then clicking Download from the Attachments window, causes the attachment to be displayed in the right frame of the Attachments window. Deleting an attachment also deletes associated equations created with the Equation Editor, causing an error message related to the equation to appear. In Internet Explorer 6.0, attempting to download mail attachments may sometimes cause the Save As prompt to freeze, keeping the download from succeeding. Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed. Designer's Course ID is displayed rather than their WebCT ID.
Manage Course	If the browser is set to warn the user before sending unencrypted form data, a browser-initiated dialog box will appear with a warning notice when unencrypted form data is about to be sent. Clicking Cancel on the dialog box may cause errors.
Manage Students	In letter grade columns, an upper limit percentage of zero (0) causes the corresponding range percentage be deleted. If a student has deleted a course from their myWebCT, their record cannot be deleted from the course database by the designer.
Menu Bar	On Macintosh, when the Menu Bar is set to be compressed (through the administrator course settings), and the left-hand navigation bar is hidden, the drop down Control Panel will not display.
myWebCT	Course News link for Assignments remains after an assignment has been submitted.
Navigation Bar	In rare instances, in Netscape 6.2, the Navigation Bar may not be displayed when users first access a course.
Netscape Navigator 6	In Netscape 6, when configuring WebCT to run within an integrated frameset, the page generating the top level HTML must be on the same server as WebCT. If it is not, a security violation will occur when the top level HTML page is to be displayed, and only the top frame of the page will appear.
Quiz	In Internet Explorer, for quizzes set to deliver one question at a time with no review, using the backspace key to invoke the browser's back function causes the current quiz question to be skipped, preventing the user from answering the skipped question. In Netscape, after the user saves their quiz answer, resizing the window causes a warning message to be displayed. Note: User can proceed to the next question by clicking OK. If multiple .mov files are embedded in a quiz question, only the first .mov file is displayed correctly. In Internet Explorer, using the backspace key causes quiz questions to be skipped, preventing the user from answering the skipped questions. In Netscape, after the user saves their quiz answer, resizing the window causes a warning message. Workaround: User can proceed to the next question by clicking OK. In the Edit Categories screen, the same category title can be used multiple times. If a Quicktime Movie clip located on an external streaming server is embedded in a quiz question, the link to the movie will be broken. This is because the link to the external server will be re-parsed in such a way that the link will no longer be valid. Workaround: Put in an extra qtsrc statement in the html code, as in this example: Original html code: <EMBED src="htpp://www.arts.someuniversity.edu/QT4Required.mov" qtsrc="rtsp://streaming1.osu.edu:7070/media/music141/piece1.mov" width=400 height=330 autoplay=fale controller=true loop=false pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/"> Revised html code (with extra qtscr statement in bold): <EMBED src="http://www.someuniversity.edu/QT4Required.mov" qtsrc="rtsp://streaming1.osu.edu:7070/media/music141/piece1.mov" qtsrc="rtsp://streaming1.osu.edu:7070/media/music141/piece1.mov" width=400 height=300 autoplay=false controller=true loop=false pluginspage="http://www.apple.com/quicktime/"> In the Question Database, searching by category does not work correctly. Using the Equation Editor, if the Enlarge Editor button is clicked during equation creation, input textbox squares appearing on the edit screen will become square characters. Workaround: The square character can be easily removed.
Selective Release Feature	The note "Conditional" indicating that a link is selectively-released does not appear in the teaching assistant interface.
Standard API	Deleting a non-existent user record from the student database produces a success message.
Student Presentations	Students who are deleted from the course by the WebCT administrator are not deleted from their presentation groups.
Track Pages	For quizzes used as Content Module pages, hits to the page and posts from the page are not tracked correctly.
Track Students	Using the sort function will result in all student records being displayed.
Welcome Page	If a designer selects a tool or page for selective release, and sets a start date and time without setting an end date and time, a message appears incorrectly indicating a problem with the start time. Workaround: Set an end date and time, or set a start date only (with no start time). (Note: The Release to field is reached as a designer by selecting Change Settings, Course Menu, selecting a Course menu item, then under Hide, Reveal or Edit Link, selecting the Edit link option for a particular element or tool.)
Whiteboard	Clicking the Apply button in the font editor causes text to be temporarily hidden. Workaround: To display text again, click the Whiteboard drawing area. Drawing new lines may delete previously-drawn lines. If the Whiteboard page has not loaded completely, Whiteboard cannot be started. Workaround: Wait for the Whiteboard page to load completely. On Macintosh, uploaded images cannot be viewed. On Macintosh Internet Explorer and Netscape, the Whiteboard's accessible interface is not available. In AOL 7.0, Whiteboard does not function.