WebCT 4.0 Campus Edition Release Notes

WebCT Campus Edition™ 4.0 Release Notes

May 1, 2003

Contents

About WebCT Campus Edition 4.0
Supported Configurations
New Features and Enhancements
Issues Resolved in WebCT Campus Edition 4.0

About WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 | Top

WebCT Campus Edition is a course management system offering a complete set of easy-to-use teaching and learning tools for course development, course delivery, and course administration.

In this release, WebCT Campus Edition offers greater usability through a number of new features and system enhancements. These include:

a set of course design wizards to help designers create and modify the basic elements in their WebCT courses.
an HTML editor that allows users to format text using word-processor type controls.
a feature that allows the import/export of online learning content that implements IMS specifications.
expanded integration to include additional partners such as Datatel®.

Installation

For complete installation instructions, see the appropriate version of the Installation and Upgrade Guide: WebCT Campus Edition.

SCT®/Datatel® Users:
If you are upgrading WebCT in an existing SCT integrated environment, or if you plan to install WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 with SCT or Datatel integration, see the appropriate version of the Guide to Integrating SCT with WebCT Campus Edition or the Guide to Integrating Datatel with WebCT Campus Edition.

SCT Plus™ Users:
Be advised that integration of WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 with SCT Plus, or upgrading to WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 from a previous version of WebCT in an SCT Plus integrated environment, requires application of a patch to SCT Plus. This patch is expected to be available from SCT in mid-May 2003. For more information, contact SCT Client Services.

Supported Configurations

Server Operating Systems

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 supports the following server operating systems:

Microsoft® Windows® 2000 Server SP3 operating system, Windows 2000 Advanced Server SP3 operating system. Warning: Because WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 uses a newer version of Perl (version 5.6.1), do not install WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 with WebCT 3.6.x or earlier on the same Microsoft Windows server. WebCT Campus Edition 3.7, 3.8, and 4.0 use the same version of Perl and can be installed on the same Microsoft Windows server operating system.
Red Hat® Linux® 7.3 (Kernel 2.4.18-3) operating systems for Intel® processors
Important: If you are running Red Hat Linux 7.3, you need to install the Red Hat Linux 6.2 libstdc++ compatibility package. At the time of publication, the most recent version of this package was compat-libstdc++-6.2-2.9.0.16.i386.rpm.

To find out if the package is installed, run the following command:
rpm -q compat-libstdc++-6.2
If the package is installed, the package name displays.

To install the package:
1. Download the file from:
  http://rpmfind.net/linux/RPM/redhat/7.3/i386/compat-libstdc++-6.2-2.9.0.16.i386.html
2. Log in as root and type:
  rpm -i compat-libstdc++-6.2-2.9.0.16.i386.rpm

Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS 2.1 (Kernel 2.4.9-e3) operating system for Intel processors
Red Hat Enterprise Linux ES 2.1 (Kernel 2.4.9-e3) operating system for Intel processors
Sun™ SPARC™ Solaris™ 8 and 9 operating systems

IMS Content Migration Utility

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 is compatible with IMS Content Migration Utility 2.0. Note: It is not compatible with IMS Content Migration Utility 1.2.x.

Perl

Perl is the primary scripting/programming language for most of the programs and program modules in WebCT Campus Edition 4.0. Perl 5.6.1 is bundled with the WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 distribution file. Installing WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 also installs Perl within a WebCT directory. For information on Perl, visit the Perl web site at www.perl.com

Warning for Microsoft Windows users: Because WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 uses a newer version of Perl (version 5.6.1), do not install WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 with WebCT 3.6.x or earlier on the same Microsoft Windows operating system. WebCT Campus Edition 3.7.x, 3.8.x, and 4.0 use the same version of Perl and can be installed on the same Microsoft Windows operating system.

Apache™

The WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 distribution files include Apache 2.0 web server software. WebCT installs the Apache server within its own installation (<webct_install_directory>\webct\server\) and does not overwrite or modify any existing Apache server included with your operating system. Important: You must use the Apache web server software included in the WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 distribution files.

Client Operating Systems

Microsoft Windows 98, 2nd edition/2000/XP operating systems
Macintosh® OS 9 operating system
Macintosh OS v.10.1.x and v.10.2.x operating systems

Browsers

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 supports the following browsers:

Microsoft Windows 98, 2nd edition /2000/XP operating systems software:

Netscape® Navigator® 6.2.x and 7.0 browsers
Microsoft® Internet Explorer 5.0, 5.5 and 6.0 browsers. Note: Internet Explorer 5.5 SP1 is not supported
AOL® 7.0 and 8.0 browsers

Macintosh OS 9.x operating system software:

Netscape Navigator 6.2.x, browsers
Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.1 browsers

Macintosh OS v.10.1.x operating system software:

Netscape Navigator 6.2.x and 7.0 browsers
Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.1 and 5.2 browsers
AOL for Macintosh OS X browsers

Macintosh OS v.10.2.x operating system software:

Netscape Navigator 6.2.x and 7.0 browsers
Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.2 browser
AOL for Macintosh OS X browsers

Note: For the most current information on supported browsers, see WebCT's Browser Tune-Up Page.

To optimize your browser for WebCT, we recommend the following browser settings:

For all browsers, enable JavaScript™.
To use Chat, Whiteboard, the edit-on® Pro HTML editor, and the WebEQ™ Equation Editor, enable Java™.
To use ticket-based authentication, client browsers must allow cookies.
To use all features in Content Module, client browsers must allow cookies.
For all browsers, enable cascading style sheets (.css).
For all users, set cached pages to update "automatically" (Microsoft Internet Explorer, and Netscape Navigator 6.2.x), or "when the page is out of date" (Netscape Navigator 7.0).

Language Plug-Ins

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 is compatible with all 4.0 Language Plug-ins. Note: It is not compatible with any earlier Language Plug-in versions.

SCT and Campus Pipeline™

If you are upgrading to an SCT-WebCT integrated environment, you may be required to simultaneously upgrade SCT Banner® or SCT Plus and Mercury Message Broker, Mercury Message Gateway, and Campus Pipeline. Please verify the required versions and recommended patch levels of all components of the SCT/CP/WebCT Connected Learning Solution prior to upgrading any part of the Connected Learning Solution.

Failover

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 requires third-party software in conjunction with WebCT scripts to create a failover environment. For the Solaris operating system, we use Sun Microsystems Sun Cluster™. For the Windows and Linux operating systems, we use SteelEye Technology LifeKeeper®. These vendors are WebCT partners and they will provide support to ensure that you use the proper version of their software to configure WebCT for failover. To configure your system for failover, contact your account representative.

New Features and Enhancements | Top

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 provides the following new features and enhancements.

Course Design Center with Wizards

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 includes a new Course Design Center. It contains course design wizards that guide faculty and course designers, step-by-step, through the completion of common course tasks including setting up their course Homepage, Syllabus, Organizer Pages, Content Modules, Discussions, Mail, Calendar and Chat.

Updated Look and Feel

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 has a new look. The style of the application has been updated throughout, and controls have been grouped and positioned to facilitate easier access and more efficient course design.

More specifically, the following enhancements have been added:

Course tasks and activities now require fewer clicks.
The breadcrumbs have been improved allowing for easier course navigation.
When entering a new screen, the cursor is now placed in the first input field so the user can begin entering information immediately.
For designers:
- tabs have been added to clearly separate the student view and designer view, making it easier to design and preview courses.
- the view of the course — either student or designer — is maintained until the other view is specifically chosen.
- the References and Links screens in Content Module are easier and faster to use.
- the Self Test screens are easier and faster to use.
- the Customize Page Color screen, accessible from several areas in WebCT, now displays a preview of the color combinations chosen.
- the Syllabus screen has been updated to separate and highlight the options associated with each of the two Syllabus sources, Syllabus file and Syllabus tool.

WebCT Administrator Enhancements

The following enhancements have been added:

Command-line scripts now verify user permissions.
Settings have been added that allow the administrator to enter custom URLs to use when a ticket expires or a user logs out.
The backup.pl script can now backup courses by category or term.
The performance of the IMS API functions has been improved.
The active/inactive status of users that was introduced in the IMS API in WebCT Campus Edition 3.8 is now extended to the administrator and designer user interfaces.

WebCT Tool and Page Enhancements

The following enhancements have been added:

To complement Add Page or Tool, an Edit Page or Tool function has been added. This function allows the designer to access and edit all tools and content that have been added to the course.
There are now two Control Panels available. The Basic Control Panel provides access to the main areas of WebCT and the Expanded Control Panel is similar to the Designer Map from previous versions of WebCT. The designer can choose which to use as the default. Also, the designer is able to set the course to open to the Control Panel rather than the Homepage.
For designers, My Grades and My Progress now offer sample student views to demonstrate how this information is presented to students.
In Calendar, the Add entry function is now available from the monthly and weekly views, as well as the daily view. The Compile function is now available from the weekly view as well as the monthly view.
For designers, the Glossary listing screen now shows the definitions as well as the keywords.
The Notes topic can now be accessed and posted to directly from Discussions as well as from pages in a content module.
Designers can now create files in Content Module as well as Manage Files.
In Mail, when a user redirects messages to an external email address using Mail Forwarding, message attachments are now also sent.
In Quizzes/Surveys:
- the quiz index page has been replaced by a quiz listing page with a link to the Question Database.
- a Question Browser has been added. It is similar to the WebCT File Browser and makes it easier for designers to select questions to add to a quiz.
- the Quizzes/Surveys screen has been improved. Summary data and search criteria have been added near the top of the screen to help users locate items in the listing more quickly. The format of the items in the listings has been changed so that longer titles can be used, and the status and pertinent information is easier to read.

Content Import

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 makes it possible to create content modules offline using applications such as Microsoft® FrontPage®, and Microsoft® PowerPoint®, and to directly import these objects into WebCT, with all of their structure and linking intact. Learning objects, including both content modules and the assessment suite, can also be tagged and exported for storage or reuse.

Note: All WebCT CE 4.0 Import and Export features require installation of CMU 2.0 before they can become operational.

Integrated HTML Editor with Spell-Check

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 includes an HTML editor with spell-check, providing course designers with "What You See is What You Get" (WYSIWYG) content creation and editing capabilities, making it easier to create and maintain content within the WebCT course environment.

Browser Checker

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 includes a new Check Browser feature that can automatically detect if the user's browser is compatible with WebCT. If the browser is not compatible, users can access WebCT's Browser Tune-Up Page from the Check Browser screen to download a compatible browser. Note: Check Browser can only check the compatibility of browser versions; service packs are not checked.

Datatel Integration

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 features a new adapter that makes integration with the Datatel® Colleague® student information system faster and easier than ever before. Leveraging the adapter and interfaces available in Datatel's Envision Data Exchange (EDX) product, specifically designed to support rapid integration with WebCT Campus Edition, institutions can achieve real-time exchange of user, enrollment, and grade information, as well as single sign-on between WebCT Campus Edition and Datatel WebAdvisor.

Language Plug-ins

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 features Language Plug-ins that remain compatible across multiple WebCT Campus Edition Service Pack releases. There is no need to install a new Language Plug-in each time you install a new Service Pack. The only instance when this does not apply is when a Service Pack contains language phrasing changes. In this case, a new set of Language Plug-ins will be released with the Service Pack.

Internationalization

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 has added support for right-to-left languages such as Arabic and Hebrew. For these languages, any left-to-right language words or phrases, which are embedded in the text, display correctly (i.e. left-to-right).

SSL

WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 now allows administrators to configure the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) protocol to redirect all WebCT requests from a non-secure server to a secure server. In addition, the Apache server and OpenSSL module that are shipped with WebCT incorporate all of the latest security fixes.

Issues Resolved in WebCT Campus Edition 4.0 | Top

TOOL/AREA	FIX DESCRIPTION
Administrator	In Netscape Navigator 6.2, on the User Mgmt toolbar, some of the link buttons did not display correctly in that some of the text was slightly cut off. This has been corrected. In Course Mgmt, the Change Password function is now only accessible when a course does not have a designer assigned to it. Cross-listed courses created using the Standard API or IMS API did not retain the information entered for category or term. This has been corrected. In Course Mgmt, category names can now be edited. Course IDs can now contain a hyphen, as long as it is not the first character. When using a Language Plug-in, and importing global database records from a text file in User Mgmt, on import, default global database field names that are in the language of the interface now correctly match field names in the global database. When the restore.pl script was used to restore a course, and a new designer was assigned, the original designer's name appeared in myWebCT. This has been corrected. With Microsoft Windows servers, when an administrator edited an announcement, blank lines would be added to the announcement in some instances. This has been corrected.
Assignments	When grading assignment submissions, the Comments field is no longer a required field.
Calendar	When a content page is deleted from a content module, any internal links to that page from a Calendar entry are now also deleted. From the View Day screen, if a designer selected Delete all, public entries posted by students were not deleted. This has been corrected. The breadcrumbs, which show a user's location in a course, now update correctly as a user navigates through Calendar. The time display setting selected by the user did not always display correctly in Calendar. This has been corrected.
Chat	Quotation marks included in the name of a Chat room are now displayed. When the administrator setting for Student Name was set to Display students' full names as well as their WebCT IDs, only full names would appear in Chat. This has been corrected.
Content Compiler	When the pages from a content module were compiled, they did not compile correctly if the pages contained an equation and CD-ROM was enabled. This has been corrected.
Content Module	HTML content pages that use JavaScript to reference relative URLs now function correctly. A quiz or an HTML file can now be added to a content module multiple times. Textblocks added to the Table of Contents page can now contain JavaScript tags. Microsoft® PowerPoint® presentations that are saved as an .html file, but contain only one slide, now work correctly.
Course Backups	The setting for the maximum number of course backups, which is set by the WebCT administrator, now also applies to course backups uploaded using WebDAV.
Discussions	If a message recipient's name contained a comma, the recipient received two copies of the message. This has been corrected. When quoting a message that contained an equation, the equation was lost if the message was quoted more than twice. This has been corrected. If the administrator setting allows User IDs to be shown, students and teaching assistants can search messages by User ID. Regardless of this administrator setting, designers can now search messages by User ID. In topics that were designated as anonymous, messages were not posted anonymously by default. The user had to select anonymous posting each time a message was created. This has been corrected.
Exported Files	Files downloaded from WebCT that are delimited by commas are now exported in CSV format. This makes it easier to import the files into spreadsheet applications such as Microsoft® Excel.
Image Database	When a column is selected as the sorting column in the Image List table, this selection is now retained until a new selection is made. The Image Database list of Available databases is now sorted alphabetically.
Mail	If a message recipient's name contained a comma, the recipient received two copies of the message. This has been corrected. When quoting a message that contained an equation, the equation was lost if the message was quoted more than twice. This has been corrected. If the administrator setting allows User IDs to be shown, students and teaching assistants can search messages by User ID. Regardless of this administrator setting, designers can now search messages by User ID.
Manage Files	When creating a zip file, it is now possible to overwrite an existing file of the same name.
Manage Students	When using a Language Plug-in, and importing student data from a text file in Manage Students, on import, default student database field names that are in the course language now correctly match field names in the student database. In the Student table, clicking Submissions for a deleted quiz or assignment caused an invalid Submissions screen to appear. This has been corrected. If a student's grade is overridden, and the new grade falls within the existing grading scheme, the student record is now placed in the correct location in the list of grades when the column is sorted. Previously, all overridden grades were listed at the top of the list in the order in which they were entered. Any overridden grades that do not fall within the existing grading scheme will continue to be placed at the top of the list. When a letter grade column was used to sort the Student table, the values in the Page drop-down list were replaced by "---". This has been corrected.
Quizzes/Surveys	In calculated questions, logarithmic functions that contain negative "x" values now return an error rather than infinity. Invalid values used for "x" in asin(x) and acos(x) functions now return an error rather than a zero. When releasing a quiz to a selected set of students, the Select button could become disabled if a large number of students were selected. This has been corrected. In a calculated question, where the number of decimal spaces required in the answer was specified, any zeros that appeared at the end of the answer were dropped. This has been corrected. For multiple choice questions, letter indices were displayed as numbers in some areas of Quizzes/Surveys. This has been corrected. In a round (d,x) function, if the "d" parameter for the number of decimal places is excluded, zero is now assumed.
Share Designer Access	If you have more than one designer with shared access, it is now possible to delete any or all designers at one time.
Student Tips	The tips are now sorted alphabetically.
WebEQ Equation Editor	In some instances, very long equations could not be edited after they had been added. This has been corrected for Microsoft Windows users. The situation has been improved for Macintosh users, but due to limitations of the Macintosh implementation of the WebEQ Equation Editor, the issue cannot be completely resolved. On a Macintosh, clicking Cancel in the WebEQ Equation Editor caused Netscape Navigator 7.0 to crash. This has been corrected.
Whiteboard	On a Macintosh, uploaded images can now be viewed. In the accessible interface, it was possible to click the Start Whiteboard before the Whiteboard applet had finished loading. This has been corrected. When the administrator setting for Student Name was set to Display students' full names as well as their WebCT IDs, only WebCT IDs would appear in Whiteboard. This has been corrected.