Blackboard FAQ: Communication

My Collaboration Tools (Lightweight Chat, Virtual Classroom) aren't working, what do I do?
When sending e-mail through Blackboard I receive a strange error message, something about processing a lock and disk quota exceeded, how can I tell who has received my e-mail and who hasn't?
My students are having trouble pasting their papers into my discussion board, what do I do?
Why am I not receiving any e-mail my instructor sends me through Blackboard?
My Virtual Classroom and Light Weight Chat windows aren't working and I know my Java plugin is current, what is wrong?
What can I do to keep my students from sending mass e-mails (spamming) from Blackboard?
What does the "Lock" function do within Blackboard Discussion Forums?
How can I get old messages off the discussion board? If I erase a message, will it disappear for everyone or only for me?
Who can remove messages posted by users other than themselves?
Can I restrict access to to viewing a discussion forum to certain students in my class?
Why are my ["] quotes turning into [?] question marks and footnotes going crazy when I paste text into my disucssion board text editor and submit it?

My Collaboration Tools (Lightweight Chat, Virtual Classroom) aren't working, what do I do?

More than likely, this means you don't have the correct Java Runtime Plug-in for your browser. You can download the correct plugin and install it. MAC OS 8 & 9 users will only be able to use the Lightweight Chat utility. OS 10 shouldn't need a plug-in.

When sending e-mail through Blackboard I receive a strange error message, something about processing a lock and disk quota exceeded, how can I tell who has received my e-mail and who hasn't?

This error message is rather confusing, but don't worry your students have still received your e-mail. Just look for one line of the error that state that the mailbox quota or limit is exceeded. This means that the student(s) with that particular message have full in boxes and need to clean them out and they didn't receive your message but your other students did.

My students are having trouble pasting their papers into my discussion board via the text box, what do I do?

The most likely reason your students are having trouble is that their papers are too large (have too many characters). Blackboard's Text-Editor text box has a 4000 character limit . The solution is to have your students attach their papers instead.

Why am I not receiving any e-mail my instructor sends me through Blackboard?

If your course instructor is sending emails to your class using Blackboard and you aren't receiving them, you should try the following:

Make sure that you know which email address the mail is being sent to. By default, this will be the username@shsu.edu that is associated with your SHSU computer account. If you would like your email automatically forwarded to another address , you can do this by using E-mail forwarding option in the Computer account section of SamWeb.
If you do use a webmail-based address (like Hotmail or Yahoo), the emails from your Instructor could be in your 'Bulk Mail' or "Spam Mail" box. This is because they have multiple recipients, and webmail treats them like spam. Just add the professor to your trusted senders list.
If none of theses suggestions work, contact the Helpdesk ( helpdesk@shsu.edu , 936.294.1950) and your instructor and let them know that you aren't receiving e-mail from blackboard.

My Virtual Classroom and Light Weight Chat windows aren't working, what is wrong?

The most likely reason your windows aren't showing up or are disappearing before they can load is that you have your pop-up blocker enabled on your browser. Just make sure to allow pop-ups from blackboard.shsu.edu and you should be fine!

What can I do to keep my students from sending mass e-mails (spamming) to the class from Blackboard?

You can control you students' ability to send e-mail within the course via the Control Panel. Just enter you course then go to the Control Panel > Manage Tools (in Course Options section) > Tool Availability then uncheck the checkbox next to Email and hit submit.

Note: This will disable sending e-mail all together throughout the course. Your students can still use the messages or discussion board or digital drop box to communicate/send files.

If you just want to disable the send e-mail to All Users option then do the following:

Go to the Control Panel > Manage Course Menu and choose the modify button next to Communication. Once on the Communication Area Page, uncheck the checkbox next to All Users under Send Email and hit submit.

What does the "Lock" function do within Blackboard Discussion Forums?

The "Lock" tool allows you to stop the discussion of a particular topic. Select those posts that you want to lock by clicking on the checkbox to the left of each post. Then click the lock button at the top of the screen (if you do not see it, click the "Show Options" button for access to the discussion tools). Once the posts are locked, students will not be able to respond to those messages, although they will still be able to read them.

How can I get old messages off the discussion board? If I erase a message, will it disappear for everyone or only for me?

There are two ways to remove messages from the discussion board. The first is simply to use the "remove" command. This will delete the message permanently. Neither you nor any other user will be able to access it again. A less drastic option is the archive feature. It works as follows:

Enter a discussion forum.
Beneath the list of messages there should be a link labeled Click Here for Archives. Follow this link.
It will take you to the archive section for that particular forum. At first, there will not be any archives (giving you the option of organizing the archives however you like - by date, by subject, etc.). Click on Add Archive to create one.
Once an archive has been created, you can add messages by choosing to "modify" it. This will provide you with a list of threads in the discussion forum. Simply select those threads that you wish to be archived. (You also will be given the option of returning archived threads to the discussion forum.)

Who can remove messages posted by users other than themselves?

Normally only an instructor or TA can do this. It is possible, however, to grant this authority to other users. The procedure is as follows:

From the Control Panel , select Discussion Board under the Communications Center heading.
Select Modify for the appropriate discussion forum (privileges can be extended only one discussion board at a time).
Under Forum User Setting is a list of all registered users. Select each user to be given removal privileges, then press the Admin button.
Submit the modified form.

Users so selected gain not only the ability to delete any message from the discussion forum, but also full archiving privileges (including the ability to create new archives). (N.B. Although graders technically can be given this authority, they do not have access to the discussion board.) .

What can I do to keep my students from sending mass e-mails (spamming) to the class from Blackboard?

Note: This will disable sending e-mail all together throughout the course. Your students can still use the messages or discussion board or digital drop box to communicate/send files.

If you just want to disable the send e-mail to All Users option then do the following:

Can I restrict access to to viewing a discussion forum to certain students in my class?

The quick answer to this question is no, you cannot restrict access to viewing a normal discussion forum to certain students within your course (Within the normal Discussion forums you can restrict if a student can post.). However, you can create a group, enable the discussion forums for the group and add the students you want to have access to that group/forum. To learn how to create a group, see How do I create a group within my course?

Why are my ["] quotes turning into [?] question marks and footnotes going crazy when I paste text from MS Word into my discussion board text editor and submit it?

The apostrophe/quote/hyphen error is really a Word problem and happens when you copy/paste something from a Word document. In Word, the default setting for quotation marks and apostrophes is something called "smart quotes." It replaces "regular" quotes with the curly quotes. When text with the smart quotes are pasted into BB, the text editor converts the formatting to html to be viewed on the web.

The text editor can't figure out what the smart quotes are so it replaces the "character" with a question mark. There is also a setting that converts two hyphens (--) into a long dash. If you do a lot of copy/pasting from Word, then you can turn off the "smart quotes" feature. In Word, go to the Tools menu --> AutoCorrect. Click on the "Format as you Type" tab. The first box is "Straight quotes" with "smart quotes." Uncheck the box. The hyphen/dash box is also in there.