Attendance – Delete and restore registers | Updated

This feature complements the Attendance – Manage registers | Updated feature released in the May 2021 / 20.21.5 release.
Instructors can now restore mistakenly deleted attendance registers and associated session data. You can delete registers individually on the Attendance Registers page or in bulk.

Note: Deleted registers do not appear in the Attendance data set.

Figure: The Attendance Registers page with the More Actions drop-down menu > Delete functionality
 

This feature implements PIE ideas D6051 and D1535.

Brightspace Editor – Additional functionality | Updated

This feature updates the Brightspace Editor – Improvements | Updated feature released in the May 2021/20.21.5 release and includes the following functionality:

• Format painter – you can now copy and apply text formatting
• @mentions – @mentions is controlled by the organization unit configuration variable, d2l.Tools.WYSIWYG.Mentions, that is deployed in an OFF state. Once enabled by an administrator, in discussion posts, users can now tag other users within the same course using @mentions depending on permissions. Tagged users are notified by alerts in the minibar. External notifications are not yet available. 

Privacy is an important consideration of this feature, so the @mentions feature is controlled by multiple permissions. A role must have the following permissions to use the feature when enabled for their organization unit:

• User Information Privacy > See First Names*
• User Information Privacy > See Last Names*
• User Management > Search for {role} 

When a user is tagged, their profile is linked to their tagged name – this will eventually be replaced with the Profile Card. To see the profile of another user, the following permission is required:

• User Profile > View Other Users’ Profiles

 
Without the View Other Users’ Profiles permission, the profile link does not render for that role. 
 
After @mentions are created in a course, if this functionality is turned off, the @mentions links and notifications in the alerts area remain active. However, users cannot add further @mentions.   
 
Note: At this time, a user, when fully permissioned, can @mention any active user (depending on the roles they can search for) in their organization unit regardless of group, section, or conditional release restrictions for that discussion forum/topic. When a user is @mentioned in a topic they do not have access to, they do not receive an alert, to prevent 404 errors. Further work to enhance this workflow is planned.

Brightspace Platform – LaTex rendering in quiz questions | New

This feature releases the d2l.Tools.WYSIWYG.InlineLaTeX (OrgUnit) configuration variable that renders inline LaTex equations in the HTML Editor and in the new Brightspace Editor. As a result, scientific and mathematical equations are rendered seamlessly without the need to use the LaTeX equation option in the Equation Editor.
This configuration variable is turned ON by default for new clients and is turned OFF by default for existing clients. 

When enabled, any existing inline LaTeX equations render as expected. When disabled, these equations no long render. However, the equation remains unaltered.

Figure: A Content topic with some inline LaTex equations and a learner’s view of the equations
 

This feature implements PIE ideas D1822 and D7732.

Data Hub – Course Publisher Brightspace Data Sets | New

To increase the value of the Data Hub offering, this release adds the following new Course Publisher Brightspace Data Sets, which return details from the Course Publisher tool, introduced in the May 2021/20.21.5 release:  

• Content Publisher Recipients:
  • Total number of new users created in a specific range
  • Unique enrolments
  • Course accessed
  • Number of unique users accessed
  • User access logs (date, time, userID, type of course package launch (AICC or LTI)) 
  • LMS type (Brightspace or non-Brightspace)
• Content Publisher Launches:
  • User access logs (date, time, userID, Recipient ID)
  • Unique enrolments
  • Number and type of course package launches (AICC or LTI)
  • LMS type (Brightspace or non-Brightspace)

Data Hub - Learning Outcomes Brightspace Data Sets | New

To increase the value of the Data Hub offering, this release adds the following new Learning Outcomes Brightspace Data Sets (BDS), which return details from the Learning Outcomes tool:

• Outcomes Scale Definition: provides details about the achievement scales created for all your org units.
• Outcomes Scale Level Definition: provides details about the outcomes scale levels created for all your org units.
• Outcome Details: provides details about the outcomes that are part of all registries in all your org units.
• Outcome Registry Owners: provides details about the registries that are associated with your programs or org units.
• Outcomes in Registries: provides details about which outcomes belong to which registries for all your org units.
• Outcomes Aligned to Tool Objects: provides details of which outcomes are aligned to which assessment tools for all your org units.
• Outcomes Demonstrations: provides details about outcomes assessments for all your org units.
• Outcomes Program Details: provides details about the programs that are defined to hold a collection of outcomes (registry).

 For more information about what these new data sets capture and how to use them, refer to this blog post: Introducing Outcomes Data Sets in the Brightspace Data Hub. 

Data Hub - Versioning columns added to Brightspace Data Sets | Updated

To help Data Hub users disambiguate Brightspace Data Set (BDS) differentials where the records may be out of order or duplicated, this release adds the following versioning columns to existing data sets:

• New Version column added to Assignment Summary BDS.
• New LastModified column added to Checklist Completions BDS.

When multiple rows in the data extract have the same primary key value, users can identify the most recent row based on which row has a higher value in the versioning column. For more information, refer to this blog post: Multiple Records in Brightspace Data Sets.

Email – Auto save outgoing messages | New

When users send email messages, these sent messages are automatically saved in the Sent Mail folder. As a result, the User Account > Email Settings > Save a copy of each outgoing message to the Sent Mail folder check box is no longer available.

Figure: The Email Settings page before this email setup improvement


Figure: The Email Settings page after this email setup improvement

Import/Export/Copy Components – Export course metadata | New

Brightspace Learning Environment course packages now include metadata that identify the Course Name, Course Code, and Language used in the course. This metadata is displayed in the IMSManifest.XML file.

Rubrics - Detach rubric warning for feature assignment creation experience | Updated

When an attached rubric is deleted from an evaluated assignment, if evaluations of that rubric have been performed, the user now receives a detach rubric confirmation message for the assignment. This change applies to the New Assignment Creation Experience. 

Figure: The Rubric Detachment confirmation dialog.

Rubrics – Reorder criterion groups | Updated

In order to increase the value of rubric criterion groups, it is now possible to reorder those criterion groups in the New Rubric Creation Experience. If more than one criterion group appears in your rubric, direction arrows appear to the left of the criterion group header to reorder the criterion groups in the rubric. If only one criterion group appears in your rubric, the direction buttons do not appear.

This implements PIE item D5263.

Figure: Direction arrows located beside the criterion group header

Rubrics – Replace legacy Rubric grading in Competency Manual Assessment items with New Rubric Experience | Updated

To hasten the end of life of the legacy Rubric experience, manual assessment for competency items now display the New Rubric Experience by default. Now, when evaluating a competency manual assessment item, the New Rubric Experience displays automatically.

Rubrics – Replace legacy Rubric grading in ePortfolio with new Rubric experience | Updated

To hasten the end of life of the legacy Rubric Experience, ePortfolio items now display the New Rubric Experience by default. Now, when evaluating an ePortfolio item, the New Rubric Evaluation Experience appears automatically. 

Rubrics – Replace legacy Rubric grading in Grade items with new Rubric experience | Updated

To hasten the end of life of the legacy Rubric experience, Grade items now display the New Rubric Evaluation Experience. Now, when you evaluating an indirect rubric on a grade item, the New Rubric Experience appears by default when evaluating a grade item with a direct rubric association. With this change, all grade book workflows now follow the New Rubric Experience.

Integrations

IPSIS - OneRoster® section association | New

OneRoster® now includes additional logging for Section Association course deletion events when merging or moving sections, as part of an IPSIS Section Association Tool workflow. Full updates will now correctly maintain the history of Section Association changes and no longer recreate the course offering that was deleted. 

This update resolves known issue PRB0055758, such that IPSIS can track the historical relationships between a course offering and a section and prevent faculty members from being incorrectly unenrolled from course offerings as part of a section association request. 
 

SCORM – Export and import course packages across orgs | New

Administrators can now export and import course packages containing SCORM objects across orgs. Previously, course packages containing SCORM objects could be exported from an org; however, attempting to import those course packages into a different org failed.

For example, when an administrator exports a course containing SCORM objects from Org A, copies of the SCORM objects are added to the exported course package. The end result is a course package available for import and SCORM objects with all references to the SCORM objects retained within the original course.

When an administrator imports the course package into Org  B, the SCORM objects are added into the org and re-linked to the imported course so references are not broken (the physical copy SCORM objects now exist in Org B, separate from Org A, where the course package was exported from). As a result, any instructor with the Can insert new SCORM objects permission for a course can access the SCORM objects that were copied into the imported course.