Blackboard Learn services were restarted following the corrective action on the Windows servers on which Blackboard Learn is hosted. This restart has resolved the root cause of the issues we’ve been experiencing recently.

We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience this has caused and encourage you to get in touch with the IT Help Center online, via email at ithelp@bu.edu, or by phone at 617-353-HELP (4357) if you encounter any further problems.

Previous Update

IS&T system administrators and Blackboard Learn support staff have identified the root cause of this issue as a problem with one of the Windows servers on which Blackboard Learn is hosted. A restart of the affected services has been completed, but some system tasks required for a complete fix have not finished running yet.

Once all required system tasks have completed, and after we have had a chance to evaluate the success of the service restart, we will determine whether or not any further planned outages are required to fully reset the systems.

In the meantime, the workaround identified in the original post below can still be used to alleviate any symptoms.

Original Post

There are a variety of Blackboard issues that are on-going and have not yet been resolved. The vendor is aware of the issue and is currently investigating a fix. An update will be posted here as soon as more information is available.

Meanwhile, users are reporting any combination of the following symptoms:

1. Missing or incorrect number of Internal Messages
2. Error message when accessing course materials and documents
3. Grading assignments or submitting assignments

What we’ve learned so far is that two of the five Blackboard application servers are out of sync with each other.  At any given time, you can be connected to any one of the five server nodes.  If you are running into the behavior described above, you are likely hitting one of the two bad nodes.

A workaround you can attempt is to log out completely and close your browser.  You should then clear your cache and cookies: (see www.bu.edu/tech/teaching/lms/blackboard/how-to/clear-your-browser-cache/ ).  Trying alternate browsers and using Private/Incognito might also be helpful if clearing the cache doesn’t work.