UPDATED: eClass Moodle Problems for PDFs with Adobe Reader Update for Mac/Firefox

The latest release of the Adobe PDF Reader (version 10.1.3) causes problems for some eClass Moodle users when viewing PDFs within courses. This issue only affects users on Mac computers who are using the latest version of Firefox (11).

When version 10.1.3 of Adobe Reader gets installed, users can no longer view eClass PDF files using Firefox. When opened, the PDF content will not render directly in the browser, nor will any link be provided with the option to download the file.

UPDATE: The most recent version of Firefox, 13.x,  will now show a link to download the PDF content (but still will not show the content in-browser). We have been tracking this issue and it is not limited to eClass Moodle PDFs. Mozilla support has released 2 support posts that describe a couple of different workarounds.

The first involves switching Firefox into 32-bit mode and will allow users to view PDFs directly within their browser: http://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/925330.

The second is a Firefox setting that will allow users to force downloads of PDFs to save them, print them, or view them offline: http://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/925055

At this time, we still recommend that users do not update to this latest version of Adobe Acrobat Reader. If users have already performed the update, they will need to remove Adobe Reader version 10.1.3 to restore PDF function within eClass on Firefox. The previous safe release, version 9.4, is available at http://get.adobe.com/reader/otherversions/.

If you have any questions about this, please email ctl@ualberta.ca.

Regards,
CTL Technology Services

Problems Submitting Assignments to eClass Moodle

There is currently a known issue for students submitting assignments in eClass Moodle. This issue stems from incorrect system feedback that tells students they have successfully submitted an assignment when in fact they have not.

During the submission process, once a file has been selected, it will initially appear on the assignment submission page for confirmation. At this point, the file has not been uploaded. Users must then click on ‘Save Changes’ or else their file will not be uploaded.

Depending on the setup of the assignment, students may see incorrect messages telling them that their file has been submitted - either in the assignment submission tool, or on their course home page. Students should always verify that they can see their assignment file in the Submission Draft area. If this area has no files in it, regardless of any other messages visible, the assignment has not been submitted.

This is a known bug in Moodle that we are tracking and we will implement a fix for it as soon as possible.

Regards,
CTL Technology Services

eClass Outage Schedule 2012

To ensure adequate maintenance of the eClass and eClass Live! services, we are scheduling a monthly maintenance outage on the last Sunday of each month. During each outage we will perform routine maintenance, address any outstanding problems, and add or update plugins as required. The length of each outage will be determined by the complexity of the changes required.

eClass and eClass Live! may be unavailable during the time slots listed below so plan accordingly.