Blog from September, 2013

At 11:38 p.m. Eastern, on Tuesday, 24 September 2013, CourseSmart announced that connection issues with their Service Hub servers had, in their words, "stabilized". You should be able to access CourseSmart resources from Desire2Learn courses normally.

Earlier in the day on Tuesday, CourseSmart had issued an advisory regarding intermittent failures in attempts to connect to their Service Hub servers.

The CourseSmart Service Hub servers act as the gateway between the CourseSmart eTextbook and digital resource tools within Desire2Learn with the rest of CourseSmart's servers. Therefore, Service Hub connection failures prevented Millersville University users from accessing CourseSmart resources used in Desire2Learn courses.

CourseSmart's Service Hub servers are not dedicated to Millersville University users. The Service Hub serves users from all institutions that offer CourseSmart digital resources, and according to CourseSmart technical support, an unusually large number of users attempted to connect to the Service Hub servers yesterday. Unable to support the number of connection attempts coming in, the Service Hub began dropping or refusing some connections.

CourseSmart technical support is investigating why the unusually large number of connection attempts occurred yesterday and as well as how best to handle such situations in the future.

Yesterday's CourseSmart Service Hub connection problem only affected the CourseSmart tools within Desire2Learn. The remainder of the Desire2Learn system remained online.

UPDATE: Please see CourseSmart Connection Failures - Stabilized.

CourseSmart have issued an advisory regarding intermittent failures in attempts to connect to their Service Hub servers.

The CourseSmart Service Hub servers act as the gateway between the CourseSmart eTextbook and digital resource tools within Desire2Learn with the rest of CourseSmart's servers. Therefore, the Service Hub connection failures may prevent Millersville University users from accessing CourseSmart resources in Desire2Learn courses.

As the connection failures are intermittent, retrying the CourseSmart tools in Desire2Learn may meet with success. If you experience repeated failures when attempting to use the tools within Desire2Learn, you may access your CourseSmart resources directly at coursesmart.com. The coursesmart.com website is not affected by the Service Hub connection problems.

Technicians at CourseSmart are working on the Service Hub connection issue.

The CourseSmart Service Hub connection problem only affects the CourseSmart tools within Desire2Learn. The remainder of the Desire2Learn system remains online and is functioning normally.

Faculty and Staff: Join Desire2Learn in Lancaster!

Pennsylvania Desire2Learn Ignite is your forum to make an impact by exchanging insights, strategies, and best practices with your local peers. Take advantage of the day and work with your educational neighbors to build a community of collaboration and spark the passion for learning that connects us all.

Registration Is Now Open!

The agenda in now finalized and registration is open. Check out the agenda summary below or visit the Pennsylvania Desire2Learn Ignite site for a full agenda and session descriptions.

Already Registered?

Be sure to return to the registration site to select your sessions. They will fill up quickly.

Key Highlights

• Sit in on both Desire2Learn-led and user-led presentations
• Gain practical experience with hands-on sessions
• Provide firsthand feedback in focus groups
• Experience a first-look demonstration of the latest solutions Desire2Learn has to offer
• Share tips and tricks with your peers during scheduled networking opportunities

With presentations, training sessions, and dedicated time for peer networking, attendees can engage directly with Desire2Learn staff – and each other – to discover how the latest developments in online learning technology are changing the educational landscape from a local perspective.

Agenda

Share this Opportunity

• Share on Facebook
• Share on Twitter
• Share on LinkedIn
• Share on Google+

Pennsylvania Desire2Learn Ignite 2013 Host and Partners

Due to scheduled, monthly maintenance, Desire2Learn will be unavailable from 1 a.m. to 7 a.m. Eastern on Sunday, November 10. No patches or upgrades to Desire2Learn are planned for this maintenance period. Instead, this monthly, scheduled downtime allows Desire2Learn's data center to perform necessary computer and network hardware upgrades.

Due to scheduled, monthly maintenance, Desire2Learn will be unavailable from 1 a.m. to 7 a.m. Eastern on Sunday, October 13. No patches or upgrades to Desire2Learn are planned for this maintenance period. Instead, this monthly, scheduled downtime allows Desire2Learn's data center to perform necessary computer and network hardware upgrades.

Due to scheduled maintenance, McGraw-Hill Campus will be unavailable from 4 a.m. to 6 a.m. Eastern on Saturday, September 28.

Only McGraw-Hill Campus, accessible through a widget in Desire2Learn courses that use McGraw-Hill online resources, will be affected by this maintenance period. Desire2Learn itself will remain online throughout, and all tools but the McGraw-Hill Campus widget will function normally.

In some courses, attempting to enter the Manage Grades area fails with Desire2Learn displaying an "internal error" message. This problem was first reported at approximately 9:30 a.m. Eastern on Tuesday, 3 September 2013. Desire2Learn technicians are investigating the issue.