This is a new recent discovery that is occurring on our Blackboard 9.1 SP 8 server. I noticed this yesterday that when I would create a new course in the admin console. When you try to go into the course it hangs and never opens, but if I go to a course that was created awhile ago it opens just fine. Yesterday I ran the PushConfigUpdates and it fixed it, but later in the afternoon I ran the Patchset 2 and now it is doing that again. I have rolled back the Patchset 2 and it is still acting this way. I have checked the logs and I can not find anything that would tell me why this is occurring. I am hoping one of you may be able to help.
Clay,
I'm not quite sure from your description, but is this slowness occurring for all courses, or only courses that have just been created? Also, what is the entry point set to on these courses by default--do they open to announcements, or to a course home page with notification modules?
Just to confirm, since you also posted this question over on the listservs, have you also set the value "bbconfig.group.javascript.files" in bbconfig to "false" and ran a PushConfigUpdates?
Mike
The bbconfig.group.javascript.file is set to false and I have ran several PushConfigUpdates. Yes this seems to only be happening when I create a new course and does not happen to any course that was created on the 18th or before. Weird thing is that I did not change anything other than the patchset 2 which I have now rolled back. The default entry point is the home page with all of the default modules. I have not set a default look to the home page as of yet.
Okay, so it's a problem with courses created since the 18th, and it started before you initially applied Patchset 2--is that right? That seems to imply that it's not caused by something in Patchset 2.
The first thing I'd do is try changing the course entry point on one of those new courses, to see if it still hangs. If it only hangs with the Course Home Page as the entry point, that would indicate that the problem is with the notification system, and the delay is with gathering the information for those notification modules.
One more general question--how often do the database tables get re-indexed? Could there be a problem with the database maintenance routines? I've seen slow response due to corrupted indexes before, though nothing exactly like this (i.e. problems with data added after a particular date...)
Yes I applied Patchset 2 hoping that it would resolve the issue. I am still fairly new to blackboard and learning it. How do I change the entry point of a course? I will have to ask the DBA how often that database is re-indexed and the maintenance routines.
Go to the course control panel and look under Customization > Style > Course Entry Point. Of course, you have to be able to actually get the course to open enough to get to the control panel.
I can't get the course to open in any fashion to change the entry point setting.
You'll definitely want to open a ticket with Blackboard, if you haven't already, but you might try this direct connection to the course style settings page:
http://<your server>/webapps/blackboard/execute/cp/manageCourseDesign?cmd=display&course_id=_<course pk1>_1
You can find the course pk1 value by looking at links to the course.
I think you are right. That direct link did work and I changed the settings, but when I went back out and tried to get into the course it did not let me in.
Well, that at least narrows down the likely causes, anyway.
Do you see this same problem if you copy an existing (pre-June 18) course to a new course and try to open it? Also, does it hang going to other places in the course if you initially get to the course with that course style settings page link? The style settings like is getting to the course by calling a different process than the regular course link, but (on my server at least) it's still showing you the course menu and control panel.
I'm wondering if there's something that the "webapps/blackboard/execute/launcher?type=course..." process (the one that the regular course link calls) needs that's broken in those new courses. But it's almost certainly something that Blackboard Support will need to sort out, I'm afraid.