Publishing Flash to Blackboard

Blackboard is a course management system that is commonly used for publishing and maintaining online content.

Note: This section assumes you are familiar with the interface of Blackboard.

To publish to Blackboard, there are two general steps:

Create a folder for the file(s).
Upload your file(s) to the Blackboard server.

Organizing Files: Folders

The first task in publishing a Flash presentation to Blackboard is to create a new folder, also known as a directory. Within this folder, you will place your file(s).

To create a new folder:

Log into the course as the course manager (instructor).
Select the "Control Panel" option in the navigation list (bottom left side of the screen).
Select the location where you would like the folder to be placed. For this example, select "Course Documents."
Select "Add Folder"
Under the "Folder Information" section, provide the name of the new folder. For this example, name the new folder "Accessible HTML Documents."

Note: You should create one common folder into which you place all your accessible files.
Under the "Folder Information" section, provide text that offers a description of the new folder. For this example, provide the text as "This folder contains all of the accessible HTML documents for the course."
Select "Submit" (bottom of the screen).
The name of the folder and its description are displayed in Blackboard at the specified location. For this example, the folder "Accessible HTML Documents" is listed under "Flash Presentation"(see Image 21).

Image 21: Creating a new folder in Blackboard

It is recommended that you create a common folder into which you place all files. For this example, the common folder was named "Accessible HTML Documents." However, a file is usually associated with other files, such as images or audio. Thus, each file should have its own folder within the common folder; this is called a subfolder, also known as a subdirectory. Within this subfolder, you will place a file and all its associated files.

To create a sub-folder:

Log into the course as the course manager (instructor).
Select the "Control Panel" option in the navigation list (bottom left side of the screen).
Select the folder where you want to place the sub-folder. For this example, select "Course Documents" then "Flash Presentation".
Select "Add Folder" (see Image 22).

Image 22: Creating a sub folder in Blackboard
In the "Folder Information" section, provide the name of the new subfolder. For this example, name the new subfolder "Lab2."
In the "Folder Information" section, provide text that offers a description of the new subfolder. For this example, provide the text as "This is a Flash presentation for Lab 2."
Select "Submit" (bottom of the screen).
The name of the subfolder and its description are displayed in Blackboard at the specified location. For this example, the subfolder "Lab2" is listed under "Flash Presentation" (which is under "Course Documents").

Uploading Files

The second task in publishing a Flash presentation to Blackboard is to upload all the files.

Log into the course as the course manager (instructor).
Select the "Control Panel" option in the navigation list (bottom left side of the screen).
Select the folder into which the file should be uploaded. For this example, select "Course Documents" then "Flash Presentation" and then "Lab2."
Select "Add Item" (top of the screen).
Provide text that offers a description of the file to be uploaded. For this example, provide the text as "This is a Flash presentation for Lab 2. Please read this as soon as possible and contact the instructor if you have any questions."
In the "Content Attachments" section, select "Browse."
This opens a "Choose File" dialog box (bottom of the screen) for you to locate the file on your computer that you want to upload to Blackboard. For this example, select the file named "lab2.swf."
Select "Open" to confirm the file selection and close the "Choose File" dialog box.
Select "Submit" (bottom of the screen).
Blackboard will upload the file and check if there are any associated image files.

Note: Depending on the file size, the time to upload will vary.

Note: You do not need to upload the html file. Students can view the .swf file directly.

Viewing Uploaded File

Once all associated files such as images and audio have been uploaded, you can view (or as needed download) the completed file within Blackboard by selecting the link to that file. For this example, select "Course Documents" then "Flash Presentation" and then "Lab2" to view the file named "lab2.swf" (see Image 23).

Image 23: Viewing uploaded file in Blackboard

The next page will discuss publishing Flash to the course management systems (CMS): WebCT.

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Publish to WebCT