We hope you had a restful Thanksgiving Break! November is quickly wrapping up, which means our Sakai 12 Upgrade is just around the corner!
The Sakai 12 Upgrade is scheduled for January 3rd from 8am-5pm (see new upgrade date announcement). Please plan for the Sakai system to be completely offline that day.
*Important Note on Assignments*
While Sakai should be back online by 5pm, please note that Assignment conversions to Sakai 12 will take several hours to run. You may not see Assignments you created before the upgrade until the next morning (Jan 4). If you have Assignments that students must start submitting to on January 3rd, we recommend creating the Assignment when Sakai comes back online that afternoon. We appreciate your understanding and patience.
Sakai 12 Upgrade Blog Series on New Features
In the next few weeks we will begin sharing new features to come in Sakai 12 as part of our Sakai 12 Upgrade Blog Series. Be sure to check back to see what’s new!
Just a reminder, we already included the following new features back in our Sakai “Upgrade Part I” August 6 Maintenance. All these features are already available to you in Sakai production:
- Extended delivery testing accommodations
- Delete multiple test submissions
- Zoom video web conferencing
- Poll Everywhere Gradebook integration
Removed Tools: Blogs, DPM, & Modules
We deprecated both the Modules and the Discussion and Private Messages tools back in 2016 when we upgraded to Sakai 11, as these tools were no longer supported by the Sakai Community after having been replaced by more powerful tools, Lessons and Forums, respectively. While we asked users to switch over to Lessons and Forums, we understand that for various reasons, some site administrators still preferred to use the older tools in their existing sites, but without support.
With the Sakai 12 Upgrade on January 3rd, the Modules and Discussion and Private Messages tools will be completely removed from the Sakai environment. Any sites that have the tools enabled on their sites will need to switch immediately. The Sakai Community has also chosen to completely remove the Blogs tool from Sakai 12, and we cannot backport it into the Sakai 12 environment.
**Please note that starting on January 3rd when we upgrade to Sakai 12, these three tools will no longer be available:
- Blogs
- Discussion and Private Messages (note this is NOT the Messages tool)
- Modules
In lieu of these tools, we recommend switching to the following:
Blogs >> 3 options:
- Lessons
- Student Content Pages
- Forums
- Modify permissions on a Forum to allow students to create Topics. Each student will have their own Topic to use Conversations as “blog posts”
- TIP: Use the “Display Message Content” button to see all posts on a Topic
- WordPress (not in Sakai)
- Have students create their own WordPress sites
Discussion and Private Messages >> Forums
Modules >> Lessons
We’d be happy to assist you should you need any help getting started with the transition of these tools. Please do not hesitate to reach out to us by submitting a help ticket or by signing up for a personal consultation.