Blackboard CPIP Connector Information
Blackboard CPIP with IE / Netscape / Firefox
Last year we had SCT come here and give a CPIP class using the 'new' Generic
Framework. It was a 3 day class and on the 3rd day we built a bunch of
connectors. One of which is our connection to Blackboard. We have Luminis III.3
and Blackboard 6.x "basic" so there is no data integration (you need the
Enterprise version of BB)
Our connector seemed quite straight forward and during class worked great. It
wasn't until after a billion other changes to the system, including going live,
that we realized that we never tested it with Netscape or Firefox (yea that's a
no-no now a-days). So being the good little Luminis admin with people on my
back, I posted a ticket to support.
After much going back and forth support (Jared) sent me some interesting
information. Those of you that read 'camppipetech' may have seen my postings,
but the quick of it was that the Blackboard system sets a cookie named
"session_id". The pickup.html page that the CPIP uses also sets a cookie named
"session_id" because of how the CPIP works. They are both correct blackboard
session identifiers, however, the one that the pickup.html file sets is the one
we want to use for our connector.
IE takes the first BB cookie and then overwrites that cookie with the one the
pickup file sets, which in this case, is the right thing to do (three cheers for
IE). Netscape and Firefox, for some reason (possibly the correct technical
thing) appends the values so you end up with this being passed back to Luminis
-
Cookie: session_id=@@902fc44bfd8a51e0739eb078539b99a6;session_id=@@d6bbd81505820eca9e88cfa120868587
Yea, that's a problem.
To solve this, I created another webserver instance in IIS on
port 81 where I placed my pickup.html. I changed this line in my properties file
-
mcbb6.pickup.remoteurl = http://blackboard.messiah.edu:81/pickup.html
Saved it, bounced my CPIP webserver and it works now in
IE, Netscape and Firefox.
I've attached my CPIP files to this post if anyone needs them <G>
-Jon
Thanks
Thanks again for this useful information, we too are integrating BB and would not have tested it against other browsers. One question though did you have to change anything in BB for the CPIP connector to work? We have the enterprise version also.
Out of the box
No we didn't need to change anything. I think you just need to know which authentication you're using and uncomment / comment the correct block in the mcbb6.xml file. That block changes the hidden fields that get passed back and forth.
I just got an email this morning that the connector doesn't work off campus ... guess the network guys didn't open up port 81 yet. <G> ... works great from here.
License
Great! how do I get a mcbb6.license.key and mcbb6.license.issued? I have the generic CPIP but if I am creating my own CPIP connector how do I get the key and license? Can I just copy it from another CPIP connector? I am a little confused about this.
GCF CPIP Licence Key
If you haven't obtained a license key from SCT in the past (before it was part of the Luminis release) you can copy the development license information from one of the out of the box .properties files (ie. banweb.properties) in the $CP_ROOT/luminis/products/sso/config directory. That should work.
- Jon
CPIP to Bb - Firefox, different IIS Service, W2K3
Jon,
You've posted before a solution for Firefox and Netscape Blackboard CPIP issue. This worked great when we our Bb webserver was on Win2K IIS5. When we upgraded to w2k3 on our test server - the problem happens even with having pickup.html in a different IIS 6 "Web Site".
Were you able to get CPIP to Bb working for Firefox with Bb on Windows 2003?
Thanks,
Dmitriy B.
BB - 2003k
Interesting, no we're still on 2000. I wonder how / why it traps all web instances / ports, if BB is sitting on one web instance, all others should be independent. Weird. Is there a blackboard support site / list / forum that you can post to ? I would think this is a huge issue if you're using the system for multiple web apps. There has to be a BB setting to either turn that off or an IIS one to stop it, I'm not sure which would be better, probably disabling BB.
I just spoke to our BB admin, what version of BB are you using, did you upgrade to the just released v7 ?
-Jon
Figured it out - Upgrade Firefox!
Jon, this started working when I upgraded my Firefox to 1.0.7. Version 1.0.6 was having trouble, but the latest one works :)
Thanks,
Dmitriy B.
Files
Are these the only files you need when trying to integrate blackboard with Luminis? Where do these files go and are any changes needed such as rebooting, to the luminis machine required as well? Thanks for any help that may be provided.
gotcha ?
Hi,
here' a scenario I'm still investigating but this is what I think I'm seeing:
just to say i think we've seen peoplpe get logged out of blackboard during tests due to the SSO - people we're not appreciating that
a SSO to blackboard did not give you a completely separate session
since when luminis logs out it logs out of blackboard.
I'm not clear if the "check activity" CPIP functionality is implemented and if it is if I have it working correctly but during blackboard tests I believe the user's remain on a since page until the end of the test - blackboard uses javascript to make it look like the users are paging through a sequence of questions but actually no
request is made back to the server until the test finishes.
This means that even with a working check state the BB users may spend a considerable time (upto the BB timeout) working without accessing BB. If you're BB timeout is longer than your portal timeout
your users may get logged out !
The solution might be (1) make the luminis timeouts at least as long as the blackboard timeouts
(2) make the popup message clearer to say it will log you out of blackboard
(3) to remove the auto-logout of bb when the portal exits.
Anyone got any ideas?
rich
Disable Log Off for Bb
Rich, we simply disabled the auto-logout for Bb CPIP, to avoid this headache. Luminis simply single signs in users, but does not handle logout. This was our policy decision, and I think for Blackboard its a good decision. For other systems where people don't spend so much time, this may be a bad idea, but...
Dmitriy B.
disable log off
I agree !
which Chapter 5
Jonathan:
I am trying to develop BB connector based upon the information you have provided. You suggested Chapter 5. I have Campus Pipleline Integration Protocol (CPIP).pdf February, 2005 version and I do not see an example that you have discussed in this forum. Will you tell me Chapter 5 from which guide are you suggesting? Or may be you may direct me to the proper document for this purpose. I am planning to install gc.jar file suggested on 3.56 from System Admin Guide version E May 31, 2005.
Thanks,
Milind Chokshi
Re: mcbb6.xml
Jon,
I'm trying to build a GCF connector for Blackboard 7.1 and Luminis 3.3.
In your mcbb6.xml,I noticed that the following tag is used to call
some Java class:
CALL a:class="com.campuspipeline.sso.authenticator.custom.Blackboard"
Is this class built-in to Luminis or custom developed ? Should this class be set in the CLASSPATH ?
Also, is your GCF connector deployed on the Luminis box or on the Blackboard server ?
Any help/pointers will be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
Shyam
Blackboard 7 CPIP
We don't have 7 here and are actually moving away from Blackboard to Moodle so I'm afraid I can't give any real insight or good technical help / experience using 7. I've heard from others that its a bear to CPIP to.
To answer your question, that class is built in to Luminis so you can simply list it as is (at least for v6).
There are some other posts about BB6.3 and 7 breaking CPIP and people working through it --
http://www.lumdev.net/index.php?q=node/763
http://www.lumdev.net/index.php?q=node/786
Good luck
Blackboard Basic 8/9 connector
We've just started our luminis implementation and besides SSO to our library system, Blackboard SSO is at the top of our list. Has anyone done an SSO connection for Blackboard Basic 8 or 9 with Luminis 4? Can we use the same files Jon posted for Blackboard 6 Basic or is it totally different? We were told we had to upgrade to Blackboard Enterprise but we think this is not the case but that we just have to build it ourselves instead of buying the service. We know we won't be able to use the automatic event processing to populate the classes but are not doing that now so nothing will change. It would be nice if we could do the SSO though.
Blackboard 9 SSO
We are moving from Blackboard 7 to Blackboard 9. We have been using Luminis4 to Blackboard 7 SSO connector for over an year now. Is SSO to Blackboard 9 going to be any different than the GCF connector that is being used for Blackboard 7.
Can anyone please share the information if they have implemented SSO to Blackboard 9.
Any information is appreciated.
Thanks,
Sharda
BB 9 Luminis 4 Single Sign On
Has anyone figured out the CPIP for Luminis to BB 9?
BB9 CPIP
When we first went live with Blackboard, we were on version 7. We were not able to use the BB6 files for this, and ended up getting a custom CPIP from SCT. We upgraded to BB9 in August 09, and contracted with SCT for updated files. This seems to be something that they have already set up and ready to go, and you just have to pay them for the files.
For us, the cost of getting this CPIP from SCT vs. us investing time and resources setting it up ourselves, it was worth it to purchase from SCT.
Christine
SSO to Blackboard 9
I am in the process of configurind SSO to Blackboard 9. I modified our existing GCF connector for Blackboard 7. It is able to pass credentials to Blackboard 9 but for some reason it is not able to authenticate the user and hence getting "Access Denied" error.
Has anyone tried SSO to Blackboard9. Can you please share some information on this.
I observed that the frameset.jsp of Blackboard 9 is lot different from Blackboard 7. Do we need to make any change on the connector's .xml file?
Any insight would be very much appreciated.
-Sharda
SSO to BB9 working
I got SSO to BB9 working after some changes to our existing apdapter.
Can you share your adapter???
Can you share your adapter???
It is very similar to the
It is very similar to the adapter that we used with Blackboard 7. The main change that we had to do was with the EXISTS string. This has changed from blackboard7 to blackboard 9.
Give me your emailid and I can send you the files.
Email Address
Thanks, we are a vista school going to bb9. My address is djohnson@valenciacc.edu.
Shardak, Would you care to
Shardak,
Would you care to send me a copy of your XML too please? I'm having the same issue.
aaron.harris@wku.edu
Thank you.
Aaron
sme issue
we are having the same issue. care to share your files? jcollins3@atu.edu
Looks like many schools are
Looks like many schools are working on Blackboard 9 SSO.
As I mentioned in my previous post that the main change that the connector's XML required was changing the EXISTS string in tags and from "/webapps/portal/tab/_1_1/index.jsp" to "/webapps/portal/execute/tabs/tabAction?tab_tab_group_id=_1_1". Also the .properties file needs to be changed to match the new hostname for Blackboard 9. This would actually resolve the SSO problem.
Also, it may vary depending on how each school has implemented its old connector.
But, for us it was changing the EXISTS string as the old EXISTS string is no longer valid for the return token string from Blackboard to Luminis to verify an active session.
Hope it helps!
still out
I got the connector working more but not fully now i am getting a You do not have permission to access this service message
Working in Safari and Firefox but not IE
We're implementing Luminis IV now and I've worked on an SSO connector to Blackboard 9 this week, but I think we are doing it much differently than all the posts I've seen. Blackboard released (pretty recently I think) an autosignon building block that we are using. The building block gets installed on the blackboard server and configured through the admin interface. Once it's configured, autosignon happens via HTTP Post to a url on the blackboard server with a timestamp, the username and a Message Authentication Code which is an md5 hash of the parameters. We've created an SSO.jsp page that gets called when our BB9 icon is clicked which does the hashing and redirects to blackboard. It is working with Safari and Firefox but when I try it in IE 8 I also get the "You do not have permission to access this service" message. I'm curious if anyone has determined what this actually means and how to resolve it, since I'm stumped. Thanks!
Building Block name
Do you happen to know the name of this building block? I'm working on a solution myself and am familiar with the CE 8 SSO. This seems to be very similar to what I am already familiar. I did a search on Blackboard's site and couldn't fin anything that described itself this way.
Edit: Found it - bbgs-autosignon
Blackboard Building Block SSO Portlet
I have a working SSO portlet to Blackboard 9. It uses the SSO building block for Blackboard mentioned above. It has been in production for about 3 months and so far so good. If interested let me know.
Thanks
Thanks. I actually coded a custom CAS client already, and wrote the SSO code yesterday. It was pretty straight-forward with that building block (plus it has actual documentation, which makes it so much easier). The biggest issue was looking up the courseId for redirection into a specific course. How did you accomplish this task?
SSO Portlet
Kevin,
Can I get the code for your portlet? I'd like to check it out. brippe@nocccd.edu. Thanks!