Lynx Results

Fall 2001
Spring 2001

Fall 2001

Spring 2001

Lynx had no problems reading the text-only version of Blackboard 4, the only version of any program it could easily access. No other product included a text-only version of their site.

Unfortunately, Blackboard 4's text-only sites do not include all features. In the graphics version, these features cause problems in Lynx. Links throughout the product did not work because they used JavaScript, which Lynx could not interpret. The most apparent example of this was the automatically generated link to a quiz on the announcement page. This means a user dependent on a text-only browser can not take quizzes in Blackboard unless provided a direct URL. While this is possible, it is neither easy nor practical.

Attempts to use form-based functions encountered problems as well. Lynx included a workaround to missing default selections within forms: it added a default entry to form fields. In a quiz, Blackboard depended on these blank form fields to determine if a student skips or misses a question. If a Lynx student accidentally skips a question, an answer was marked by default, so she would get no warning. The form-based discussion boards had an even greater problem. Users could not fill in the text fields or modify the radio button options.
In the instructor entry area, form submissions continued to cause concern. As with the discussion board, an instructor using Lynx could not submit anything to the course. Many course areas returned JavaScript, form syntax, or address errors. In Course Documents, the same problem as with the discussion board appeared; none of the fields could be modified. In many instances, attempts to post submissions with the unmodified fields returned error messages.

Prometheus was virtually unusable with Lynx. The login would not process without JavaScript. We found a solution by generating a URL from logging into Prometheus using a Java-enabled browser. We typed this URL into Lynx, and received access to the course site. Unfortunately, this URL is long and dynamic. It would not be practical for a user to manually enter this URL every time she needed to enter her course. Prometheus's reliance on a JavaScript-based login rendered it useless in Lynx and, by extension, most other lower end text-to-speech or text-only browsers.

Neither Blackboard 5 nor WebCT could be viewed with Lynx. When attempting Blackboard 5, we could only get a blank screen. Even when we tried to use the URL of a specific frame within the course, we failed. With WebCT, Lynx generated the same error seen with HPR 2.5.