First Time Users Unable to Access Ares Content in Blackboard Using LTI 1.3 Links

Issue

After setting up an LTI 1.3 integration, first-time Ares users may encounter issues accessing Ares from the Blackboard course page due to a known issue in Blackboard that causes an incorrect username value to be sent to Ares for those users when all of the following conditions are met:

• Certain custom parameters have been configured to pass data from Blackboard to Ares
• A deep link to an Ares item is clicked from the Blackboard course page before the user has clicked the link configured for the Ares course home page
• The user is a first-time Ares user (i.e., the user does not yet have an Ares account created for their username)

Observed Behavior

Under the conditions above, this issue causes the following behavior in Blackboard and Ares:

1. A first-time Ares user clicks on a deep link to an Ares item from the Blackboard course page before clicking on the link to the Ares course home page
2. The Blackboard bug causes the value "admin" to be sent to Ares as the username for that user instead of the correct username value
3. Ares creates an account for that user with the incorrect Ares username value of "admin"  
4. Another first-time user clicks on a deep link to an Ares item before clicking the Ares course home page link
5. Blackboard attempts to send "admin" as the username for that user due to the bug
6. The user receives an error message as an Ares account has already been created with the username "admin," and the user is unable to access Ares content from the Blackboard course page

Solution

This is a known issue awaiting resolution by Blackboard and cannot be fixed on the Ares side of the LTI integration. At present, the recommended solution is to add some additional text to your Blackboard course pages instructing users to click the Ares course home page link configured for the course before clicking on any additional deep links to Ares items.

Once the Ares course home page link is clicked and an account is created for that user in Ares using the proper username value, the deep links to Ares items may be safely accessed by that user at any time in the future without causing the error described above.