Seesaw Product Updates

Beth

Seesaw Product Updates for March 16, 2023
Available in This Release
Update iOS devices to 8.15 to get these changes. Android does not have an update this week.

Improvements in creative tools to use less device memory, which will increase performance on older devices and overall reliability
Cache posts in the Journal tab for teachers to improve performance and reduce load times

Seesaw Product Updates for March 10, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.14 to get these changes:

Available on all platforms:

Frames bug fix: Place multipage draw+record videos in their appropriate frame.
Messages: Moved “Create New Thread” button to the top of the screen on mobile apps, matching the desktop and mobile web experience.
Messages: Fixed issue impacting Seesaw Basic (free) teacher access to Messaging when teachers have 200+ archived classes.
Messages Usability: Simpler and clearer Messaging hint-text and informational banners to clarify when School Settings do not allow families to reply to teacher announcements and teachers can start group conversations.
Messages: Fixed issue when teachers or admins try to send messages to large class recipient groups so that message sending doesn’t time out.

Available on the Web:

Top Admin Request: District-Level Messaging Settings! Allow district admins to select messaging settings that will apply to all the schools within their district.
District-Level Bulk Class Archival Tool: District Admins are now able to initiate bulk class archivals district-wide from their District Admin Dashboard.
Fix bug with camera access permissions in Incognito browsers

Seesaw Product Updates for Feb 23rd, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.12 to get these changes

Available on all platforms:

Messages Usability: Simpler and clearer Messaging empty states for families and teachers, and hint-text to clarify when families can reply to teacher announcements. Also, removed Messaging promotion banners and “welcome message” from the summer launch.
Update the empty state of the Journal tab for teachers with zero posts in their class to promote the Resource Library and link directly to the Getting Started Collection for the class grade level.
Frames bug fixes: Automatically start recording when a student clicks a Voice frame. Improvements to the Text frame.
Update the “Save” activity flow to allow teachers to automatically add to a collection and unsave more easily.
Domain validation bug fixes: updated language in errors to make it clearer when new users are being added with the wrong email domains.
Skills bug fixes: ensure skills stay attached to an activity when students/folders are edited; ensure skills are sorted by ascending/descending order.
Bug fix for incorrectly showing a “video playback not supported” error message on some Draw+Record videos.

Available on the Web:

Self-timer mode for photo camera! For our friends on Chromebooks and computers with only a selfie camera, it can be tricky to get a good photo of work on a piece of paper or something in the classroom. We’ve added a self-timer button onto the camera screen that gives students a 3-second countdown before taking a photo. Additionally, pressing the space bar also works to take a photo.

Seesaw Product Updates for Feb 15, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.11 to get these changes:

Messages: Use localized date formatting in Messaging.
Messages: When Seesaw Basic (free) classes are archived, display message threads in the archived folder (previously these threads would “disappear” unless the class was unarchived) and display clearer copy for archived class threads in free classes.
Setup & Rostering related bug fixes: archiving and unarchiving classes with no domain validation issues now working without throwing exceptions
Frames bug fixes: Students will see frames reappear on the canvas if they delete a photo, video, or recording they originally placed with a frame.

Available on the Web:

Top Teacher Feature Request: Copy & paste page between activities! Allow teachers to copy and paste pages from one activity to another for easier creation of assignments. Copy & paste page is not available for students, Journal posts or message attachments.

Seesaw Product Updates for February 10, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.10 to get these changes:

Messages: When Seesaw Basic (free) classes are archived, display message threads in the archived folder. Additional clean-up for free class message threads when class associations are changed.
Public blog: Remove the Google SSO option from public blogs. Seesaw sign-on is still supported from this page. Users can also use Google, Clever, Classlink, and Seesaw sign-in options from the main login page, and then navigate to the blog.
Text Frames: Allow teachers to add Frames that support student text.
Skills Bug Fixes: Corrected issues with users being unable to view/search for skills; implemented pagination of Skills.

Setup & Rostering related bug fixes:

Org Dashboard: “Assign missing studentIDs” now correctly displays students that are missing IDs in the org.
CSV Rostering: Org Import Status banner copy edited for clarity when an error has occurred.
CSV Rostering: Student with generic email being unarchived from org no longer erroneously displays teacher email in error message.
Roster Sync Errors no longer showing “Unknown Errors” due to error codes changing with invalid domain errors.

Seesaw Product Updates for February 2, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.9 to get these changes:

Prevent the device from going to sleep when uploading multimedia.
Fix bug where some users were stuck on a gray screen with a white bar when relaunching the app.
Messages: Don’t allow private replies when the announcement thread is archived.
Messages: Small bug fixes, visual improvements, and performance improvements with recently launched features for Suggested Recipients and Archiving.
Allow students to drag and drop photos, videos, and recordings into frames.
Update the Share Activity flow for School and District libraries to let teachers more easily select which specific library they want to share an activity with.
Fix bug that was preventing family members from syncing to Seesaw if they had a phone number mismatch between Seesaw and their SIS.

Seesaw Product Updates for January 26, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.8 to get these changes:

Frames: Smart shapes that allow students to add photos, videos, and more in designated spaces on the Seesaw canvas. This feature is now launched for all teachers and students with a “Beta” label in the product.
Messages: Fixed an issue impacting automatic archive from Jan 10-Jan 24; Message threads should now correctly be automatically archived when classes are archived.
Messages: Small bug fixes, visual improvements, and performance improvements with recently launched Messaging features for Suggested Recipients and Archiving.
Account Switcher: Refresh the counter for notifications for other accounts when opening the left sidebar menu.

Seesaw Product Updates for January 19, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.7 to get these changes:

New! Account Switcher: Easily switch between multiple accounts on the same device
New! Improvements to Messaging:

Easier experience for families to privately reply to teacher announcements
Teacher owners and school admins can “archive” threads for everyone
Message threads automatically archived when classes are archived
Suggested recipients for families and teachers to easily start common threads

Frames in Creative Tools Beta: Frames are smart shapes that allow students to add photos, videos, and more in designated spaces on the Seesaw canvas. Users can submit feedback via our in-product survey.
Creative tools: Fix flashing of canvas when tapping undo/redo
Additional audio and video playback improvements
Fix issue with scrollbar sometimes not appearing on Seesaw for Schools admin dashboard.
Update style of folders underneath posts to comply with WCAG accessibility color contrast requirements

Seesaw Product Updates for January 13, 2023
Available in This Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.6.1 to get these changes:

Messages: Clarity updates to indicate when announcement recipients can or cannot privately reply.
Messages: Exclude archived message counts from messaging unread counts.
Messages: Notify recipients when a message thread was archived by a teacher or admin.
Messages: Increase the size of the smallest font sizes on mobile devices.
Messages: Show error when creating an announcement with 1000+ classes.
Messages: Show sender and message snippet for Messaging notifications.
Additional improvements to multimedia uploads.
Additional audio and video playback improvements.
Additional improvements to better detect if a device is online/offline.
Creative Tools: Fix bug where videos created on web from Jan 11 at 3 pm PT - Jan 12 at 1 pm PT would not playback on iOS

Seesaw Product Updates for December 20, 2022
iOS 8.5.2 Update Now Available

Fix a bug where some devices would run out of memory when creating posts and videos and users would not be able to tap the green check to finish uploading or would get stuck on a grey screen.
Fix bug where Clever SSO was not working properly if the user was already signed in but the app was quit. Now Clever SSO will work regardless of if the user is already signed in or if the app is open/closed.

Android 8.5.1 Update Now Available
Fix bug creating and playing back voice labels on Android.

Seesaw Product Updates for December 14, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android to 8.5 to get these changes:

Improvements for online/offline handling when playing videos and audio.
Messages: Show clearer relationship context in people's search results. Additionally show connected students in family search results, as well as co-teachers in teacher results.
Messages: Make message threads that are archived or closed due to settings fully read-only — don’t allow editing recipients, labels, or message types.
Messages: Fixed a few visual bugs related to private replies and loading message thread list.

Seesaw Product Updates for December 1, 2022
Summary of Top Updates

All Seesaw for Schools and Plus users are receiving full access to the Seesaw Library (formerly known as the Lessons Library) on Thurs, 12/1. Free teachers continue to have access to Teacher Preview.

Available in this Release
Please update iOS to 8.4 to get these changes. There is no Android app update this week.

Content Library: Rename “Activity Library” to “Resource Library”. Rename the “Seesaw Lessons” tab to “Seesaw Library”.
Creative Tools: Add an option to cancel and retry uploads to prevent users from getting stuck on endless spinner due to flaky network connections.
Creative Tools: Fix bug where you could upload a post without your video being fully uploaded if you clicked on the green check several times before the video had finished processing, which would result in a ‘blank post’.
Creative Tools - iOS: Improvements to memory usage to prevent crashes in creative tools and prevent lost student work. This change should also improve the performance of the app overall.
Creative Tools - iOS: Improvements to uploading photos and videos to make this more robust and prevent lost student work.
iOS: Fix bug where some users were stuck on a grey screen when opening the app from a push notification when their authentication session was expired.
Activities Tab: Fix bug where the activities To Do count for students was incorrect after filtering to a specific folder.
Messages: Show updated reply snippet with more context when privately replying to announcements.
Messages: Fixed issues impacting Seesaw Basic teachers and families when they also share a connection in a school, and show clearer error messages when trying to start a message thread without a teacher or admin.
Messages: Improvements, clearer error messages, and bug fixes for translations of message content.
Messages: Optimizations for real-time messaging delivery and scrolling performance.

Seesaw Product Updates for Nov 17, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS to 8.3.0 to get these changes. There is no Android app update this week.

Improve retries when playing voice labels and voice comments on devices with a spotty network connection
Fix issue where certain PDFs had images rotate incorrectly or fonts incorrectly modified when uploading
Increase the image quality of photos taken in Seesaw on iOS
Messages: Clean up contextual information for message threads to show student information for families and teachers more visibly, and fix bugs when message thread participants are connected by multiple classes or students.
Messages: Clearer visual context for message thread participants that are blocked, disconnected from a student or class, or deleted account.
Messages: Improved error handling when Google Translate API has an error.

Web Only:

Admin-related bug fixes:

When a district admin adds a post to a class, it will now not require teacher approval. This is now consistent with the school admin experience.
When an admin goes into an org dashboard and clicks on a student name within a post, it will now no longer show an error and go directly to the class/post.

Org Admin Dashboard copy improvements for improved clarity (e.g - “Send Activation Emails” changed to “Resend Account Activation Emails”)

Seesaw Product Updates for November 10, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS to 8.2.0 and Android to 8.1.9 to get these changes.

Creative Tools iOS: Fixed an issue where front-facing camera was black on certain iPad models. Now the camera displays normally.
Messages on Android: Updated error handling and “retry” improvements to improve the robustness of “real-time” message receipt.
Messages: Prevent editing messages if the message thread is archived or closed by settings.
Messages: Updated UI for announcement snippet for private replies to show more content and link to the original announcement thread.
Messages Minor Bug Fixes: Fixed display bugs with Edit Message modal and Welcome Message links. Removed “Hide” feature from Admin Visibility view.

Web Only

Fixed a bug where stats around number of posts and parent visits were under-reporting for some classes (and in aggregated school and district stats on admin dashboards and emails).

Seesaw Product Updates for November 3, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS devices to 8.1.10. Android does not have an update available this week.

Creative Tools - iOS: Improve the quality of photos taken with the Seesaw camera on iOS
Creative Tools - iOS: Fix crash when using “tap to focus” in the camera or video camera or switching between cameras on certain iOS devices
The bad words lists for Messaging and the main app are now case-insensitive
Messages: Fixed iOS issue with scrolling and opening message threads due to iOS soft keyboard issue

Seesaw Product Updates for October 27th, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android devices to 8.1.8 to get these changes.

Messages: Support a much more targeted list of bad words for Messaging and re-enable the bad words filter in Messaging.
Messages: Fixed minor display bugs: Fixed white screen when loading messages with URL previews and removed the “Create” button from the Admin Visibility feature.
Messages: Retroactively “undeleted” attachments that were erroneously deleted from previously sent messages (original bug that was deleting attachments was fixed on 10/19).
Messages: Updated error handling and “retry” improvements to improve the robustness of “real-time” message receipt.
iOS Photo and Video: Have the aspect ratio of the camera preview match the aspect ratio of the photo that ends up on the canvas
iOS Photo and Video: Support tap to focus gesture
iOS Video: Improve the quality of videos recorded in the app
Fixed issue where archived students were still able to sign-in and access previous classes
Web: Started enforcing stricter password requirements for those using CSV Rostering tool

Seesaw Product Updates October 19, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android devices to 8.1.7 to get these changes.

Messages: Fixed regression that caused inconsistent behavior for unsent message drafts that wouldn’t “clear” or message attachments that would “disappear” from previously sent messages. We’re also retroactively “undeleting” the attachments impacted by this bug. This may cause some “duplicates” (which can be removed by the teacher if desired), but will ensure that no attachments are missing.
Messages: Updated icons for announcements and group conversations to improve readability and clarity in inbox and recipient search results.
Messages: Updated error handling and “retry” improvements to improve the robustness of “real-time” message receipt.
Messages: Unblocked bit.ly links in Messaging.
Admin Dashboard: Fixed an issue with the email edit panel on the “Teachers” tab that prevented district admins from updating email addresses.
Admin Dashboard: Fixed an issue that caused the scrollbar to disappear on the Admin dashboard
Messaging: Resolved an issue that displayed a smaller font in messages when opening messages from a push notification when the app is closed.
Journals: Fixed issues where “View Original” does not open the PDF on mobile.

Seesaw Product Updates October 13, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android devices to 8.1.6 to get these changes.

Security: Password validation to prevent the use of commonly-breached passwords.
Security: Any user who signs in with an email/password can opt-in to multi-factor authentication.
Security: Updated School settings to require multi-factor authentication or SSO (Google, Clever, Classlink) for sign-in.
Web: Resolved admin dashboard issues including: scrollbar while using a mouse, 400 errors when admin creates new teacher account via class settings, LTI integration setup screen icons misalignment
Messages: Turned off the bad words filter after customer feedback that its current implementation is too sensitive for messaging use cases. We are still checking for bad links, and teachers and admin owners can still remove messages as needed to manage their conversations.
Messages: Updated “replies turned off” system message to clarify that this might be due to school or class settings.
Messages: Fixed a few minor bugs related to filtering messages.
Creative Tools: Fixed minor issues where saving drafts with videos did not save the actual video.

Seesaw Product Updates October 5, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android devices to 8.1.5 to get these changes.

Security: Require email verification for accounts that have not been accessed in the past 1 year + 1 month.
iOS and Android: Fixed an issue where users could be signed out of the app if they went into Messages and lost internet connection.
iOS and Android: Password reset links open the mobile app.
Creative Tools iOS: Fixed flashy labels when using a case with an external keyboard. Don’t move labels offscreen when using an external keyboard and not the soft keyboard.
Creative Tools: Fixed issue where sometimes the creative tools screen would go blank when editing a PDF file on Safari.
Creative Tools iOS: Fixed issue where sometimes the wrong menu would appear for uploading a Voice Caption file.
iOS: Fixed issue playing back voice instructions and voice captions on iOS 16.
Accessibility: Have helpful alternative text on posts for screen readers in the feeds.
For example: Emily’s post, in response to Spelling Bee, one of three pages, contains voice.
Security: Removed the 25-character password restriction in activating teacher account flow.
Messages: Allowed message thread owners (admins and teachers) to view removed message history from the message info panel (3 dots on a message → View Message Info).
Messages: Updated icon display for group chats for improved visual clarity.
Messages: Properly display the bad words filter message for links with detected bad content.
Messages: In the Admin “View Messages” Tool, properly show all message threads involving the selected person, not just threads where the person sent a message.
Messages: Fixed a regression involving unread counts. Customers that were reporting unread count issues should now be seeing the proper unread count in their messages.
Activity Library: Fixed issue with School & District Library where Seesaw Lessons are unable to be removed.
Activity Library: Fixed issue with long URLs not wrapping properly in Activity Teacher Instructions.

Seesaw Product Updates September 30, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android devices to 8.1.4 to get these changes.

Creative Tools iOS: Fixed bug where it was not possible to move the cursor in a label.
Creative Tools: Fixed bug where sometimes a gray screen would load when students tapped +Add Response. Now it takes them to the creative canvas as expected.
Creative Tools: Fixed bug where sometimes students were routed back to Messages after completing an activity if they had previously been in Messages. Now they go to the Journal as expected.
Creative Tools: Fixed bug where sometimes the link preview image would disappear when editing a post.
Messages: Support multiple teacher/admin senders for an announcement, as well as a feature to manage owners/senders manually. Any teacher or admin that is added explicitly by name to the recipients of an announcement thread (ex. Recipients: “Families in 3rd Grade Owls, Brittany Co-Teacher”) will be a thread owner and can send announcements within that thread. Owners can use the message info panel (3 dots menu within a message thread) to add/remove owners and recipients and manage the message thread. We’ve also added a toggle in the Add Classes modal to make it easier to add co-teachers as additional senders when starting an announcement thread.
Messages: Additional visual improvements for readability and clarity in inbox and recipient search results.
Messages: When the school settings change to be more restrictive OR if the class relationships change and an existing conversation is not allowed from the existing settings, all existing conversations that no longer match the setting will automatically “close” (turn off replies).
Messages: Allow admins to remove messages on behalf of teachers from the Admin Visibility feature or from within the message thread.
Messages: Block message from being sent if a bad word is detected from the bad words list.
Messages: Fixed a regression that caused Messages to show up with a tiny font size after following a push notification into Messages.
Security: Stricter password requirements for new accounts or password resets.
Security: Do not allow Seesaw for Schools students who sign in with email or SSO to join a class that is not part of their Seesaw for Schools subscription.
Progress: Fixed bug where double tapping on Progress could result in a partial white screen.
Activity Library on iOS: Fix bug where if you had previously searched for something, the keyboard would keep popping up, even when you were not entering text.

Seesaw Product Updates September 21, 2022
Available in this Release
Please update iOS and Android devices to 8.1.3 to get these changes.

Security: Implement a captcha for login with email/password and text codes.
Creative Tools: Fix additional bug with uploading multimedia on a flaky network connection.
Creative Tools: Better offline handling when the device loses network connectivity.
Creative Tools: Draw+Record on iOS - Fix bug where audio was not properly recorded after a pause if the creator did not interact with anything on the screen.
Creative Tools: Fix bugs with audio recording and playback on iOS 16.
Activities: Fix student activity links to properly open in the iOS app, not mobile Safari.
Activities: Fix bug where the count of “To Do” activities were not properly refreshing.
Messages: Support hiding message threads from your inbox that are no longer needed or relevant. “Hide” will show up as an option in the “3 dots menu” on an individual message thread in the inbox, or from a long press on mobile. Hidden threads can be viewed and moved back to the inbox using the “Hidden” filter. Any new messages sent to a “hidden” thread will bring the message thread back into the inbox.
Messages: Fixed a regression that caused loading Messages to occasionally get into an “infinite” loading state.
Messages: Fixed a regression that caused message notifications to send for some recipients even when the email/push notifications setting was “OFF”.
Messages: Recalculate unread counts to address unread counts issues from migrated conversations.
Messages: Added an indicator when conversation participants no longer have access to a conversation because they were removed from the class or school.
Messages: Improved message loading performance.
Admin Dashboard: Fixed broken help-desk link.

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