SAFARI Montage^® Version 8.1.x

Introduction

This document contains the release notes for SAFARI Montage 8.1. This is a full release of the SAFARI Montage System and the following sections provide details of its release.

This SAFARI Montage 8.1 upgrade is not a software-only upgrade from SAFARI Montage 4.x and earlier versions. Upgrading from SAFARI Montage 4.x or earlier versions requires a new OS drive, may require increased RAM and/or a new server. Contact SAFARI Montage Technical Support (1-800-782-7230) regarding SAFARI Montage 8.1 upgrade options.

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New in this Release - 8.1

• SAFARI Montage with Microsoft^® Immersive Reader
• The inclusion of Immersive Reader from Microsoft inside the SAFARI Montage Learning Object Repository (LOR) enhances equitable access to SAFARI Montage for all learners. This powerful Microsoft Learning Tool greatly supports reading and comprehension for students across all grades and reading abilities by giving users customizable control of on-screen text in SAFARI Montage with options to:
• Read text aloud with just a click of a button
• Translate text to Spanish, French, German, Polish, Chinese, Arabic & dozens of other languages, and have it read aloud
• Adjust text size, spacing, font and color
• Break words down by syllable & parts of speech
• Picture Dictionary for multi-sensory processing
• And more!

New in this Release - 8.0

• LOR Lesson Presenter Enhancements
• Provide district-approved course scope & sequence and lesson resources to ensure students have equitable access to relevant instructional lessons
• Organize playlists into district-created course scope and sequence folder structures
• Manage target academic standards associated with all levels of course scope and sequence, supporting teachers and lesson developers
• Support collaboration among lesson developers & co-editors
• Manage courses and development responsibilities by department
• Provide flexible dashboard access to courses, including individual personalization
• Allow Teachers to easily customize lessons by copying & customizing lesson playlists or adding their own playlists
• Updated LOR Lesson Presenter Teacher & Admin Guides
• LOR Enhancements
• Easy Upload support for web links, including streamlined one-step drag & drop with automated metadata extraction
• Greatly improved Thin Common Cartridge import process with new tools for previewing, downloading, regenerating thumbnails and changing permissions for Thin Common Cartridge resources
• Expanded ways to manage approved YouTube resources via the LOR for safe student viewing
• Enhanced IMS Global CASE support
• Present combined search results of content by academic standard (for GA Math & Science and IL ELA, Math & Social Science), regardless of how original alignments were provided
• Real-time integration from 3rd party systems using CASE identifiers for academic standards
• Import Common Cartridges containing CASE alignments
• Import academic standards in CASE format, including standards not pre-loaded on SAFARI Montage
• French language support, allowing users to search for French language resources and tag newly uploaded resources as French
• Replace media files in place while seamlessly preserving existing permanent & embedded links
• Updated BrainPOP resources, adding 21 new topics for a total of 845 topics (Requires LOR subscription and purchase from BrainPOP)
• BrainPOP Jr. users can now find relevant BrainPOP Jr. resources in their federated searches (Requires LOR subscription and purchase from BrainPOP)
• Follett Aspen SSO Integration
• Updated LOR Teacher & Admin Guides
• Playlist Enhancements
• Playlists now support enhanced embedded presentation of web and LTI links, providing a seamless playback experience
• Documents and web links can now be attached to Playlists that are tagged with the Learning Resource Type of Lesson
• Support for up to three attachments labeled Teacher Guide, Lesson Plan, and Ancillary Attachment
• Playlists now support searchable Teacher Prep Notes
• Playlists now support the assignment of a group of co-editors, providing co-editors with equal access and editing rights
• Enhanced Google Forms Playlists integration, providing a streamlined method to collect feedback
• Academic Standards Enhancements
• Updated Academic Standards are now available, including:
• Next Generation Science Standards
• College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework
• ACTFL World Readiness Standards and Can Do Statements
• CSTA Computer Science Standards for K-12
• SHAPE America Physical Education Standards
• Future of Sex Education (FoSE) Sexuality Education Standards
• Joint Committee on National Health Education Standards
• IPTV & Live Media Streaming Enhancements
• SAFARI Montage Broadcast Encoders now support centralized API-based remote management, allowing administrators to reconfigure encoders throughout the district directly from the SAFARI Montage administration UI
• Administration Enhancements
• Support for the stricter SameSite cookie model set to begin rollout with Google Chrome 80
• Web interface is now fully secured via HTTPS^[NOTE]
• Support for district-level user groups spanning multiple schools
• Centralized database implementation for zero latency (Requires WAN-1036X or WAN-1044X Servers)
• Video Streaming Library Enhancements
• VivEd 3D Science NEW (Requires Purchase) - 260+ brilliant, interactive 3D models that can be easily manipulated via Chromebooks, tablets, and laptops
• 1,480+ NEW free and open educational resources have been added for January 2020 release. Highlights include:
• National Geographic Video Links
• Science and Star Wars Video Links
• McGraw-Hill PreK-12 Video Links
• Cambridge English Video Links
• Shmoop Video Links
• GoNoodle Video Links
• PhysEd Games Video Links
• Rumpus! Video Links
• California Academy of Sciences Video Links
• KQED Video Links
• Amoeba Sisters Web Links
• WellCast Web Links
• Great Chicago Stories Web Links
• Florida Humanities Council Video Links
• Khan Academy Web Links UPDATE
• Crash Course Web Links UPDATE
• PhET Interactive Simulations UPDATE
• TED-Ed Web Links Update UPDATE
• The Citizen Genius Project Web Links UPDATE
• Web Browser Support
• Support for the following web browser types:

• Operating System	Microsoft® Edge®	Microsoft® Internet Explorer®	Chrome®	Apple® Safari®	Firefox™
  Microsoft Windows® 10 (Desktop Mode)	80.0	11.0	80.0	N/A	72.0
  Microsoft Windows® 8.1 (Desktop Mode)	N/A	11.0	80.0	N/A	72.0
  Apple Mac OS® X 10.13 or greater	N/A	N/A	80.0	13.0	72.0
  iOS 13.3.1	N/A	N/A	80.0	13.0	N/A
  iPad OS 13.3.1	N/A	N/A	80.0	13.0	N/A
  Android 9 (Pie)	N/A	N/A	80.0	N/A	N/A

SAFARI Montage Media Player

• SAFARI Montage Media Player version 7.0.10 (Microsoft^® Windows^® 10 and 8.1)
• SAFARI Montage Media Player version 7.0.0 (Apple Mac OS X 64-bit)

Browser Plug-ins (All Platforms)

• SAFARI Montage Media Player Installers
• Version 7.0.10 (Microsoft^® Windows^® 10 and 8.1)
• Version 7.0.0 (Apple Mac OS X 64-bit)
• Required for:
• Selective Video Streaming (SVS) multicast streaming support
• Playback of Career Clips Content (MPEG-1 format)
• VideoLAN
• The SAFARI Montage Media Player is compatible with the use of the VideoLAN VLC media player for live stream and Video on Demand (VOD) playback.
• Version 3.0.8 (Windows all versions)
• Version 2.0.10 (OS X all versions)
• Apple QuickTime
• The SAFARI Montage Media Player is compatible with the use of Apple QuickTime for Video on Demand (VOD) playback.
• X (Apple Mac OS X 10.14, 10.13, 10.12)
• Adobe^® Flash^® Player 18 or later
• Adobe^® Acrobat^® Reader
• Sun^® Java^® 7 or later - required for LOR bulk upload.
• VivEd 3D Science
• Required to view VivEd 3D Science models:
• Graphics card support for Web GL 2.0 (OpenGL ES 3.0)
• Support for the following web browser types:

• Operating System	Microsoft® Edge®	Chrome®	Apple® Safari®	Firefox™
  Microsoft Windows® 10	80.0	80.0	N/A	72.0
  Apple Mac OS® X 10.13+	N/A	80.0	13.0	72.0
  Chrome OS	N/A	80.0	N/A	N/A
  iOS 13.3.1	N/A	80.0	13.0	N/A
  iPad OS 13.3.1	N/A	80.0	13.0	N/A
  Android 9 (Pie)	N/A	80.0	N/A	N/A

Additional Local Software

Additional software maybe required to create or view certain LOR content.

• Software clients for the associated file types
• SMART Notebook^® software / SMART Notebook Interactive Viewer software - .NOTEBOOK / .NBK
• Promethean^® ActivInspire^® / ActiveStudio^® / Flipchart Viewer - .FLIPCHART / .FLP / .AS3A
• Hitachi^® StarBoard^® - .YAR
• eInstruction^® Workspace^™ - .GWB
• Egan^® TeamBoard^® - .TMB
• Mayer-Johnson^® Boardmaker^® - .BM2
• Clear Touch Interactive^® EasiNote^® - .ENB
• Microsoft Office / Office Vewiers - .DOC/.DOCX, .XLS/.XLSX, .PPT/.PPTX
• OpenOffice.org^® - .SDW/.ODT, .SDC/.ODS, .SDD/.ODP, .ODG; .ODF, .SDP
• Apple iWork^® - .PAGES, .NUMBERS, .KEY
• Adobe Acrobat Reader - .PDF
• An EPUB^® Reader - .HTML, .MOBI, .LIT, .EPUB
• Interactive Whiteboard Integration - supported software versions
• SMART Notebook Software / Notebook Interactive Viewer - v 9.5 or greater
• Promethean ActivInspire (v 1.5 or greater) / ActiveStudio (v 2.5 or greater) / Flipchart Viewer
• StarBoard (v 8.11 or greater) / StarBoard LE - Viewer Only (v 3.0 or greater) / StarBoard for OS X (v 9.2 or greater)
• eInstruction Workspace for Windows (v 8.90 or greater) / eInstruction Workspace for OS X (v 5.10 or greater)
• Egan TeamBoard Draw v3 or greater
• Mayer-Johnson Boardmaker (v6 or greater) / Boardmaker Studio (v14 or greater)
• Clear Touch Interactive EasiNote v 3.1 or greater

Local Area Network

• 100Mb Wired Ethernet Full Duplex Network

Special Considerations

• Lecture Capture
• Requires Lecture Capture client v1.0.57 or greater
• Lecture Capture recordings do not support ABR conversion. The SAFARI Montage Auto-Converter must be configured to enable "Convert to H.264 MP4s:" if the "Adaptive Bitrate Streaming (ABR)" auto-conversion option is enabled.
• Internet Explorer 11 on Windows 7
• This configuration does not support the playback of ABR video and requires the SAFARI Montage Media Player in conjunction with VLC v3.0.3.
• Classroom Media Contollers/KIOSKs
• Do not support playback of ABR video and require that the SAFARI Montage Auto-Converter be configured to enable "Convert to H.264 MP4s:" if the "Adaptive Bitrate Streaming (ABR)" auto-conversion option is enabled.
• SupeTube
• Requires that the SAFARI Montage Auto-Converter be configured to enable "Convert to H.264 MP4s:" if the "Adaptive Bitrate Streaming (ABR)" auto-conversion option is enabled.

Please read these instructions in their entirety before you begin:

• These instructions and all related documents are available online at http://www.safarimontage.com/support
• It is important that you review the SAFARI Montage 8.1.x Release Notes available online, as these may include Known Issues that you should understand before running the upgrade.
• Review the SAFARI Montage 8.1.x System Requirements, which include important information that will ensure your environment meets all requirements.
• Allow for time to back up your system in your update planning.
• No one should use the SAFARI Montage System during the update process, so please perform this update during off-hours.
• Review any questions with Technical Support in advance. Please note that SAFARI Montage Technical Support is available Monday - Friday from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Eastern Time and they may be contacted by telephone at 800-782-7230 or online via http://www.safarimontage.com/support

Important Considerations:

1. We recommend you update all client computers to the current version of the SAFARI Montage Media Player prior to running the OS upgrade. Not doing so will result in all users receiving an alert upon logging in to SAFARI Montage instructing them to upgrade the player. Administrators can suppress this notification in the following location: Admin > Settings > System > Alert to Install SAFARI Montage Media Player. The latest version of the player is available for download at http://www.safarimontage.com/support
2. If monitoring the update from the console, be aware that the system may appear to be inactive at certain times during the upgrade. This does not mean that the upgrade has stopped.

WARNING: DO NOT interrupt the update in any way or power off the server at any time during the update process or database optimization. Doing so may severely and irreparably damage your SAFARI Montage system.

If you are running WAN Manager with Expansion Server(s):

1. The Expansion Controller must be upgraded first. See Upgrade Instructions below.
2. Once the Expansion Controller has been upgraded, it will automatically push the upgrade to all of the Expansion Servers. The progress of the upgrade can be viewed by navigating to Admin > Expansion Server > Expansion Servers.

If you are running WAN Manager with Remote School Server(s):

1. The WAN Manager Parent server must be upgraded first. See Upgrade Instructions below.
2. Once the upgrade is completed on the WAN Manager Parent server, you will be able to automatically 'push' the upgrade to the Remote School Servers, thereby eliminating the need to upgrade them separately on-site.
1. Navigate to Admin > WAN Manager > Remote School Servers
2. Either check 'Remote update all servers', which will update five servers at a time until they have all been upgraded, or select individual servers to be upgraded by checking the box next to the server name.

Total time to upgrade all expansion and/or remote school servers will depend upon the total number of servers and available bandwidth. The upgrade will be downloaded to each remote server, where the upgrade process will run automatically and can take several hours to complete. If 'Remote update all servers' is selected, servers will be processed in groups of five, and upgrades will run concurrently on each group of remote servers.

Download and Upgrade Instructions:

1. Back up your SAFARI Montage system via the Administration tools:
1. Navigate to Admin > Data Recovery > Backup
2. Perform a full backup:
• Set Type to Data & User Content and select to either keep or overwrite the previous backup.
2. Download upgrade media (ISO) using the link provided in the email from SAFARI Montage.
3. Upload the downloaded ISO file to the SAFARI Montage system via the Administration tools:
1. Navigate to Admin » Tools » Software Update History.
2. Click on the Upload an ISO image of the update and install link.
3. Browse to the location of the ISO file downloaded in Step 2 and click on Open.

The ISO will begin uploading to the server. Once the upload is complete, the upgrade will begin and will take approximately one to two hours, after which the server will reboot.

~ THIS COMPLETES THE SERVER UPDATE PROCESS. PLEASE TEST FROM A CLIENT BROWSER. ~

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Deploying the SAFARI Montage Media Player:

Go to http://www.safarimontage.com/support/ to download the latest version of the SAFARI Montage Media Player and for instructions on how to deploy the player to your client environment.