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Blue 9.6 release notes

The release notes include a brief description of the newest features, deprecated features, fixed issues, known issues, and security updates that together form the latest release of Blue. To learn more about Blue 9, see Blue 9 - Welcome guide and Blue 9 - Transition guide from Blue 8 to 9.

Release Date: December 16, 2025

Features and enhancements

Enhanced Project & Report Administration Experience

Blue 9.6 introduces improvements inspired directly by feedback from the Explorance Community and Explorance World 2025 that make project management faster, clearer, and more intuitive.

Improved grid usability: Drag and drop for filters, trigger conditions and more, and better visibility for large lists.
Apply-button optimization: Blue makes it clear when you are applying a change in a panel before saving projects and reports.
New Overview page: A centralized view of project status and settings to confirm readiness before publishing. Learn more about project overview.
Report copy with preserved filters: Filters and conditions now carry over automatically when duplicating reports, even across projects.

Improved PDF Report Generation Performance

Blue 9.6 introduces a major improvement in PDF report generation performance.

Faster PDF generation
Improved scalability for large PDF report volumes

Before we roll this out to everyone, we're opening exclusive early access to select customers as part of our Report Generation Early Access Program in Blue 9.6.

Reserve your spot in our Report Generation Early Access Program here
Spaces are limited; sign-up closes January 31, 2026.

MLY in Blue Reports Integration Updates

Blue 9.6 delivers key integration updates to enhance alignment, context, and privacy across the MLY and Blue platforms:

Comment Blocks with Alert Categories: Ensures compatibility with MLY 3.2’s new alert classification system.
Comment Contextualization: Displays question context for each comment to enhance understanding.
Manual Redaction Data Flow: Integrates with MLY 3.2’s Redaction API for stronger privacy management across products.

Learn more about MLY in Blue reports

DIG 3.1 Enhancements

DIG 3.1 introduces several major updates that make data management more flexible, efficient, and accessible:

Multilingual UI support: Includes RTL, language picker, calendar, and notifications.
Improved UX: Bulk edit for merged/split subjects, and clipboard copy support.
Advanced filters and search: Inline search in dropdowns, clear search box shortcut, and filter by split/merged.
Rules enhancement: Supports UserID validation via RegEx patterns.
Modal and tooltip improvements: Enhanced behavior and contextual guidance for user actions.

Learn more about DIG

Security and Infrastructure Improvements

Blue 9.6 strengthens platform security and stability through key authentication, validation, and infrastructure updates:

XSS Prevention: stronger safeguards against JavaScript-based vulnerabilities such as phishing and cross-site scripting.

Additional Enhancements

Filename Hash/GUID Removal: exported reports now use cleaner, more readable filenames without technical suffixes.
Addressing Canvas's announcement Enforcing User-Agent Header for Canvas API Requests: Blue 9.6 addresses the recent changes made by Canvas to their API in Blue Connector. Learn more about the changes in Canvas
Blue seamlessly integrates with Moodle: Moodle data can flow directly into Blue, using the new Moodle datasource connector. Read about setting up the Moodle datasource connection

Changes in behavior

In this section you will find an explanation of any behaviors that have changed since the previous version of Blue and that you should take special not of.

Import log records all deleted records during overwrite mode

When overwrite mode is used to import records into an existing data source, the import log records every record that was removed and the reason for their removal.

PDF report page numbering (Blue 9.6+ only reports with new engine)

What has changed

Once the new PDF engine is activated (see above), any report generated in Blue 9.6 does not count the cover page in the page numbers printed inside the report. The first content page now shows page 1. The cover has no number.

Example

Before Blue 9.6 - cover was page 1 → a report with 5 content pages showed pages 1–6.
Now - cover is unnumbered → the same report shows pages 1–5.

PDF file names

What has changed

PDF report file names no longer include the long unique ID at the end. File names are now shorter and include only the fields you’ve chosen (e.g., course, term, instructor).

Example

Before Blue 9.6 - Course Evaluation - ECON101 - Fall 2025 - B26A639C-30AE-... .pdf
Now - Course Evaluation - ECON101 - Fall 2025.pdf

PDF report page breaks (Blue 9.6+ only reports with new engine)

What has changed?

The new PDF rendering service handles page breaks differently than the original rendering service. As a general rule, reports tend to be shorter with less white space between blocks. This means that if you regenerate a report from the previous rendering engine, the two reports may not be identical.

Be sure to verify the look and feel of any reports that you generate. If necessary, add manual page breaks in order to customize your reports.

Known issues in this release

This section lists the issues currently known to affect Blue, including any limitations, unexpected behaviors, and module-specific constraints. Each item includes a workaround when available. Reviewing this section helps administrators anticipate potential issues and apply recommended guidance while configuring projects, reports, and workflows.

Reports

Reports using the classic theme generate a blank page after the cover page if they start with a section block and the next block cannot fit on one page.
Workaround: Avoid starting classic-theme reports with a section block. (BCORE9-9889)

Copying a report with a rater filter to a public survey prevents the report from containing data
Workaround: Make an exact copy of the report, then remove the rater filter and make a public survey report. (BCORE9-10172)

Clicking cancel multiple times during the report generation may lead to a blank page being loaded Workaround: When cancelling the report generation process, click only once and wait for the system to stop generating the report before initiating more clicks (BCORE9-10184)

System

Pairing definition projects with a secondary subject filter don't return the correct subject status
Workaround: Don't use secondary subject filters with pairing projects. (BCORE9-10081)

Deleted groups still appear in the datasource export Workaround: None. (BCORE9-10044)

DIG

Users without a preferred language (or with a preferred language not in the project) may not receive all expected multilingual DIG emails, and configured vs. default email content behaves inconsistently compared to Blue. Users will still receive an email as expected, but that email may not be in a language they can use.
Workaround: For multilingual DIG projects, configure email content for all project languages (including the base language) to ensure users without a preferred language receive the full set of expected emails. (BCORE9-9541)

Users created through DIG tasks do not appear in Blue Authentication due to missing logic distinguishing new vs. existing users in the staging table, causing synchronization failures.
Workaround: None. (BCORE9-10400)

Import/export responses

When exporting a backup file, the Certificate column is present but remains empty despite the project being configured with certificates, leading to loss of Certificate ID in the exported file.
Workaround: None. (BCORE9-10410)

MLY

When a project name is changed in Blue after MLY analysis, the updated name is not reflected on the MLY Dashboard even after re-analysis is performed.
Workaround: Use the original project name (do not rename it in Blue) if you need the correct name to appear on the MLY Dashboard after re-analysis. (BCORE9-9449)

A number of issues exist related to MLY in Blue reports and demographic data. In some cases, the demographic fields don't sync between Blue and MLY, in other cases they cause system instability.
Workaround: Don't use demographic data when using MLY in Blue (BCORE9-10131, BCORE9-10200)

End user

The task list page in Blue Home does not auto-refresh after changing a task status or performing an opt-out/opt-in via Access As from Blue; the updated status only appears after manually refreshing the page.
Workaround: After changing a task status or opting a task out/in via Access As in Blue, manually refresh the task list page in Blue Home to see the updated status. (BH-4266)

Rater selection: An issue has been identified in the rater selection task where raters that are also in the fillout task group and use the relationship link type are not removed from the rater selection task even after they have been removed from the datasource.
Workaround: None. (BCORE9-10013)

Fixed in this release

This release resolves a broad set of defects across projects, reports, integrations, data handling, and end-user tasks. This section summarizes the fixes delivered in Blue so administrators can understand which past issues have been addressed and what areas of the system now behave more consistently or reliably.

Projects

Fixed an issue where questionnaires could not be previewed in projects (BCORE9-8087).
Fixed an issue that prevented nightly automatic field synchronization from creating tasks for Public-audience projects, causing errors when no demographic data was returned. (BCORE9-9417)
Fixed an issue where Nightly Sync failed to update projects and create FO tasks after new demographics were added to the Course-Rater relationship datasource post-publication. (BCORE9-4730)
Fixed an issue by adding an “Is” (equals) filter operator for Comment questions in Project Triggers and Report Filters to support exact text matching. (BCORE9-8914)
Fixed an issue where Nightly Sync created new FO tasks with empty start and end dates after the related SM task was updated or completed, even though the correct schedule was assigned. (BCORE9-8365)

DIG

Fixed an issue where Group Member advanced filters based on relational demographics did not filter any records on the DIG Subjects List page. (BCORE9-8935)
Fixed an issue where emails using task-list piping keys ($TASK_LIST_ACTIVE, $TASK_LIST_ALL, $TASK_ENDDATE) failed to display any tasks for DIG projects. (BCORE9-9196)

End User Tasks

Fixed an issue where the My Tasks list did not automatically refresh after tasks were updated (BH-3397).
The task widget’s “View all tasks” button could display a bracketed count that didn’t match the actual number of tasks shown on the task list page, because it was using the filtered total instead of the nonfiltered total. (BH-3976)

Reports

Fixed an issue where the distribution start date was not being copied to a new report from the copy report option. (BCORE9-9429)
Fixed an issue where the Hide reports that have not yet met the minimum number of responses option was not being copied to a new report. (BCORE9-9143)
Fixed an issue where the report viewer access setting on the Report info page was not being copied to a new report. (BCORE9-9144)
Fixed an issue where the Impact of owner removal setting was not being copied over to a new report. (BCORE9-9146)
Fixed an issue where the Prepared by field was not being copied over to a new report. (BCORE9-9145)
Fixed an issue where the Turn off expiry date setting on the distribution tab was not being copied over to a new report. (BCORE9-9147)
Fixed an issue where the aggregate by field selection in an export report was not being copied over to a new report. (BCORE9-9165)
Fixed an issue that caused the “Overall of all questions” caption in spreadsheet blocks on multilingual reports to always display in the base report language instead of using the selected report language translation. (BCORE9-8367) *Fixed an issue where group by reports that contain non-latin characters would not display blocks in a breakdown section. (BCORE9-4293)
Fixed an issue that caused group-by reports for Typical Survey projects to show a survey audience of 0 when using fields containing non‑Latin characters. (BCORE9-5433)
Fixed an issue where Export reports crashed when a user demographic field was named FirstNameLastName and conflicted with Blue’s internal special field, by making the internal field name unique. (BCORE9-5705)

System

Fixed an issue that prevented warning emails from being sent for relationship datasource imports that succeeded with issues, even when “Send email for a successful import with errors” was enabled. (BCORE9-9415)
Fixed an issue where Advanced Export showed empty Question Personalization titles instead of falling back to the project’s base-language titles in multilingual projects. (BCORE9-9416)

Security hardening

Explorance continuously incorporates security best practices into its Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC). Specifically, Explorance’s approach to application security is aligned with DevSecOp Agile development methodologies that incorporate security considerations at all stages of the SDLC – Planning, Design, Development, Testing, Deployment, and Maintenance.

Performance enhancements

Explorance continuously optimizes system performance.

Compatibility

To ensure proper functionality, each Blue release is validated against specific versions of related Explorance products. This section identifies the recommended or required versions to use with Blue, helping organizations maintain a compatible and fully supported ecosystem.

For information on which versions of Explorance software is compatible with your version of Blue please refer to the Blue compatibility table.

Fixed an issue where charts were not consistently visible when a report was re-generated. (BCORE9-10645)

System

Fixed an issue where changes to external definitions — such as users, objects, or relations — required manual re-saving whenever the underlying records were added, updated, or deleted. These changes are now automatically synchronized through datasource imports and record management. (Blue9-2368)
Updated Japanese captions in Home and other user areas. (BH-4372)

Version 9.6.6

Release Date: 2026-04-07

Project

Fixed an issue that could cause delays when switching from Text Analytics to Task Management during large analysis uploads. (BCORE9 -10108)
Fixed a performance issue related to project load and save. (BCORE9 -10134, 10135, 10144)
Fixed an issue that could cause delays when switching from Text Analytics to Task Management during large analysis uploads. (BCORE9 -10200)
Fixed a bug causing system crashes on the Text Analytics tab in Primary/Multiple Secondary projects with MLY Text Analytics when relationship demographics outnumbered entity demographics. (BCORE9 -10131)
Fixed a crash during Response Rollback in auto-backup caused by a missing 'CertificateID' column in temporary tables, ensuring successful creation of backup files. (BCORE9 - 9678)

DIG

Fixed an issue where prepared data was read instead of original data causing false record deletion log. (BCORE9-10183)

System

Fixed a performance issue that could cause high CPU usage and impact overall system performance during background synchronization. (BCORE9 -9944, BH-4299, BH-4300)
Fixed an issue causing authentication redirect loops due to exhaustion of HttpClient sockets in Blue Core. (BCORE9 -10398)
Fixed an issue when importing users across multiple datasources with SSO enabled, NULL and duplicate EUIDs were incorrectly created. (BCORE9 -10254)

Version 9.6.5

Release Date: 2026-03-10

System

Updated the Japanese language captions in a number of places around Blue including the login pages. (BN-5099, BCORE9-10212, BH-4321)
Fixed an issue where DIG user datasources connected to SSO, would lose their SSO mappings during the datasource import process. (BCORE9-10245)

Version 9.6.4

Release Date: 2026-03-03

System

Fixed a problem with the nightly sync process failing for 360 projects that contained rater selection tasks with manual entry groups or projects with global groups. (BCORE9-7204, BCORE9-10139)

Tasks

Fixed a problem that caused the rater selection task to display an error when a new rater was manually added to the task and then removed from the task. (BCORE9-10096)
Fixed an issue with the rater selection task that cause some raters that were manually entered to disappear when saving the task (BCORE9-9008)
Fixed an issue with being unable to save or submit the rater selection task due to a rater attached to the task being removed from the datasource and then appearing as null null on the task. (BCORE9-8868)
Fixed an issue with where some raters would reappear on the rater selection task after they have been removed from the task. (BCORE9-9760)

Integrations

Fixed an issue where Blue was sending the datasource prefix as part of the userID or courseID to MLY when using MLY in Blue reports. (BCORE9-10092)
Fixed an issue where multiple MLY analysis would be triggered when the confirm button for an analysis was clicked multiple times. (BCORE9-10175)

Version 9.6.3

Release Date: 2026-02-10

Reports

Fixed an issue that caused previously generated reports to display incorrect formatting on the cover page of the report. (BCORE9-10116)

Version 9.6.1

Release Date: 2026-01-27

Reports

Fixed an issue in Blue reports where the use of a score block cross-tabulated with rater demographic data to calculate the mean and overall scores for a single selection table question displayed incorrectly. Single selection questions were not affected. (BCORE9-8936)
Fixed an issue in Blue reports where downloading a CSV file at the same time a report was being generated would result in the report engine restarting. (BCORE9-9928)

Projects

Fixed an issue with the completion notifications where they were not being copied when the schedule was copied. (BCORE9-7575)
Fixed an issue encountered in simplified surveys where a member that was removed could not be added back into the survey without encountering an error. (BCORE9-9974)

System

Implemented a change to the SSO configuration so that the username claim key field is now required for all SSO providers to ensure data integrity. (BN-5054)
Added an option in the SSO settings to enforce signed SAML requests. This option is disabled by default. (BN-5053)
Fixed an issue where password reset notifications were being sent to users in situations where basic authentication was not available. If SSO is the only authentication available, and the password expiry duration is set, password reset notifications will not be sent. (BN-5081)
Improved the messaging for users that have authenticated with their SSO but do not have access to Blue. The messaging now returns a message explaining that their account cannot be found instead of returning a general error. (BN-4991)

Exports

Fixed an issue with the advanced export of data in projects implementing 3-level relationships, where task data for secondary subjects without tasks was incorrectly included. (BCORE9-8539)

Text analytics

Fixed an issue with Blue Text Analytics that caused premature system termination when Text Analytics was enabled but MLY in Blue was not. (BCORE9-8681)

Home

Added an option in Home administration to allow administrators to toggle the user profile bio on or off. When enabled, users can modify their profile bio; when disabled, the profile bio is hidden. (BH-3481)
Updated the widgets and layout so the profile widget can now be enabled or disabled and repositioned anywhere within the left sidebar. (BH-3951)

DIG

Fixed an issue where date validation rules would flag a date field as being outside the acceptable range of dates even though the dates were valid. (BCORE9-10048)