Month: January 2009

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Adobe Captivate 4: Panning

 
Adobe released Captivate version 4 last week. In the upcoming weeks, I'll be spotlighting some of the coolest new features.
 
This week: Panning.
 
Captivate's Panning feature is useful when you want to record something on your computer that is outside of the capture area. If you enable Panning prior to recording, and use Automatic mode, clicking outside of the capture area will force Captivate to move the recording area to include the area you clicked.
 
Here is how you would enable panning:
 
  1. From within Captivate 4, select Software Simulation from the Create Project area
  2. On the Record tab, select Application
  3. Select an area on your computer that you would like to record from the Select Application drop-down menu
  4. Select Custom Size from the Snap Recording Rectangle to area
  5. Select a size from the Size drop-down menu

    Capture setup in Captivate 4

  6. Click OK
  7. Click the Select Automatic Recording Mode button on the control panel

    The Automatic Recording panel appears.

  8. Select Manual Panning from the Panning drop-down menu
  9. Ensure Audio is set to No Narration
  10. Select any one of the assessment modes (Demonstration, Training, or Custom–if you select Custom, enable Click Boxes)

    Automatic Recording: Manual Panning

  11. Click the Record button

    Click a few times in the recording area (you should hear Captivate create some screen captures each time you click)

    Right-click a few times within the capture area (and you should hear Captivate pull more screen captures)

  12. Carefully drag the red recording area so that the recording area is outside the current recording area
  13. Click your mouse a few times and you should hear Captivate pull more screen captures.
  14. Press [END] on your keyboard to stop the recording
  15. Name and save the project
  16. Preview the project by pressing [F4] on your keyboard.

    As you interact with the simulation, notice that the right-clicking you recorded is fully supported (a brand new and much anticipated feature in Captivate 4).

    In addition, the panning you recorded is also visible. Very, very cool! 

***
 
Do you have a Captivate production problem that's making you pull your hair out? Email your problem and let others learn solutions from your experience. 
 
***
 
Need learn more about Adobe Captivate 3? Click here.
 
Want to learn Adobe Captivate 4? Click here.
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Adobe RoboHelp 8: Loads of Enhancements

 
Adobe announced the release of RoboHelp version 8 last week. In the coming week, I'll be spotlighting some the hot new features… and there are plenty of them. The following is direct from the Adobe site:
 
Here is what's new:
 
Publishing Features
 
Enhanced support for Adobe AIR: Adobe AIR technology provides a revolutionary new help application that provides many new ways for users to find information, add and share comments, in a system that is always up to date. It combines the best of the Web as well as the desktop, whether the user is online or not. Authors can generate this exciting new Adobe AIR help application and package it for easy deployment and management of automatic updates.
 
Powerful Search engine: Search results are ranked by relevance (with the initial text from the topic displayed for context), search highlighting, a synonym editor and a brand new Keyword Search that can be defined to help the user find what they are looking for. Also added is a way to define search Phrases as well as Substrings. In addition, text in Adobe PDFs and MS Office documents can now be searched.
 
Enhanced Printed Documentation options: More flexibility in mapping your online output styles to the printed version in Microsoft Word or Adobe PDF.
 
Breadcrumbs/Mini TOC: Breadcrumb navigation and/or a Mini TOC can be added with placeholders on a topic basis or with Master Pages. If preferred, breadcrumbs can be added globally with a single checkmark when generating output.
 
Improved Glossary: Edited Glossary definitions are now automatically updated in glossary hotspot links.
 
Merged Help implementation: Merged project enhancements provide a visually intuitive way to merge child projects which become part of a master TOC.
 
Twisties: Twisties provide both expanded and dropdown hotspots and can now have configurable images which provide a visual cue to the user.
 
More author-friendly enhancements
 
A new Styles and Formatting pod: Quickly apply, create or edit CSS styles.
 
World class Table, List and Autonumbering: Table designs (with many new prepared templates) can now be created or modified in the Styles editor using a graphical preview and exposed formatting tools. List support now includes enhanced handling of standard HTML Lists, MultiLevel lists and customizable autonumbering.
 
Easier import of MS Word and Adobe FrameMaker files: Define common Import and Conversion Settings for consistent use of CSS and Style Mapping across all projects.
 
Linking MS Word files: By linking to MS Word files you can keep your content updated to the original source MS Word document without re-importing each time.
 
Import DITA: Topic-based content into a RoboHelp HTML project. This allows the DITA author to take advantage of RoboHelp software's rich feature set of TOC, Index, Glossary and advanced publishing options.

 

Enhanced Unicode and Language Support: There is now Unicode and language support at the topic and paragraph level.

 

FLV format now supported: For compelling eLearning and video presentations.

 
IFrame support: Include an external HTML or PDF inside a topic.
 
Single Sourcing Features
 
Brand new CSS Editor: Provides a graphical way to define Table Styles, and complex List Styles.
 
Master Pages (formerly Templates): Help separate layout and styling from content. There are new placeholders for breadcrumbs, a "mini" Table of Contents, and the Body section of each topic.
 
Resource Manager: Allows you to manage and reuse assets (including Images, Topics, Stylesheets, Multimedia and Snippets) across multiple Robohelp projects.
 
Formatted User-defined Variables (UDV): Provide a robust way to make global changes to common blocks of content throughout many topics. A major new enhancement is the addition of formatting and the inclusion of such things as images and links which are easily created in a Design and HTML editor.
 
Productivity Features
 
Scripting: Automate with built-in scripts or create your own. The entire Adobe Extended Scripting Toolkit CS4 is included with Adobe RoboHelp 8, including many ready-made scripts to get you started.
 
Integration with other Adobe applications: Adobe Captivate 4, RoboScreenCapture and RoboSource Control are separate applications that are integrated into the Adobe RoboHelp 8 interface.
 
Custom To Do List: This popular RoboHelp favorite now allows you to edit the supplied tasks and add your own items depending on your own workflows.
 
Usability Features
 
Project Manager Enhancements: RoboHelp software's strength has been its ability to help the author keep track of the many assets in a given project. Now, you can drag and drop topics and folders to create the same hierarchy used in the TOC. There is a choice to customize the list of files shown or switch to the traditional view with its virtual folders.
 
UI Enhancements: Color-coding to show pods with focus, easy close of topics in Design Editor, more tooltips on Navigation buttons and more robust right-click Context Menu support are some of the user-friendly changes to the interface.
 
Custom File Type mapping dialog: In addition to choosing your preferred HTML editor, there is an enhanced dialog to associate file extensions with your choice of applications.
 
More functionality added to existing features: Snippets can now be added to Popups and Drop-down hotspots and DHTML effects in non-IE browsers. Because of improved HHActiveX support, Glossaries and Browse Sequences can be included in the HTML Help (.chm) format in Chinese, Japanese and Korean (CJK) multibyte languages.
 
***
 
We are hard at work on our "Essentials of Adobe RoboHelp 8" book and will soon begin offering virtual training classes on RoboHelp 8. Stay tuned to this newsletter for announcements.
 
*** 
 
Not ready to upgrade and need to learn Adobe RoboHelp 7? Click here.
 
Want to learn more about HTML? Many find it's a good idea for RoboHelp authors to have basic HTML skills. Click here to learn about our basic HTML class.
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Grammar Workshop: Splitting Verbs in the Presidential Oath of Office

I just love it when a grammar issue occurs in a highly visible public way. I am referring, of course, to the goof-up of the presidential oath of office last Tuesday.

 
  • "I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States."
 

Chief Justice John Roberts moved the adverb faithfully to the end of the clause: "that I will execute the office of President of the United States faithfully." President Obama ended up stating it that way as well.

 

Steven Pinker of the New York Times supposes that Roberts did that because he believed in the outdated and incorrect "rule" that you cannot split an infinitive, and, by extension, you cannot split any verb in English by placing an adverb between the parts of the verb. Whether he believed in that rule or not, the fact is that the Constitution split the verb, and the oath had to be re-administered later in the day to make sure it counted legally.

 

The facts: you can split an infinitive. You can split any verb. Don't even worry about it. It is time for this rule to finally die. I myself have been keeping this outdated rule alive by teaching that you should avoid splitting the infinitive if you can, because some of your readers might believe in this outdated rule. After the fiasco with the presidential oath, I am changing my tune. Now I say: Split the infinitive. Split any verb you like. That is how the English language works: we have infinitives that can be split, so that we can split them. We have multiple-word verbs so that we have the flexibility to insert adverbs between them to subtly or greatly change the meaning.

 

The irony of the oath of office incident is that there is actually another split verb even before the faithfully part:  I do solemnly swear. And another one later on: will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend.

 

Here are some examples of verbs that are either infinitives (to verb) or verbs preceded by one or more helping verbs. All of them can have adverbs placed between the parts of the verb:

 
  • to boldly go
  • has totally bungled
  • will greatly alter
  • might seriously affect

Now, it is also perfectly correct to place the adverb at the end of the sentence. Roberts did not make a grammatical error by moving the adverb-just a legal one. An adverb placed at the end of a sentence actually gets more emphasis, so you might choose to do this on purpose: 

  • This error will greatly alter our plans.
  • This error will alter our plans greatly.
 

So from now on: split those verbs! Place the adverb right in the middle! Or move your adverb to the end of the sentence-but only if you feel like it, and not because of some outdated rule.

 
*** 

 

About the Author: Jennie Ruby is a veteran IconLogic trainer and author with titles such as "Essentials of Access 2000" and "Editing with MS Word 2003 and Adobe Acrobat 7" to her credit. Jennie specializes in electronic editing. At the American Psychological Association, she was manager of electronic publishing and manager of technical editing and journal production. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer (Chauncey Group). She is a publishing professional with 20 years of experience in writing, editing and desktop publishing.
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Questions of the Week

Adobe Captivate Question: Why Is My Progress Indicator Off?
 
I have an 80+ slide project with 10 question slides. When previewing the lesson, I notice that the first question slide, instead of saying that it's Question 1 of 10, says that it's Question 20 of 30. Any idea why I'm seeing this?

 
Answer

Yes, more likely than not, there are interactive objects on several of your other slides that are Reporting the user interactivity. It's a simple thing to check. Choose Project > Advanced Interaction. Look at the total score. If needed, you can remove the Reporting option for objects directly on the Advanced Interaction screen.
 
***

 

Newsletter Question: Where Do Your Old Articles Go?

 
I'd like to re-read some articles you've included in your "skills and drills" newsletter. Do you keep a newsletter archive?
Answer
 
Yes. All of the articles from my newsletter end up on my BLOG (usually within a week of the newsletter being sent out). The BLOG has a Search feature making it easy to located older articles.
***
 
Adobe RoboHelp Question: File In Use Error?
 
I'm using Adobe RoboHelp 7. Every time I try to publish I get an error message saying that the process was canceled because a file is in use by another process. I'm stuck… can you help?
 
Answer:
 
Check the properties of your layout. Ensure that you are NOT generating and then publishing to the same location (I'm betting that you are).
 
Followup:
 
YOU DA MAN!  That's exactly what had happened.
 
*** 

Got a question you'd like answered? Email me.
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Link of the Week

Adobe Unveils Two New Suites: TechCom 2 and eLearning
 
The eLearning Suite integrates best-of-breed tools for rapid eLearning, courseware authoring, simulations, and media editing. Create rich, interactive learning experiences that engage audiences with video, audio, and powerful visuals. Work productively with rapid authoring tools that deliver smart collaboration features as well as tight integration with asset-creation tools. And deliver content to the web, the desktop, mobile devices, and Learning Management Systems. 
 
The eLearning suite includes: Adobe Captivate 4, Adobe Flash CS4, Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 with CourseBuilder Extension, Adobe Photoshop CS4 Extended, Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro, Adobe Presenter 7 and Adobe Soundbooth.
 
 
Adobe Technical Communication Suite 2 is a complete and integrated solution for authoring, managing, reviewing, and publishing technical documentation, help systems, knowledgebases, and training. Create content once and then publish it to multiple channels–even as an Adobe AIR application. Take advantage of the powerful image processing capabilities in Adobe Photoshop CS4 and the new roundtrip PDF review workflows.
 
The Technical Communication Suite 2 includes: Adobe FrameMaker 9, Adobe RoboHelp 8, Adobe Captivate 4, Adobe Photoshop CS4, Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro Extended and Adobe Presenter 7.
Click here to learn more about the eLearning suite.
 
Click here to learn more about the Technical Communication Suite.
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Adobe Captivate 3: Simulating a Password Has Never Been So Easy

by Kevin A. Siegel

 
Allowing users to type directly into your eLearning simulation is one of the highest levels of user interactivity you can add to a Captivate project. You can add this kind of fuctionality to any Captivate slide by choosing Insert > Text Entry Box.
 
Here is one scenario where a Text Entry Box might be appropriate: you are simulating a login screen for a Web or desktop application. When the login screen appears, you want the user to type the word password into the Password field on the screen. Here is how you would do it:
  1. Record the screen showing the empty Password field
  2. In Adobe Captivate, choose Insert > Text Entry Field
  3. On the Text Entry Box tab, type the correct answer into the Correct Entries field

    Correct entry added

  4. Click OK

    By default, your slide will include the new Text Entry Box (indicated by the arrow in the image below), a button (which users could click after typing the correct entry), and feedback captions (that can be edited to suit your taste).

    Inserted Text Entry Box and other objects

  5. At this point, you would move the Text Entry Box over the Password Screen shown on your slide
  6. Test the Text Entry Box by pressing F10 on your keyboard (to preview 5 slides at a time). You should be able to type the word password and either click the submit button or press ENTER on your keyboard to move to the next slide in the project.

    The only problem now is that, during the test, you should have noticed that you can actually see the word password as you typed the password into the Password field. At this point, what you'd hope to see is a series of astericks instead of the letters of the word password.

    So what's a developer to do? Read on…

  7. The solution is actually quite simple, but often overlooked. Right-click the Text Entry Box and choose Properties.
  8. On the Options tab, select Password from the Options area

    Password option

  9. Click OK
  10. Test the Text Entry Box again by pressing F10 on your keyboard.

    You should be able to type the word password as before. However, this time when you type the password, you will see astericks instead of letters. 

Do you have a Captivate production problem that's making you pull your hair out? Email your problem and let others learn solutions from your experience. 
 
Want to learn more about Adobe Captivate 3? Click here.
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Adobe RoboHelp 7: What the WYSIWYG? Use HTML!

by Kevin A. Siegel

When working with RoboHelp topics, many new Help Authors (and even a few seasoned professionals) forget that every RoboHelp topic is actually a Web page created using the hypertext markup language (HTML). 

I can't really blame a RoboHelp author for forgetting this fact because many Help Authors are not familiar with HTML (or have limited HTML experience). Thanks to RoboHelp's What You See Is What You Get (WYSIWYG) window, you can type and edit a RoboHelp topic oblivious to the HTML code being spun behind the scenes as you work.

 

While it is not necessary to be a Web master to create killer Help Systems, if you have even minimal experience using HTML, you may find it helpful to work in the HTML window.

 
Why should you bother with the HTML window? Great question! The WYSIWYG window is wonderful. However, every once in a while you'll find yourself attempting to make a change to your topic (remove a hyperlink or text formatting) and the change you are trying to make simply will not work. What the heck? It's likely that there is conflicting HTML code in the code window (likely caused by poor HTML structure when the topic was originally created and imported into RoboHelp).
 
How on earth can you fix the problem when clicking a RoboHelp tool that is supposed to do the trick simply doesn't work? Another great question. Read on…
 
  1. Open a topic in RoboHelp
  2. Click the HTML button at the bottom of the topic

    HTML Button

  3. At this point, you can quickly edit the HTML code to make changes to how your content will look back in Design view (the WYSIWYG window). In the example below, the size of the headline (currently a heading level 2 will be changed to a larger headline, a heading level 1).

    HTML Code

    H2 changed, part 1

    H2 changed, part 2

It's as simple as that. Once you switch back to Design view, the headline will grow from a level 2 to a level 1. In the images below, you can see how the two headlines would render in Design view (the heading 2 is shown first):

H2

H1

Want to learn more about Adobe RoboHelp 7? Click here.
 
Want to learn more about HTML (I think it's a good idea for RoboHelp authors to have basic HTML skills)? Click here.
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Grammar Workshop: Should You Resign or Re-Sign?

My son and daughter got into one of their little "discussions" over the holidays about the words resign and re-sign.

He insisted that the two words were spelled exactly the same way.
 
She said that when you mean "to sign again," you hyphenate the word.
 
I usually try to stay out of the middle of these things, and the dictionary allows me to step aside and let a disinterested party resolve the issue. She is right: re-sign means to sign again; resign means to leave a job.
 
The need to hyphenate certain words to avoid complete ambiguity occurs every now and then. Usually, a prefix is involved.
 
Here are some other examples:
  • re-cover vs. recover
  • re-creation vs. recreation
  • un-ionize vs. unionize
Keep an eye out for these odd little exceptions!
 
About the Author: Jennie Ruby is a veteran IconLogic trainer and author with titles such as "Essentials of Access 2000" and "Editing with MS Word 2003 and Adobe Acrobat 7" to her credit. Jennie specializes in electronic editing. At the American Psychological Association, she was manager of electronic publishing and manager of technical editing and journal production. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer (Chauncey Group). She is a publishing professional with 20 years of experience in writing, editing and desktop publishing.
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Questions of the Week

Adobe Captivate Question: Is the Playbar Close Button Temperamental?
 
The Close button on my Playbar (the one that's supposed to close the lesson) only works part of the time. What am I doing wrong?

 
Answer

You're not doing anything wrong… it's actually a browser thing reported by many Captivate developers. This post on the Adobe Captivate forum might prove useful.
 
***

 

Adobe RoboHelp Question: Can I Control the Highlight Color When Spellchecking?

 
I have a question about the RoboHelp spellchecker. On my computer, when the spellchecker finds a questionable word, it highlights the word in aqua and the text becomes light gray. I can barely read this, and I have good eyes. Is there any way to change this? I haven't found anything in the RoboHelp help files that addresses this issue.
Answer
 
The highlight color you're describing isn't controlled by RoboHelp. My feeling is that it's a Windows thing. You might want to check your PCs color settings:
  1. Choose Start > Settings > Control Panel
  2. Double-click Display, and then click the Appearance tab
  3. In the Scheme box, select a color scheme

    NOTE: For screen elements that contain text, you can also specify a font style, size and color.

  4. Click OK
***
 
Adobe Captivate Question: Can I Stop Users From Changing Quiz Answers Sent Via Email?
 
We have recently found that several of our staff members have found ways around completing Captivate Assessments.  As you know the program has an option to auto generate an email with the participant's score. We have been using these scores as our documentation that the individual has mastered the content.  However, some of them are just changing the score to the minimum score needed to pass. Is there any way to make that information protected so they can't change it?
 
Answer:
 
You've run into a problem with the email results–the student can prevent the attachment from being sent to you; worse if they know what they're doing, students can change the answers by opening and editing the ATT attachment via any text editor.
 
One way to stop this kind of thing from happening would be to create a JavaScript that changes the name of the file (perhaps makes it invisible too). You could also create an application that locks down the ATT file. Programming is not my area of expertise, but I know it can be done. Of course, for the money you might spend perfecting a series of JavaScripts or creating a custom application, you could have purchased a Learning Management System (which locks down the student's answers).
 

Got a question you'd like answered? Email me.
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Adobe Captivate 3: Say Goodbye to the Flash Security Warning

by Kevin A. Siegel

 

If you have attempted to preview a Captivate project in a Web browser, there's a very good chance that you have run face-first into the perplexing Adobe Flash Security warning shown below:

Flash Security Warning

If you are nodding yes at this point, and you clicked the OK in the dialog box shown above, your eLearning lesson might have performed as expected in the browser (links may not be working, animation isn't playing, etc). Of course, there's a better than 50-50 chance that the lesson didn't play correctly at all. Maybe your animations and/or FLV's failed to play?

So what's the deal with the message, and how do you get rid of it? Great questions. Read on…

According to Adobe, "The Flash Player was designed to provide security settings that do not require you to explicitly allow or deny access in most situations. Over time, as SWF and FLV content have become more sophisticated, the Flash Player has also become more sophisticated, offering users additional privacy and security protections.

"You might occasionally encounter older SWF or FLV content that was created using older security rules. In these cases, Flash Player asks you to make a decision: You can allow the content to work as its creator intended, using the older security rules; or, you can choose to enforce the newer, stricter rules. The latter choice helps ensure that you only view or play content that meets the most recent standards of security, but it may sometimes prevent older SWF or FLV content from working properly.

"When older content runs in a newer version of the player, and the Flash Player needs you to make a decision about enforcing newer rules or not, you may the dialog box above which asks your permission before allowing the older SWF or FLV content to communicate with other locations on the Internet."

Rest assured that your customers will not see the dialog box above. You'll only see the message while you're developing the Captivate project on your computer (prior to uploading the published SWF to a Web server or LMS).

If you'd like to prevent the dialog from appearing on your computer ever again, follow these steps the next time you see the dialog box.

  1. Click the Settings button to open the Global Security Settings page in your Web browser (or click here to visit the site now)
  2. From the Adobe Flash Player Settings Manager, click Always allow

    Always Allow

  3. Click Edit locations and then click Add location

    Add Location

    The Trust This Location dialog appears.

  4. Click the Browse for folder button

    Browse for Folder

  5. Open the folder containing your Captivate projects

    Folder selected

And, and… you're done (it will seem a bit anti-climatic at this point because there is no final OK or Done button to click). Close the browser window, preview the project again and the Flash Security warning will not appear.

Do you have a Captivate production problem that's making you pull your hair out? Email your problem and let others learn solutions from your experience. 
 
Want to learn more about Adobe Captivate 3? Click here.