Category: e-learning

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ARTICULATE STORYLINE 360: Publishing to Video

by Kal Hadi, COTP

When teaching my students how to publish Articulate Storyline projects during my beginner class, I often get the following question:
 
Student: “How do I publish my project as a video (MP4)?”
 
Me: “You can’t.”
 
Cue the crickets along with disappointed comments in the chat pod, especially from Adobe Captivate users (Captivate has been able to publish projects as a video for years). 
 
Why would a Storyline developer want to publish a project as a video (especially when you lose any interactivity you've built into the slides)? Video files are self-contained. They can be viewed on just about any device without the need for a web browser. You can email the video output to a colleague who does not have Storyline, so they can view your slides. And published videos can be uploaded into video streaming servers such as YouTube and Vimeo. 
 
Given that publishing as a video has been a requested Storyline feature for some time, I’m happy to report that Articulate Storyline 360 now allows you to publish a single video of a Slide, a Scene, or the Entire Course. 
 
There are some settings and best practice options in the Publish to Video dialog box we’ll discuss.
 

Under Size and Quality, there are a few choices:
  • Dimensions. This is where you can select a size for video from a drop-down menu. If video size is not a factor, you can go as high as full 1080p HD for nice quality.
  • You have two sliders for Video and Audio Quality that ranges from Low to Very High. There is of course a tradeoff between quality and file size. High is usually a good choice.
  • “Set the same volume level for all audio” makes all sounds volume consistent throughout the project. If you want to keep the volume the same as you originally had it in the Storyline project, deselect this option.
  • Prior to publishing, you can also control how the slides flow (or the Navigation). You can either follow the “next” button actions in your course, or show the slides sequentially based on their slide number (1.1, 1.2, 2.1, 2.2, and so on).
If you need to publish a course to video, I suggest that you duplicate the project and prepare a copy for video output that automatically goes through all content flow without missing main content stored in layers. You’ll likely need to adjust the Triggers so they execute automatically. For example, if a user needs to click a button to show a specific layer, you can adjust the Triggers so one layer shows when the timeline of a previous layer end. 
 
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Looking for Storyline training? Check out these live, hands-on, online classes.
 
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Kal Hadi, COTP, is a Certified Adobe Instructor with CompTIA CTT+ credentials. He has over 15 years of experience in the field of computer graphics, imaging, and electronic publishing. He was recognized by Adobe as one of the top five trainers worldwide in 2009. He is a graduate of the Rochester Institute of Technology Electronic Publishing graduate program. He is also the author of many books and papers in the fields of graphics and web publishing including IconLogic's Articulate Storyline books.

 
 
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ADOBE CAPTIVATE: It’s Gotta Be Friday Somewhere!

by Lori Smith, COTP

Happy Friday! Ok, maybe it's Friday when you're reading this, maybe it isn't. However, if it's not a Friday, let's pretend that it is.
 
You'd like your Adobe Captivate eLearning module to greet the learners with “Hello! It’s a lovely Friday to learn a little something. Let’s get started!” 
 
Are you wondering how to get Captivate to perform this little bit of magic? You could simply write the words “Hello! It’s a lovely Friday…” into a Text Caption or Smart Shape. However, the learner would only be greeted correctly once out of every seven days.
 
Instead of manually typing the day, let Captivate share the information with your learners. Believe it or not, Captivate already knows how to get the information: via a System Variable called cpInfoCurrentDay. 
 
If you wanted to have the day show up in a text caption, all you’d need to do is type the following text and the name of the Variable. 
 
 
I thought I had done pretty well… except this is what I ended up with:
 
 
What’s that “6” doing there? Captivate did exactly what was asked. I asked for current DAY, and the 6th day of the week appeared… Friday.
 
The reason for the confusion can be found in Captivate’s Variables dialog box (via the Project menu). The Description for cpInfoCurrentDay: “Day of the week as set on the user's computer. Values range from 1-7 starting with Sunday. Sunday=1, Monday=2, and so on.” And that explains why Friday displays as the number 6.
 
 
I’m going to show you how to create a quick Conditional Advanced Action that will ensure that 6 is displayed as Friday in my current project.
 
First, open the Variables dialog box and add a new User Variable called myDay. 
 
 
Replace the cpInfoCurrentDay variable in your caption with your new myDay variable.
 
 
Next, open the Advanced Actions dialog and create an action that looks like this (I named mine determineDay):
 
 
Be sure to create and fill in the Decision Blocks, one for each day of the week. As you create the Decision Blocks, remember to set the value for each appropriately (Sunday is 1, Monday is 2, etc. as shown in the images above and below).
 
 
Execute the advanced action somewhere in your project. (I’d suggest via the On Enter drop-down menu on the slide where you’ll want to display the day of the week. In the image below, I'm executing my determineDay action.)
 
 
Assuming it's Friday, preview the slide and you'll see this in your text caption:
 
 
***
 
Like this little action? Want to learn how to create more actions like this, and more complex ones too? Join me for my Captivate Variable and Action Deep Dive series. The 101 class starts with the basics. As we move through 201, 301, and 401, we will continue to build your skills and practice with Captivate Variables and Advanced Actions. Next? We conquer the world!
 
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Lori Smith, COTP, is IconLogic's lead programmer and Adobe Certified Expert (ACE) in Captivate. Lori has a Bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from MIT as well as a Master’s in electrical engineering from George Mason University. She has been working in the field of software engineering for more than 20 years.  During that time she worked as an embedded software engineer at Raytheon (E-Systems) and ARINC.
 
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ADOBE PRESENTER 11: Creating Packages

by Kevin Siegel, CTT+, COTP

If you need to share an Adobe Presenter presentation with another developer, you’ll find the Presenter's Package tool very useful.
 
Presenter projects begin as a single, self-contained PowerPoint presentation. You can transfer them from one computer to another without worrying about leaving a part of the presentation behind. However, once you add audio or videos assets to a PowerPoint slide via the Presenter tab on the PowerPoint Ribbon, those assets aren’t embedded into the presentation. Instead, Presenter creates a folder that houses those assets every time you save. Should you forget to include the assets folder when you send the PowerPoint presentation to a colleague, the person opening the presentation will receive alert messages about missing files as Presenter attempts to load the assets.
 
When you package a Presenter project, everything a developer needs to open the project is included in the package (except for the actual Microsoft PowerPoint or Adobe Presenter software). A developer simply needs to double-click the prpkg file they receive from you to extract all of the project assets into a self-contained folder.
 
To create a Package, from the Adobe Presenter tab, Presentation group, click the Package tool.
 
 
 
Click the Browse button (the three dots) and select a folder for the package.
 
 
Click the Pack button and you're done. As mentioned above, the prpkg file contains everything a fellow developer needs to make changes to the project (assuming they have both PowerPoint and Presenter installed).
 
 
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My "Adobe Presenter 11: The Essentials" skills & drills workbook is available now on amazon.com. And if you are looking to learn all things eLearning, check out these live, online and awesomely interactive classes
 
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Kevin Siegel, CTT, COTP, is the founder and president of IconLogic. Following a career in Public Affairs with the U.S. Coast Guard and in private industry, Kevin has spent decades as a technical communicator, classroom and online trainer, public speaker, and has written hundreds of computer training books for adult learners. He has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide.
 
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New 1-Hour Live, Online Course: Microsoft PowerPoint to eLearning via Articulate Storyline, Adobe Captivate, TechSmith Camtasia, or Presenter

If you intend to create an eLearning course, it’s a good bet that you’re going to start the development process in Microsoft PowerPoint. However, PowerPoint is missing some key eLearning features to allow you to output finished eLearning content. For instance, PowerPoint cannot create software simulations or video demos. There is no way to add quizzes or learner interactions in PowerPoint. And, because there are no reporting features or provisions for SCORM or AICC, you cannot effectively integrate PowerPoint presentations with Learning Management Systems. 

Instead of relying on PowerPoint alone for your eLearning content, you’ll need to take your finished presentations into an eLearning development tool such as Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, or TechSmith Camtasia. While in those tools, you’ll add the necessary eLearning features and then publish your content. Alternately, you can rely on Presenter, a PowerPoint plug-in that works together with PowerPoint to accomplish many of the things you can do in Captivate, Camtasia, and Storyline.

But what happens to your beloved PowerPoint slides when they get incorporated into today’s eLearning tools? Do the animations still work? How about the hyperlinks? Does the voiceover audio you added to your PowerPoint slides still work when the slides are imported into your eLearning tool? Do the fonts look okay? If you or the subject matter expert updates the PowerPoint presentation outside of the eLearning tool, does the eLearning version update or do you have to re-import?

Attend this action-packed session and learn how PowerPoint works with the top eLearning tools of the day. You’ll learn the strengths and weaknesses of each eLearning tool via live demonstrations (there is no pre-recorded content). This is live, online training at its very best!

You’ll learn how to integrate PowerPoint with:

  • Adobe Captivate
  • Articulate Storyline
  • TechSmith Camtasia
  • Presenter

Learn more or sign up.

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TEACHING ONLINE: True eLearning Integration via Adobe Connect

by Kevin Siegel, CTT+, COTP

When I teach my live, online Certified Online Training Professional course, one of the core concepts I encourage is blended learning (combining online digital media with traditional classroom teaching concepts). Specifically, there's great value in integrating eLearning (asynchronous training) with live (synchronous) training by providing access to eLearning content from within the virtual training space.
 
Published eLearning content can typically be provided to online students via a Materials pod or direct link (URL) you type into the Chat pod. All of the main training platforms (WebEx, GoToTraining, Adobe Connect) provide Chat and Materials pods, although they might give the pods different names.
 
The problem with sending students outside of the training space to engage with eLearning content is that the student leaves the virtual classroom. Once your learners are outside, good luck getting them back.
 
In my experience using many of the online training platforms, only one of the vendors offers a truly integrated blended-learning experience and allows you to share eLearning content directly from within the training room, and that’s Adobe with its virtual training platform Connect.
 
Here’s how you can share eLearning courses from within Connect. First, create the eLearning content in Adobe Captivate, and then publish as an SWF.
 
From within Adobe Connect, choose Share Document.
 
 
Click the Browse My Computer button and upload the SWF you published with Captivate. In the image below, I’ve already uploaded a SWF I created with Captivate called UsingNotepad. Once you’ve uploaded content, it stays in the Select Document to Share area so you don’t have to upload content again and again and again.
 
 
All you need to do now is click the OK button and everyone in the virtual room will not only see the eLearning, they’ll be able to interact with it independent of the other attendees.
 
 
The ability of virtual attendees to work through the eLearning content independently is so cool, it's the one feature that might encourage you to select Adobe Connect as your training platform above others… and Adobe Captivate as your eLearning tool. If you’re thinking about going the Connect route, head on over to Engage Systems, tell them your friends at IconLogic said hello, and then ask for a demo of Adobe Connect.
 
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If you'd like to learn how to learn how to teach live, online classes, check out ICCOTP's certification course.
 
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Kevin Siegel, CTT, COTP, is the founder and president of IconLogic. Following a career in Public Affairs with the U.S. Coast Guard and in private industry, Kevin has spent decades as a technical communicator, classroom and online trainer, public speaker, and has written hundreds of computer training books for adult learners. He has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide.
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ARTICULATE STORYLINE 360: Three Cheers for Text-to-Speech

by Kevin Siegel, CTT+, COTP

During our live, online Articulate Storyline Beginner classes, we teach students how to import and record voiceover audio. The most common question we get about voiceover audio is “Can Storyline convert text to audio files?” The answer has always been "no." However, “no” became “yes” thanks to a recent Storyline 360 update.
 
If you select the Insert tab on the Ribbon and click the Audiotool (located in the Media group), you’ll find Text-to-Speech. Yayyyy! (If you don't see Text-to-Speech as shown below, and you're using Storyline 360, start Articulate 360 and see if updates are available.)
 
 
Before using Text-to-Speech, I suggest a little pre-work. If you’ve created a voiceover script (or have access to it), you will save yourself a lot of extra work in Storyline because you can copy and paste the script text into Storyline’s Notes area (instead of typing). The Notes can easily be converted to Speech.
 
 
Next, choose Insert > Media > Audio > Text-to-Speech to open the Insert Text-to-Speech dialog box. From the upper left of the dialog box, you can select from an awesome number of languages.
 
 
Choose your narrator and, if you'd like, use the Preview Voice option to get a feel for how your narrator is going to sound.
 
 
 
You can type the script text manually if you're into that sort of thing (the typing I mean). But remember the Notes I encouraged you to create earlier? Click the Copy From Slide Notes button and those notes will instantly appear in the panel (there's no extra typing required… I love that).
 
Click the Insert button and you're done, done, done. The resulting audio file appears at the bottom left of the slide.
 
 
If you'd like to hear the resulting audio (and who wouldn't?), right-click the speaker icon and choose Preview.
 
 
After you've added the Text-to-Speech, you can change to a different language or Narrator by visiting the Audio Tools tab and clicking Text-to-Speech and clicking the Update button.
 
Thanks, Articulate for making the whole Text-to-Speech thing so fast and easy!
 
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If you are looking to learn all things eLearning, including Articulate Storyline, check out these live, online and awesomely interactive classes.
 
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Kevin Siegel, CTT, COTP, is the founder and president of IconLogic. Following a career in Public Affairs with the U.S. Coast Guard and in private industry, Kevin has spent decades as a technical communicator, classroom and online trainer, public speaker, and has written hundreds of computer training books for adult learners. He has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide.
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ELEARNING PRODUCTION: iOS 11 Makes Mobile Demos a Snap (or a Tap)

by Kevin Siegel, CTT, COTP

Not so long ago we were tasked with creating an eLearning project that included a software demonstration of an iPhone mobile app. We experimented with several techniques for capturing the app including using a program that reflected the iPhone onto the computer. (To reflect our iPhone to the computer, we used a program called, wait for it, Reflector. Once the phone and computer were on the same wireless network, it was fairly easy to get Reflector to show the mobile device on the computer. And once displayed on the computer, it was a breeze to capture the reflection. We used Adobe Captivate, but any eLearning tool will work including Articulate Storyline and TechSmith Camtasia.
 
As an alternative to reflecting the mobile device and capturing what's shown on the computer, you can create individual screen captures of an app directly on the mobile device; then you can send the images to yourself via email, Dropbox, or any one of a several file transfer capabilities available on today’s mobile devices. (Just about every modern mobile device allows you to create screen captures.)
 
The only problem with manually creating screen captures is, well, you’ll need a lot of screen captures for a software demonstration. And that brings me to the latest and greatest innovation I’ve seen in iOS 11: video demos can now be created natively on the iPhone, saved, exported just like an image (only the video is an mp4), and then imported into your favorite eLearning development tool. 
 
Here's how easy it is to record a demo on an iPhone via iOS 11: In this scenario, I'd like to demonstrate the process of enabling the Personal Hotspot feature on an iPhone. To enable recording, swipe up from the bottom of the phone. Tab the button indicated below and, three seconds later, you're recording everything you do on the device.
 
 
When finished, tap the red bar at the top of the device and your recording will be saved among your other videos and photos as an MP4. In the image below, you can see the demo I captured as it appeared in the Camera app on my iPhone.
 
 
To add the video to a Captivate project, choose Video > Insert Video. In Camtasia, go to the Media Bin, right-click, and Import Media. And in Storyline, go the Insert tab on the Ribbon and, from the Media group, click the Video drop-down menu, and then chooseVideo From File.
 
Here's the video I captured and put into YouTube. (I imported the video into Camtasia and shared it. I didn't make any edits to the video but could have easily added audio, music, callouts, animations, you name it.)
 
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Looking to learn how to create eLearning in any of the top development tools (including Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, and TechSmith Camtasia)? Check out these live, online, and highly interactive classes.
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Kevin Siegel, CTT, COTP, is the founder and president of IconLogic. Following a career in Public Affairs with the U.S. Coast Guard and in private industry, Kevin has spent decades as a technical communicator, classroom and online trainer, public speaker, and has written hundreds of computer training books for adult learners. He has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide.
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ELEARNING PRODUCTION: Integrating GoAnimate Animations

by Jennie Ruby, CTT, COTP

Our reader Linda Tromanhauser of ADP (Automatic Data Processing, Inc.) writes: "We often use GoAnimate videos in eLearning. One thing I discovered on my most recent project is that in Storyline, you can insert a GoAnimate and have clickable items on top of it, on the same slide. So the video plays, and then the learner can select an option. I thought that was cool."
 
That does sound cool! I have a project under way in which I will add the same kind of functionality in Captivate. But in the meantime, I figured out I could do something similar in Adobe Presenter! 
 
Adobe Presenter is a PowerPoint add-in. Taking advantage of GoAnimate’s ability to import PowerPoint, I used GoAnimate to create an animated teacher for a grammar lesson. She talks, moves, points, and discusses text that appears on the slide with her. And then at the end of the video, my animated grammar teacher introduces a quiz.
 
To integrate the video with the quiz I had created in Adobe Presenter, I first created a button image in GoAnimate. Then I have my animated teacher point to the button and say, “Click here to take the quiz.” To bring functionality to the button, and to bring my learners into the quiz, I took a screen shot of the GoAnimate character pointing to the button at the end of her scene.
 
 
That screen shot serves as the first slide after the video in Adobe Presenter. In Presenter, I placed a transparent, clickable shape over the button, and assigned it a hyperlink that takes the learner to the next slide: the first question in the quiz. 
 
The learner then takes the quiz, the quiz is scored, and the quiz reports its results to the LMS. From animated lesson all the way to SCORM-compliant reporting. There is a lot to love about integrating GoAnimate with eLearning, regardless of which eLearning software you use.
 
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Looking to learn GoAnimate? Check these live, online classes.
 
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Jennie Ruby, CTT, COTP, is a veteran eLearning developer, trainer, and author. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer and Certified Online Training Professional. She teaches both classroom and online courses, and has authored courseware, published training books, and developed content for countless eLearning projects. She is also a publishing professional with more than 30 years of experience in writing, editing, print publishing, and eLearning.
 
 
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TECHSMITH CAMTASIA: Delete vs. Ripple Delete

by Kevin Siegel, COTP, CTT
 
Deleting a portion of an object on the Camtasia Timeline (a few seconds from the end of a video for example) is simple: drag the red in- and/or green out-point on either side of the Playhead, right-click, and then choose Delete. However, after deleting the selection from the Timeline media, you’ll typically be left with a gap. If left unaddressed, the gap (otherwise known as dead air), will result in a black screen when the lesson is seen by your eLearners.
 
In the image below, notice that there is an item on the Timeline to the right of a video I'd like to edit. I've already made a selection with the in- and out-points.
 
 
The next step for most people is to right-click the selection and choose Delete.
 
 
Deleting a selection works of course, but there's a gap left between the edited object and the next object on the Timeline (dead air).
 
 
As an alternative to simply Deleting (and getting a gap), this is the perfect opportunity to take advantage of an often overlooked Camtasia feature: Ripple Delete (the option is just below Delete in the menu).
 
 
By Ripple Deleting, the dead air isn't an issue because the item to the right of the edited object automatically slides left and fills the gap on the Timeline.
 
 
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Looking to learn how to create eLearning in any of the top development tools (including Adobe Captivate, Articulate Storyline, and TechSmith Camtasia)? Check out these live, online, and highly interactive classes.
 
***
 
Kevin Siegel, CTT, COTP, is the founder and president of IconLogic. Following a career in Public Affairs with the U.S. Coast Guard and in private industry, Kevin has spent decades as a technical communicator, classroom and online trainer, public speaker, and has written hundreds of computer training books for adult learners. He has been recognized by Adobe as one of the top trainers world-wide.
 
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GOANIMATE: Character-Based eLearning Made Easy

One of the hottest new tools for eLearning development is GoAnimate. Whether you want to create an animated whiteboard video (moving hand draws objects on your screen right before your eyes!), or a more character-based video (animated characters walk, move, talk, and emote), GoAnimate makes it possible. Even for those of us with limited or no drawing skill or knowledge of how to create animation.

 
I’ve been working more and more on ways to integrate GoAnimate with more traditional eLearning lessons and content. For example, I wanted to add a human, interpersonal touch to an Excel lesson. So I created a GoAnimate video in which one colleague helps another with his Excel spreadsheet. 
 
Now, it’s one thing to simply embed a video into an Adobe Captivate slide as a stand-alone, and then go on with a standard Captivate lesson in the next segment. But I wanted a tighter relationship between the video and the Excel software simulation lesson. So at one point in the GoAnimate video, the animated character is sitting at his desk, with his computer screen showing. 
 
 
Check out the computer in the image above… that’s not just a fake image on that screen. That is actually a screenshot of an Excel software simulation created in Adobe Captivate.
 
What happens next is magic. In GoAnimate, I used the Camera Effects to zoom in on the screen, until the spreadsheet simulation was full size. And at that moment, the GoAnimate video ends. And Captivate takes over. Suddenly, the mouse starts moving, the voiceover from the GoAnimate is still talking us through the lesson (I’ll explain the trickery with the voiceover in a later article), and we are into a software simulation demo on Excel.
 
Now that we are in Captivate, the lesson goes on with a training or practice Excel lesson, followed by a graded assessment. Between those segments, additional GoAnimate videos come in and explain what to do every step of the way.
 
By integrating GoAnimate videos with your eLearning projects, you can add humor, engagement, and a fun touch that learners love. But what may be more important, you can publish your projects as fully SCORM-compliant training that can be uploaded to your LMS, with all of the record-keeping and reporting that you may need.
 
Have you integrated GoAnimate videos into your training offerings? We’d love to hear from you. And if you are interested in more on using GoAnimate in eLearning, sign up for Jennie’s live, online GoAnimate course.
 
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Looking for GoAnimate training? Check out this live, online classes.
 
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Jennie Ruby, CTT, COTP, is a veteran eLearning developer, trainer, and author. Jennie has an M.A. from George Washington University and is a Certified Technical Trainer and Certified Online Training Professional. She teaches both classroom and online courses, and has authored courseware, published training books, and developed content for countless eLearning projects. She is also a publishing professional with more than 30 years of experience in writing, editing, print publishing, and eLearning.