Category: eLearning

Instead of using an LMS to manage the Quiz results, you can instruct the Quiz to send the scores to an email address. You will learn how in the steps below. However, if you use this technique, tracking the results may not be so easy.

1. Choose Project > Quiz Manager
2. On the Reporting tab
3. Select Enable reporting for this project
4. Select E-mail
5. Type your e-mail address into the text field

   

   Click OK

If you want to include a subject line and/or automatically fill in the body of the email, you can type the following:

someguy@someplace.com? subject=Captivate% 20Presentation&body=Body%20goes% 20here&cc=someotherguy@someplace.com

To: someguy@someplace.com

CC: someotherguy@someplace.com

Subject: Captivate Presentation

Body: Body goes here

Now for the tracking issue:

The following question came from P. Geisler, one of our fellow subscribers to this newsletter. We’re looking for your feedback/experience so please send your comments to me.

Question: I’m wondering if anyone has found a solution for tracking course completion or test scores from Captivate without using an LMS.

• The email system works beautifully if you’re only tracking a few dozen questions, but what do you do if you’re trying to track assessment scores (or even just course completion) for several hundred people. 
• The Adobe Developer Center has an article on using Cold Fusion to create a database that interfaces with Captivate for tracking results.  Great if you’re familiar with this powerful software but I’m not and don’t have the time to learn.
• QuestionMark Perception is not within our budget to purchase
• We use Oracle/PeopleSoft’s HR system, which includes training registration and tracking.  It’s AICC and SCORM compatible but, unless I can get the test results into a database such as Excel or Access, to do an upload, I have no way of getting the information into the system.

Start Adobe Captivate 2 and open any slide. If your mouse has a scroll wheel, use it now and you’ll notice the expected: you scroll up and down.

• Cannot move (either by cutting and pasting or dragging and dropping) Captivate slides
• Cannot rename Captivate slides
• Cannot delete Captivate slides
• Only part of the screen is captured during the recording phase
• Capture keys (Print Screen and END) do not work
• Audio does not import
• Random crashes

I’m happy to report that I received several emails from Vista users during the past week who said that Vista was getting along just beautifully with Captivate 2. Hmmmm? Interesting. If you’re using Vista, please email me your findings.

• Cannot move (either by cutting and pasting or dragging and dropping) Captivate slides
• Cannot rename Captivate slides
• Cannot delete Captivate slides
• Only part of the screen is captured during the recording phase
• Capture keys (Print Screen and END) do not work
• Audio does not import
• Random crashes

As of this writing, there is no announced release date for a Vista-compatible version of Adobe Captivate.

The following tip comes from fellow Captivate user Alan Rosenberg:

Inserting Question Slides in Adobe Captivate 2 is no trick. You simply choose Insert > Question slide, select your Question Type and click OK. However, there’s a feature available to any Question Slide that you may not have found on your own. You can specify an Action for every answer that can branch a user to any of the following destinations:

• Previous slide
• Next slide
• Any slide in the project
• A Web site (URL) or file
• Another Captivate project
• Send an e-mail
• or Execute a JavaScript

In the following example, I’ll demonstrate how to send answers in a Multiple Choice Question Slide to different slides in a project (a technique known as Branching).

1. Open or create a Captivate project
2. Choose Insert > Question slide
3. Select the Multiple Choice Question type
4. Click Create Graded Question

   The Question dialog box appears where you can create both the Question and Answers
   

5. Type the Question into the Question Area
6. Type your answers into the Answer area

   Now you will specify where each of the answers should go as the user selects the answers
   

7. Click the Advanced button
8. Select Advanced Question Options
9. Select Jump to slide from the Action list

   

10. Select any of the other slides in your project as the destination slide (that slide should contain a button that allows users to return to the Question Slide should they click the wrong answer)
11. Click OK

    Now you will set up your Question Slide so that users will have multiple attempts to answer the question correctly.
    

12. Click the Options tab
13. Select  Infinite attempts from the If wrong answer area
14. Click OK

Click here to see an example of a Question slide using this technique. And click here to see other Captivate sample projects.

Question: Can You Resize Captivate Captions Even Smaller?

Do you know if it is possible in Adobe Captivate 2.0 to resize captions to a size smaller than their default size?

For example, when I add a halogreen Caption 4 to the slide, I am unable to resize it to smaller than 156 x 81 pixels, even with "Constrain proportions" unchecked.

Somewhere in the Captivate documentation, there’s mention that "you cannot make the caption smaller than the bitmap used to create the caption", but I was wondering if you know of any workarounds, other than creating my own custom captions?

Answer:

Great question, but sorry, you cannot do it. Your only alternative is to create custom captions.

Here are some links that should help you learn to create your own custom captions:

Paul has a great Web site offering tons of Captivate information and goodies. There is also a page dedicated to custom captions.

CaptivateHelp.Macromedia.com

Dave Mozelealous’ BLOG where he created a cartoon caption.

If you are interested in creating Captivate movies for the iPod, Silke Fleischer, senior product marketing manager for Adobe Captivate, has written an article titled Mobile learning: Adobe Captivate content on video iPod devices that is quite enlightening.

Closed Captioning, an option you can show in your published Captivate project via a Skin, allows you to include transcripts for your audio clips that appear as the audio is playing. Closed Captions are typically added to a Captivate project as an aid to hearing- impaired users.

While the act of showing the Closed Captions is an easy one (you simply turn the feature on), adding the Closed Captions to each audio clip can be very labor intensive.

Here is how you add closed captions to an audio clip:

1. Open an Adobe Captivate 2 project that contains audio
2. Choose Audio > Advanced Audio

   The Advanced Audio Management dialog box appears.

3. Select a slide that contains an audio file
4. Click the Closed Caption button

   The Closed Captioning dialog box appears, displaying the audio file as a waveform.

5. Click in the waveform where you want to add a caption
6. Click Add

   A new caption field appears.

7. Type the Closed Caption
8. Click OK

   Now you need to ensure that the Closed Caption feature will be available to your customers.

9. Choose Project > Skin
10. Select any Skin (ensure Closed Captioning is selected)
11. Click OK

After adding the Closed Captions and previewing the project, you will most likely agree that the Closed Captions are hard to read (the default font size is too small).

Here is how you edit the Closed Caption properties:

1. Choose Project > Skin
2. Select the Playback Control tab
3. Select Closed Captioning
4. Click the Settings button.

You can use the options in this dialog box to control how the closed caption area will look in your published project.

The Lines Count area will allow you to make the Closed Caption area that appears in the published project either taller or shorter. If there is too much text to fit, the overflow text will be truncated.

The Font area allows you to change the font, font size, and color. I’d recommend using the Verdana font with a font size not smaller than 12. Anything smaller will be too hard to read.

The Background area controls the physical appearance of the closed caption. While you can select any color you like, I typically set the Transparency to 100% so you cannot see the Background area at all.