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My newest book, "TechSmith Camtasia Studio 8: The Essentials" is now available for the Amazon Kindle.
The printed
book is with our fulfillment house and should begin shipping next
week.
In the coming weeks, the book
will be available for purchase via the Apple iBookstore and Safari books
online.
I recently received an email from a new Captivate developer who had delivered an eLearning lesson to a client via email attachment. The client informed the developer that he could not open the email attachment since he didn't own Adobe Captivate.
I asked the developer what he had sent to the client, and was told that he had emailed an Captivate production file (the cptx file). The developer didn't realize that cptx files can only be opened by someone who has Captivate installed on the computer. When it comes time to deliver consumable content to a learner, the cptx files must be published (via File > Publish).
When publishing a Captivate project file, the format you select will depend upon on how the learner will access the lesson. If the learner is going to access the lesson over the internet (either from a web server or an LMS), publishing SWF and/or HTML5 is the way to go. If you decide to publish a SWF, the learner will use a web browser to access the lesson. In addition to the web browser, the learner must have the free Adobe Flash Player on the computer to view the SWF.
If you publish HTML5, a web browser is still required for the learner. However, since HTML5 isn't a Flash-based output, you bypass the need for the learner to need the Flash Player. Learners need only use a device, or browser, that supports HTML5 (such as the Safari browser found on the iPad and the iPhone).
If you'd like to email the lesson to someone as an attachment, neither SWF nor HTML5 are appropriate since both outputs result in multiple, co-dependent, published files. Instead, you could proceed to choose SWF/HTML5 from the publish options, select SWF as the Output, but then select Export PDF from the Output Options area.
After publishing the lesson, you'll receive an alert dialog box reminding you that the free Adobe Reader 9 (or newer) is required for anyone wanting to use the PDF. And while the publish destination folder will include multiple files (including a SWF and a PDF), the only thing you'll need to email to a learner is the PDF.
Many people are surprised to see that when opened in Adobe Reader, the PDF retains all of the lesson's animations, audio and interactivity. Because the PDF does not depend on other published assets, the PDF is a wonderful standalone option. The PDF is portable (it can be emailed as an attachment) and cross-platform (Adobe Reader is available for both the Macintosh and Windows operating systems).
If PDF isn't going to work for you, there are some other standalone publishing options. From the list of Publish options along the left side of the Publish dialog box, select Media. From the Select Type drop-down menu, you can choose to publish a Windows Executable (which will create a portable, standalone file that will only play on Windows-based PCs), or MAC Executable (which will create a portable, standalone file that will only play on Macs). Both of these options will create one single file that retain all of the audio, animation and interactivity of published SWFs, HTML5 and PDFs. However, since they are platform-specific, you'll need to know the hardware and software being used by your learners to ensure you publish the correct media.
The final option in the Select type drop-down menu is MP4 Video. This option will yield a standalone video file that can be opened by Macs, PCs and mobile devices (such as the iPad). However, while the video will include the lesson's animations and audio, any interactivity contained within the lesson will be lost (click boxes, buttons and quizzes).
The publish option that you select during the publish process really depends on your learner's setup, and how they will be accessing your lesson. Just remember that neither SWF nor HTML5 are good standalone options.
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? I teach two live, online Captivate 6 classes. Adobe Captivate Essentials and Adobe Captivate Beyond the Essentials (Advanced).
When it comes time to add assets such as images, animation or audio to your Captivate project, it's no secret that you can accomplish the task by choosing Insert and then selecting Image or Animation. To insert audio, visit the Audio menu.
The process of adding assets to a project isn't difficult, but it could become a major drag–especially if you need to add several assets. Perhaps you need to import 100 audio clips. How many times will you choose Audio > Import before you begin to go insane?
Take it easy, breathe deep and check out this sweet technique that will surely save you time when adding assets to a Captivate project.
First, create or open a Captivate project. Next, open the folder containing the assets you'd like to import. Position the Captivate and asset windows side-by-side, and then drag the asset directly onto a Captivate slide.
Using this technique, you can quickly add multiple assets such as images and audio files to your project (to add multiple assets, shift-click the assets to select them, and then drag them onto a project slide).
After dragging the assets onto a slide, they will appear on the slide and within the Library so they can easily be dragged onto other project slides later (you can display the Library via Window > Library).
Speaking of the Library, you can import multiple assets directly to the Library, instead of to individual slides, by clicking the Import tool at the top of the Library.
Drag assets onto slides? Import assets directly to the Library? Surely one of these two techniques will fit the bill for you. And I think you'll agree that neither technique is a drag.
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? I teach two live, online Captivate classes. You can learn more here.
Branch Aware is new in Captivate 6. Unlike other new features (like HTML5 support and Themes), Branch Aware has gotten little attention and few people understand what the option does.
According to Adobe: "Use Branch Aware to calculate the final score based only on the questions in the branch that users have viewed. For example, consider that a project contains a quiz that branches into two modules that in turn contain a quiz. If a user reaches the module with three questions and 10 points each, the total score is considered as 30 points. If this option is not enabled, the scores are calculated on the total number of questions in the project and not the module that users actually viewed."
Huh? I don't know about you, but I find Adobe's description of Branch Aware to be confusing. Not to be deterred by Adobe's description, I set out to play with the Branch Aware feature and figure out what I could (and couldn't) do if I elected to use the option.
I created a simple project that is Branch Aware. You can download it here. The lesson has 12 questions. Each question is worth 10 points, so the total for the lesson is 120 (you can confirm the total point value via Project > Advanced Interactions).
I enabled Branch Aware by choosing Edit > Preferences > Quiz > Settings and selecting Branch Aware from the group of Settings.
To establish the branches, I not only needed to select the Branch Aware option, I also needed to set my question Actions properly. After the last question in each branch, I jumped the learner to the QuizResults slide.
If I hadn't set the last question in each branch to jump to the QuizResults slide, my question numbering would not display correctly.
Once a learner takes my quiz, the QuizResults screen will display the appropriate scoring for the branch that the learner took.
Even cooler? If the learner chooses "Review Quiz" once reaching the quiz results slide, the learner will only review the relevant part of the quiz.
I was also surprised to find out that you can still require that the learner answer all questions within a branch.
I tried everything I could think of to mess up the scoring results, but my lesson reported properly each time. The bottom line is that Branch Aware is one mighty cool feature. Give it a try and I think you'll agree.
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? We teach two live, online Captivate 6 classes. Adobe Captivate Essentials and Adobe Captivate Beyond the Essentials (Advanced).
I've published a ton of eLearning lesson using Adobe Captivate, and I have seen the Publish dialog box more times than I can count. Sometimes I get tunnel vision when working in a tool I've used for so long and often fail to notice when tiny little options are added to a dialog box.
Take the Scalable HTML content check box for instance. If you hadn't noticed the option in the lower right of the Captivate 6 Publish dialog box, join the crowd.
The Scalable HTML content option is off by default, leading me to believe is wasn't necessarily a good idea to use it. I was curious what the option would do, so I enabled it and published a SWF. When the lesson opened in my web browser, the value of the option became clear. If you record a lesson at 800×600, and the learner's display is large, the 800×600 will float horizontally in the browser window. If the learner maximizes the web browser, the 800×600 lesson keeps its original size, and continues to float (the learner will see more white space to the left and right of the lesson).
However, with Scalable HTML content enabled in my test project, the published SWF always resized to fit my browser window (proportionally), no matter how big or small I made my browser window. I was concerned that the quality of the SWF would suffer if I made my browser window too big (I have a pretty large display). I was pleasantly surprised when the lesson continued to look pretty good, even when I maximized my browser window.
The only downside to using Scalable HTML content that I'm aware of (I asked Adobe to confirm this), is that performance will suffer if the lesson is opened on an Apple iPad. (Yes, Scalable HTML content works if you publish as a SWF or HTML5. Of course, given Adobe's warning, I'd be hesitant to use the option with HTML5 output.) If you've had issues with Scalable HTML content, please share.
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? I teach two live, online Captivate 6 classes. Adobe Captivate Essentials and Adobe Captivate Beyond the Essentials (Advanced).
When I use a program frequently, I tend to pin the program to my Taskbar for quick access. If you've never pinned an application to the Taskbar, it's a simple process. On Windows 7, click the Start button on the Taskbar and find the program you'd like to pin. Instead of starting the application, right-click the application's icon and choose Pin to Taskbar. From that point forward, you will be able to start the application by clicking its shortcut on the Taskbar.
In the image below, you can see icons for applications that I use every day, and have pinned to my Taskbar. (For instance, at the far right you can see Adobe Captivate and Adobe FrameMaker.)
Of course, I use Adobe RoboHelp every day too. And I was bummed out when I went to pin RoboHelp to my Taskbar and did not see the Pin to Taskbar menu item. What gives? Was there something within RoboHelp's code that prevented pinning? Was my Taskbar somehow inadequate? Perhaps there is a limit to the number of applications I am allowed to pin?
It turns out that the issue is quite simple. According to the folks at Adobe (who I contacted about this), applications containing the word "help" cannot be pinned to the Taskbar. Since RoboHelp is called, well… RoboHelp, that's the end of that.
Not so fast…
While applications with the word "Help" in the name cannot be pinned to the Taskbar, the folks at Adobe told me that it's simple enough to change RoboHelp's name on the computer (without fouling up anything at all).
Find RoboHelp's application icon by clicking Start (just as you would any other application). Once again, don't start the application. Instead, right-click the icon and choose Properties. On the General tab, change the name to something similar to RoboHelp HTML, except don't use Help. I changed my RoboHelp icon to simply RoboHTML.
After clicking the OK button, I was able to right-click the RoboHTML icon and, eureka, Pin toTaskbar was an available menu item. I am happy to report that RoboHelp (I mean RoboHTML) is now in its rightful home, alongside Captivate and FrameMaker.
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Looking to learn Adobe RoboHelp quickly? I offer a live, online class covering RoboHelp once each month. It's a two-day class, and provides an awesome jump-start to using this fantastic tool.
If I don't like a PowerPoint app or add-on, rest assured I'll tell you. And I have found plenty of tools not to like when it comes to making your PowerPoint presentation play on iDevices. But in iSpring Converter, I have finally found a PowerPoint distribution tool to really like.
Here's what iSpring Converter does. Imagine you want to create an eLearning module in PowerPoint and then distribute it–to everyone (even people on iPads and iPhones). The latest and greatest way to ensure the maximum number of devices can play with your end product is to ensure it is formatted in HTML5.
In the past, I have saved my PowerPoint presentations intended for mass distribution as videos. This wasn't a bad option, per se, but doing so eliminated any interactivity I had built into my course. For example, I have a presentation that allows the user to click an image of a folder to "view" its contents. The apparent functionality was created with PowerPoint triggers and actions, which cause the presentation to branch to the relevant slide. When I saved the presentation as a video, all of this interactivity was gone.
Enter iSpring Converter. Within moments of installation (it installs to PowerPoint's Ribbon), I was able to click iSpring's Publish button from within PowerPoint and bazinga! HTML5! I'd done my research, so I knew before installing that iSpring would maintain my presentation's transitions, embedded audio and video, animations, and styles. But I was unsure whether the actions and triggers for branching in my presentation would be maintained. I am happy to report that after conversion with iSpring Converter my actions and triggers still work beautifully!
To see a PowerPoint presentation converted to HTML5 using iSpring Converter, check out my sample presentation. You'll notice that clicks and mouse over actions linked to other slides remain intact, as do animations and video playback. There is also an option to publish the HTML5 file with a menu at the side so viewers can choose to skip around to different slides (and could also serve as a Table of Contents) but I chose to disable that feature for my test.
iSpring Converter is free to try for a month (but adds a relatively large watermark to the converted HTML5 presentation). I found it well worth its purchase price of $99.
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AJ teaches a live, 3-hour class that offers tips/tricks for improving the look and feel of your PowerPoint presentations: Slide Sprucing: Remodeling Lackluster PowerPoint Slides for eLearning and Presentations.
I wrote about the HTML5 output option available in Adobe Captivate 6 a few months ago. I pointed out that HTML5 is an alternative publishing format to a SWF. Unlike SWFs, projects published as HTML5 will not only play on the Apple iPad, iPhone and the iPod, but the lessons will retain any interactivity that you added to the slides (such as click boxes and buttons).
I also noted that while most features you can add to a Captivate project will work when published as HTML5, not all features are supported. For example, Rollover Captions, Rollover Images and SWF animations are not HTML5 compliant. Prior to publishing as HTML5, you should use the HTML5 Tracker (Project > HTML5 Tracker) to flag features that are not supported.
If the HTML5 Tracker window has anything in the list (as shown below), you'll need to remove the unsupported feature.
Removing the unsupported objects is simple enough. Close the HTML5 Tracker, go to the slide containing the unsupported object and delete the object. Of course, prior to closing the HTML5 Tracker, be sure to note which slides contains the unsupported objects, and which of the slide objects aren't supported. Forget that little chore and you'll find yourself needing to revisit the HTML5 Tracker again and again.
There's a better way to remove the Unsupported objects. The next time your display the HTML5 Tracker, don't bother closing it if you're ready to delete the Unsupported Objects. Believe it or not, you can instantly remove the objects right from the Tracker. Simply select the Unsupported Object from the list and, on your keyboard, press [ctrl] [x]. The selected object will be simultaneously removed from the HTML5 Tracker list and the slide.
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? We offer two live, online Captivate 6 classes. Adobe Captivate Essentials and Adobe Captivate Beyond the Essentials (Advanced).
Last week I wrote about the project expiry issue people are having when they use the trial version of Captivate 6 to open projects created with the trial version of Adobe Captivate 6.
As I mentioned last week, if you are using the licensed version of Captivate, you can set an expiration date for a project by choosing File > Publish Settings. From the Project category at the left, you can select Start and End and then select Project Expiry Date.
Last week I mentioned that the expiry issue can be resovled for trial users if someone using a licensed version of the software simply opens an expired project and sets an expiration date for a date in the future.
I've gotten several emails from people using the trial version of Captivate who are still having issues previewing projects that were created with the trial software. It turns out that the issue is with those projects that were opened with the licensed version of the software, saved and then closed (but never published with a future expiration date).
When I created the data files for my new Adobe Captivate 6: The Essentials and Adobe Captivate 6: Beyond the Essentials books, I created the projects with both the trial and licensed versions of Captivate 6. Just prior to posting the projects on my web server for people to download, I opened each projects with the fully licensed version of the software, saved and then closed.
Once I heard that people were having trouble previewing project files with the trial software I got nervous. As a test, I downloaded the project files used in both books from my server. I then opened the downloaded projects on a PC running the trial version of Captivate 6. I was able to work on the projects without issue. However, when I previewed the project, I was mortified to see a project expiration message.
Since I had never set an expiration date for any of the projects that were posted to the web server, it's clear that the expiration date was self-imposed by the Captivate 6 trial.
In the end, I re-opened every project using my licensed version of Captivate 6. I set the Project Expiry Date to March 31, 2016, and then saved and closed each project. (I did not republish any of the projects.)
I re-posted the edited projects to my web server. Then I re-downloaded the files to the PC running the trial version of Captivate 6. Not only did the projects open, they previewed and published perfectly.
This expiration drama is something new in Adobe Captivate 6, and I'm hoping the limitation will be lifted at some point by an Adobe patch or update. In any event, if you are using my Captivate books, you won't have to worry about this issue again until 2016. By then, I'm pretty confident we'll be talking about Adobe Captivate 8… or 9.
Note: If you are going to use the trial version of Captivate to work through my Captivate books, you should visit my site and download the newest data files. If you downloaded the data files last week, keep in mind that I just uploaded the "fixed" data files to my server over the past few days. If you downloaded the data files for either of my new Captivate 6 books earlier than last Friday, please throw the files away and download the updated files. All of the files will have modification dates of August 31, 2012. If you are using the licensed version of Captivate, there is no need to download the files again.
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? We offer two live, online Captivate 6 classes. Adobe Captivate Essentials and Adobe Captivate Beyond the Essentials (Advanced).
Have you, or a Subject Matter Expert, created a presentation using Microsoft PowerPoint? Are you moving away from presentations and toward eLearning lessons created with Captivate? And are you bummed because all of that great PowerPoint content is basically going to have to be redone in Captivate? Don't throw those PowerPoint presentations away. You can import PowerPoint presentations into an existing Captivate project, or create a new Captivate project that uses the PowerPoint slides.
Importing a PowerPoint presentation into Captivate couldn't be easier. From the Welcome screen, select From Microsoft PowerPoint, open the PowerPoint presentation and a few clicks later, the presentation will be reborn as a Captivate project.
During a standard PowerPoint import process, PowerPoint pptx presentations are first converted to the ppt format, and then converted to SWF. However, if you have ever used the PowerPoint to Captivate workflow, you are likely aware that some PowerPoint features, such as certain animations, Smart Art, text effects (glow, shadow, 3D, reflection, etc.), and audio bookmarks were not supported within Captivate.
In Captivate 6, if you select the new High Fidelity option, the import process will take native pptx files directly to Captivate SWF (the ppt conversion is skipped). This option, which is only available in Captivate for Windows, will result in content in Captivate that matches the original PowerPoint presentation better than ever before.
If you elect to go with a High Fidelity import, keep the following in mind:
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Looking to learn Captivate quickly? We offer two live, online Captivate 6 classes. Adobe Captivate Essentials and Adobe Captivate Beyond the Essentials (Advanced).