Intro

Multiple users asked me how to get rid of the default Success/Failure messages on quiz slides in the New Captivate version. Especially now that it is possible to have the correct answers hidden during Review, I understand this question. Depending on the situation, you do not always want an immediate feedback after each question.

The two-step Submit process which I have described multiple times on my blog remains the same as in previous versions:

1. Learner clicks the Submit button, a Success/Last Attempt message appears. That message warns to click the slide or press Y to continue
2. Learner presses Y or clicks the slide and the pause is released, the specified actions on Success, Last attempt will be done.

That situation is for a question slide with one attempt. If there are multiple attempts in case of Failure a Retry message will appear.

All messages in the new version are now in one multistate object. It replaces the individual messages which were in a static fluid box in the previous versions for a responsive project. 

It is impossible to delete that multistate object, there is no option to get rid of all the messages like was possible in previous versions by the setup in this screenshot:

Consequence of such an edit was that the first step of the Submit process automatically was deleted: no pausing after Submit, no need for the warning for the second step. I didn't succeed to achieve this in the New version, which means that you need to warn the learner to click another time. I have tried many workflows without success: changing the label of the Submit button to 'Continue' is only one of my failed attempts. 

Example output

It is a short quiz with 5 questions. I added an audio clip to the first quiz slide to warn about the extra click. All questions have only one attempt, and there is also one attempt on Quiz level. Review (without seeing correct answers) is possible from the Score slide. I did hide the review messages on that slide as well and added an extra slide (with exit button) after it. Like in previous versions it is still a recommendation not to have the score slide as last slide. You can watch the example below (fixed resolution) or the responsive version by clicking this link. Know that the loading time can be long for this version.

Workflow 1 - all quiz slides

This workflow can be used if you do not want any Success/Failure message. In that case it is important to change the settings before inserting the question slides! It cannot be applied to existing question slides.

Step 1: Default labels

• Open Quiz Preferences, from the Preferences (Edit menu for Windows, Captivate menu for Mac).
• Go to Default labels
• Delete the text for the labels you want to hide. In this example I deleted the Success and Last Attempt message:
  

  

Step 2: System colors

You are aware of the fact that this version has no longer object styles. Each of the states in the multistate object with the feedback messages has a solid color at 100% Alpha in the default Themes. Color management has not improved, it is guessing which colors have been used. For the Success message it is the Success System color, and for the Failure message it is the Error System color. I didn't spend (waste) time trying to find by trial and error where those colors were used in other situations, but changed the Alpha for those colors to 0% which makes them transparent.

Result of those two steps: you'll not see a Success or a Last Attempt message, but still have to click the slide to proceed. If you have multiple attempts on quiz level, the Retry message will still appear because you didn't edit that message nor the fill of the box. Same for the message when learner clicks the Submit button without choosing an answer.

Workflow 2 - individual quiz slides

This workflow can be used when you don't want to hide the feedback messages for all question slides, or when you want to hide them on existing  slides.

Step 1: Text color

You cannot delete the text in a state, only edit it to create a custom feedback. You can however change the color of the text. So I changed that color to the background color of the question slide. This screenshot is taken on the Score slide, for the state 'Success' of the Review message. You need to do this for all states with messages you want to hide.

Step 2: Fill colors

This is similar to step 2 in the first workflow. For the states to hide set the Alpha of the Fill color to 0%. In the screenshot of Step 1 of this workflow, you see that this has already been done for the Success state of that area. In the last screenshot of Workflow 1 you have seen where you find the Alpha setting in the Color management dialog box.

Help?

I would be very happy if another expert could find a way to:

• Style the Back/Next Review buttons the same way as all the other quiz buttons. I really miss the object styles. You cannot use Copy/Paste Appearance on buttons of the quiz/score slide. You cannot apply a new style to all the other objects with same type/style as in previous versions.
• Avoid the second step of the Submit Process.µ
• Avoid the weird state change of the images on the T//F questions. I know that you cannot disable the Hover state really, but I changed that state to look exactly like the Normal state. Nevertheless that original Hover state appears after submitting the answer.
• Getting rid of the dimming or text and state change during Review. Light grey on white background is not very comfortable for people with weak eyes.

Intro

If you have followed me since a while, you know that I am a great fan of Shared actions.  However I am aware that many developers seem to be afraid of those shared actions. In this post I will try to demystify the 'shared action', and answer some questions.

First of all: the biggest advantage of a shared action is its reusability. Whenever you need an action which will be used multiple times in a project, or which you plan to use in more than one project, it is worthwhile to consider the use of a shared action. Here are some other reasons. You can skip this part and come back to it later:

• When used within one project, you are using instances of the same shared action. If you prefer using duplicated and edited advanced actions the file size will be bigger. It can be compared with the use of multiple instances of the same graphic/audio clip.
• Shared actions appear in the Project Library with all the functionalities of Library assets: how many times uses, on which events etc..
• You can transfer an existing advanced action to a new project using copy/paste of the object triggering the action: a button, click box, TEB (success/Last attempt events), slide (Enter/Exit event). If variables are used in the advanced action, they will be created in the new project. However, in many cases, commands in the advanced actions will revert to Continue if what they are referring to is not available in the new project. Example: missing slides for navigation commands, missing states or even multistate objects...  
• Transferring a shared action to a new project is a breeze: drag the action from the original Library to the Library of the new project. Variables which are not used as parameters will be created (similar to copy/paste for advanced actions). Since the shared action is not connected with any event, you don't have to bother about having everything in place before transferring the shared action.
• There is no built-in way to document Advanced actions in Captivate. A shared action however allows to add a description to the action and to the parameters if any are used. 

There are some limitations to shared actions:

• It is not possible to trigger a shared action from a hyperlink.
• You cannot attribute a shared action to several events at once, as is possible for an advanced action.

Beware: not all advanced actions are suited as shared action. In a recent post about 'Hint after x failed clicks' I explained a use case which was meant as introduction for Captivate users new to variables and advanced actions. You may have a look at that first blog post:  https://blog.lilybiri.com/automatic-hint-after-x-failed-clicks

Conversion to shared action

It is a good idea to create and test the action as advanced action before creating the shared action. This was the advanced action  created in the mentioned blog post, triggered by the Success event of the  'wrong' hotspots (5) in the example:

Two user variables were used: 

• v_attempts tracks the number of clicks on the button/hotspot
• v_failure is used in the Failure feedback message and allows to change the content of that message. The default failure message will be replaced by a Hint message after the defined number of clicks.
  

First version Shared Action

Open the advanced action in the dialog box, use the button Save as Shared action, and this dialog box will appear:

In the screenshot you see that I have filled in the description. It is important to do so, try to explain in short sentences what the action will do exactly. It may seem a loss of time, but if you reuse the action a couple of months later, you'll understand why I emphasize this.

In the main part you see the 'parameters', and in this particular case all of them show the green check mark. This means that you can save the shared action as it is. Result will be that the parameters remain static, cannot be changed when you attach the action to an event.  They will not need a description neither. Comparing with the advanced action:

Pro

• The description of the action, which is impossible for an advanced action.
• Its appearance in the Project Library with all the functionality of other assets.
• For reusability in another project: you can drag the shared action from this library opened as external library to the Project library of the new project. For an advanced action you would need to copy/paste one of the wrong hotspots to the new project.

Con

• You cannot attach the shared action to all wrong hotspot events at once, you need to do it one by one. The advanced action could be attached in one workflow by selecting all the wrong hotspots.
• For another hotspot slide in the same project it will be easier to create a duplicate advanced action, and edit the Hint text (value for the variable v_failure).

Second version Shared action

In the first screenshot I marked two parameters with a question mark:

• Parameter '2': literal indicating the number of required wrong clicks before showing the Hint.
• Parameter 'Click on the icon 'Responsive project'': the new value (literal) for the variable v_failure to replace the failure text by the Hint text.

You can make the static parameter dynamic by clicking the check box, and entering a description for the parameter. To me the most important candidate is the Hint text. Making that parameter dynamic, means that you can enter a different Hint text for each new attachment of the action to an event. Beware: the correct checkmark will only appear after confirming the description of the active parameter:

This makes the action flexible: you only have to enter the Hint text as parameter whenever you attach the shared action to an event.

Pro

• Besides the description of the action, the meaning of the parameter will appear whenever you apply the shared action.
• Its appearance in the Project Library.
• Reusability in any new project remains.
• File size will be lower compared with using duplicate advanced actions.
• You can edit the Hint text for each instance.

Con

• You cannot attach the shared action to multiple events at once.
• You need to fill in the text parameter with each attachment (copy/paste is possible)

Third version Shared action

You can make the action even more flexible by declaring the number of wrong clicks to be a dynamic parameter.  Using that shared action you'll be able to change the number of wrong clicks before showing the Hint instead of the Failure message.  Like increasing the number for a more complicated hotspot slide. I don't have to explain this screenshot anymore:

More tips

I may write out a third blog about using this shared action as template for advanced actions, including possible enhancement by adding graphical (audio) assets to the Hint text message.

If you want to learn more about using Shared actions, please have a look at my 'crash course'. 

Shared Actions : intro

Lesson 1 (video)

Lesson 1 (step-by-step)

Lesson 2 (video)

Lesson 2 (step-by-step)

To circumvent the "Con" of shared actions not being able to apply to multiple events at once, remember that you can easily create an advanced action from a shared action. Here is an example:

Using Shared action as template