Intro

This short blog post is meant to answer another question on the Adobe forums. It is at the end of this thread:

https://community.adobe.com/t5/captivate-discussions/pausing-slide-audio/td-p/12312792

This was the goal:

1. Slide has narration as slide audio
2. There are multiple shapes used as buttons, which should trigger an audio clip using 'Play Audio' command; those shapes have no pausing point.
3. When a shape button is clicked the audio clip should play, but the slide audio should pause, and resume after the audio clip ends.
4. There is at least one more interactive object pausing the slide towards the end. Idea is that the learner can still listen to the audio clips after the slide audio has finished.

This learner tried to solve this with simple actions, using the feature 'Pause slide audio when clicked'. It cannot be solved that way however.

Example project

Watch this short project created to double-check my proposed workflow with a shared action for the shape buttons. After the Title slide you'll see a slide with a Next button to pause the slide, and a shared action triggered by each of the shape buttons. A copy of the Timeline panel can be found on the third slide. I used some slides from the Aspire Quick Start Project.

You can open a rescalable version using this link or watch the embedded version below:

Setup

You could see the slide audio (narration) in the Timeline panel. The audio clips for the shape buttons were imported to the Project library, and their exact duration was checked, because it will be needed in the shared action. Have a look at the shared action with its two parameters (name audio clip and duration clip):

It has two parameters:

The command Pause in the action will pause the slide audio automatically, contrary to a pausing point of an interactive object. You don't have to change any setting in the shape button Properties. The Continue command which will be done at the end of the audio clip will take care of resuming the slide audio.

Do not bother about having two clips playing at the same time. If the learner clicks another shape button before the first audio clip ends, that first clip is stopped automatically. No need to add a command like 'Stop triggered audio' which is only needed when you want to stop a playing clip without playing a new at the same time.

The user is concerned that applying the shared action will take more time than the approach he tried out with simple actions. However, since you don't have to change settings in the shape button Properties panel, the shared action approach needs even less clicks. Check it out. There is no danger of choking Captivate which could happen if you use duplicate advanced actions since you are using instances of one shared action (ecologically).

Problem

The previous solution works fine until the learner has reached the pausing point of the Next button. At that moment, the Continue command in the shared action will override the pausing and the playhead will continue until it reaches the end of the slide and moves to the next slide. It is necessary to cope with that different situation. The Delay command nor the Continue command take into account possible pausing points. 

There are two different situations, each needing a different workflow:

• Learner clicks a shape button before the narration has ended. In that case the slide audio needs to be paused, and to resume after the end of the triggered audio clip.
• Learner clicks a shape button after the narration has ended. You need to maintain the pause which occurs at the pausing point of the Next button.

This screenshot shows the Timeline panel, illustrating the two situations. Situation 1 in red, situation 2 in blue.

This needs apparently a conditional action for the shape buttons. You have to figure out which situation is valid. For that reason you need to know when the narration has ended. It is easy to see its duration in the timeline, in this case it was 28secs. To calculate the frame number at the end of the frame I used micro-navigation. If you are new to this type of navigation, please have a look at this blog post:

Intro to Micro-navigation

Solution

Variables

You need two user variables:

• v_start: will store the frame number of the first frame of the slide with the narration and shape buttons
• v_stop: will store the frame number at the end of the narration
  

Contrary to the timeline panel where seconds restart on each slide, the frame numbering continues throughout the project.

Shared Actions

EnterSlideAct

This shared action will be triggered with the Slide Enter event, and is meant to calculate the value of v_stop. Have a look:

The first frame number of the slide is stored in v_start. The duration of the narration is converted to frames, by multiplying with the system variable cpInfoFPS. The only parameter is that duration.

PlayAudio_Act

The former standard action has been transformed to a conditional action:

Same parameters as before. The condition checks if the learner clicked the shape button before or after the end of the narration. Only when the narration hadn't been finished it will need to resume. That has been done with the Delay command and Continue. That is not necessary after reaching the end of the narration, because the pausing point of the Next button needs to be kept pausing, and the narration doesn't need to resume.

This shared action is needed for each of the interactive objects used to play an audio clip.  In the project I used shape buttons. They are visible in the timeline screenshot as SB_Topic1…. SB_Topic4.

By using shared actions instead of duplicate advanced actions, you avoid choking the project if you need lot of those actions which was the case for the user asking the question. Moreover multiple instances of the same shared action also will result in a smaller file size. Of course they are also very easy to transfer to future projects. You can learn more about using shared actions in these videos:

Use Shared Actions: Lesson 1 (crash course)

(re)Use Shared Actions: Lesson 2 (crash course)

Intro

Adding audio clip

• Import the audio clips to the project Library
  

  
• Drag the audio clip to the timeline of the slide (or to the stage, be careful not to drag to an object on the stage). Originally the slide timeline on most QSP slides is 3 seconds. If the audio clip is longer, a dialog box will appear. Choose the first option to extend the slide timeline.
  

  
• Audio timeline appears below the slide timeline. I will increase the slide timeline duration manually bit more, so that I’m able to move the audio clip to leave a small gap before and after the audio.
  

  
• You see in previous screenshot that all the object timelines have been extended automatically.  Reason is that most - but not all  - slides in the QSP are timed for the 'Rest of the Slide'. Check Timing Properties. Have also a look at Tip 1 below.
  
  
• Test the audio, not by using Play Slide but by using a real Preview. This means for a non-responsive project that you need to use F11, Preview HTML5 in Browser. For responsive projects any Preview is fine. The three following tips are meant to fix problems detected during previewing.

Tip 1: Fix when objects disappear

In this slide (12 from Aspire) some objects have a timeline keeping the original duration of 3secs. When playing that slide in Preview, those objects will disappear after 3 seconds.

How to fix?

Tip 2: Pause commands on slide events

Many slides in the Aspire project have the setup as shown in this screenshot.

This setup will prevent the audio clip on the slide from playing because the Pause command on the first frame will pause also slide a udio.

You have to take out that pause. You can safely replace it by ‘No action’ which is the default setting both for On Enter and On Exit slide events Result will be that the slide will not be paused, but the playhead will move seamlessly to the next slide when the audio has finished. That is IMO the most logical situation. If you want to mimick a presentation, where each slide is paused at the end and needs learner intervention, you can change the On Exit action to ‘Pause’ or add a button ‘Next’ to pause the slide. However do not forget that this may not be the best practice.

Tip 3: Pausing points

Contrary to the Pause command (see tip 2) a pausing point will not pause slide audio, although the playhead will be paused and so will all graphics assets/effects which are running or appear later.  By default, all pausing points will be set to occur at 1.5secs, either on the slide (for Quiz slides and Drag&Drop), or after the start of the interactive object timeline.

In most cases the increase of the slide duration due to inserting an audio clip will not cause problems, when the pausing point is due to an interactive object like a button. Reason is that the button will often trigger an action jumping to another slide, or revealing some content. The frames after the pausing point (inactive part) are not important in that case.

Possible issues can occur on quiz slides, if you insert an audio clip.  Here is an example (T/F slide 23 in Alliance):

You see the pausing point on the slide timeline at 1.5secs. Some smart shapes are not timed for the rest of the project (see Tip 1). However since the slide is paused at 1.5secs, before the end of those shape timelines, you’ll not be bothered by that while the audio continues playing (not paused). However, if while testing that slide, you have to wait a long time after the Submit process, and you see the shapes disappearing, that is due to the Actions setup in Quiz Properties. They were set in this slide as shown here:

Both actions are set to ‘Continue’, which means that the playhead is released. It will have to move through all frames after the pausing point (inactive part), and only moves to the next quiz slide after reaching the last frame. Not exactly what you want. Two possible fixes:

Fix 1: 

As is the case for other quiz slides in the QSP projects, replace the action ‘Continue’ by ‘Go to Next Slide’. You don’t have to bother about the wrongly timed smart shapes in that case.

Fix 2: 

Move the pausing point on the quiz slide with the mouse (not possible in Timing properties) to place it near the end of the slide. In that case you have to extend the smart shape timelines as explained in Tip 1. This workflow is recommended over the first fix,  if you expect slow connections with the LMS.

Similar problems can occur on Drag&Drop slides but will not expand on that. Know however that the pausing point is not visible on D&D slides in the Timeline panel as is the case for quiz slides.

Some links

Pausing Captivate’s Timeline

For quiz slides, the Submit Process is explained in detail in this post:

Submit Process

If you want to add audio clips from another type than slide audio:

Pausing Timeline and Audio

Intro

A while ago I published several blogs and interactive movies (created with Captivate) about the ins and outs of the Timeline in Captivate, which is still the feature that causes most frustrations because of lack of understanding. With CP2019 some new features are added to that timeline, for the VR projects (360 slides) and for interactive video. Looks like it is time to explain those new features. This blog has focus on the timeline in 360 slides inserted in a non-responsive project.  Those slides are not able to have overlay Quiz slides as is possible in a full VR project. In a future post I will talk about the overlay Quiz slides and their timeline. I published recently a short post with some tips for a VR project.

360 slides

In a non-responsive project you can use the big button Slides to insert a slide which has a centered button to choose either a 360° static image or a 360° video. It is not possible to drag a 360 item to the slide from the Library, you need to use that button.

The 360 image is inserted as background, whereas a normal image inserted on a slide will have an individual timeline. In the Library you will see the images in the Background folder, and you have to use 'Find Background'.

Static 360 image

Editing a 360 slide is more limited than editing a normal slide. You will not have an Actions tab in the Properties panel, which means that you cannot use the On Enter/On Exit events for the slide. The Big Button Bar is mostly dimmed. There are only two assets that can have a timeline as you are used to:

• Audio (under Media button) can be added as slide audio, which will have its timeline as expected under the slide timeline. Slide audio can be paused on a 360 slide by a hotspot, just like by any interactive object: you find the feature 'Stop Slide Audio' on the Options tab of the hotspots (including Character which is also inserted as hotspot). 
• Label (under Text button): can be added, formatted and timed. It can be used for titles or for instructions that need to be available even if the playhead moves. Labels can be moved and will be 'distorted' to fit in the spherical image if necessary. IT is not possible to apply an effect on the labels. 

You will see 'Characters' available' under the Media button as well. However inserting a character will create a hotspot where the character is used as custom image.  It is not possible to resize the image, only the location. In most cases the characters will be very big due to that lack of editing.

The functionality of a 360 image is mainly in the so-called  'HOTSPOTS' to be inserted from the big button with that name. Referring to existing terminology, a hotspot is a new type of  interactive object similar to click boxes, (shape) buttons. However hotspots have a timeline with zero duration. In the timeline the visual representation of a hotspot is  either a half circle (brownish) if the hotspot is on the first frame of the slide, or a full circle (when on a later frame).  A selected hotspot has a blue circle surrounding the normal icon. In the following screenshot Hotspot2 is selected. The generic names were kept, but I have changed the stacking order by dragging hotspot 2 on top of Hotspot3.  Each hotspot is marked on the stage and after publishing by one of the SVG's, a custom image or a character as mentioned above. 

Default setting for each hotspot is to keep the timeline paused. For simple actions triggered by buttons in normal slides, the default setting is 'Continue playing the project'. For the hotspots, that setting is unchecked by default (if you trigger 'Play Audio' with a hotspot it will change as expected to Continue movie after audio is finished).

If you leave that option unchecked, the playhead will remain paused. If you use the option 'Explanatory', this means that all hotspots sharing that frame will be visible to the learner. In some cases you'll have only hotspots in the first frame (look at the sample project), but to avoid overload in a complicated image, you could choose to have groups of hotspots in a later frame. You see an example in the screenshot of the timeline inserted earlier: two hotspots are in the first frame and 3 more in frame 45(1,5secs). In that case you have to release the playhead, which can be done in two ways:

1. By checking the option 'Continue playing the project', not so interesting if you have set up the image in 'Explanatory' mode where the earner can choose the sequence of clicking the hotspots. But it can be a solution in 'Guided' mode.
2. By adding a hotspot with the action 'Continue', which is available in the dropdown list. That was the case for the screenshot above: it has a character hotspot (with attached audio) and a second Continue hotspot. One of the hotspot icons is clearly recognizable as a 'Play' icon.
3. By showing the playbar (and maybe instruct the learner to click the Play button). Both commands 'Hide Playbar' and 'Show Playbar' are available to be triggered by a hotspot, but I was never able to use them using a hotspot in a slide. However you can show the playbar by default or use a slide event on a previous static slide.

As I explained in previous articles, the Timeline panel is also a Layers panel, defining the stack order of objects. In a 360 slides the stacking order is not always respected: even if you put a label on top of the stack, it will always be covered by any hotspot in the same location.

However for the hotspots it also has a third functionality, only for Guided mode. The stacking order will define the sequence in which the hotspots are presented to the user: starting from the bottom. In the example screenshot, at frame 45 hotspot 2 will be presented before hotspot 4.  You can change the order by switching the layers.

The dropdown list with actions to be triggered by the hotspots is more limited than for another interactive object. I already mentioned the command 'Continue' and its possible use. There are several navigation commands (previous, next slide, jump to slide and to last visited slide). There is the Exit and No Action commands which are self-explanatory. The most useful  commands are :

• Display Image:  the image will be displayed for a duration specified in the Properties panel, Actions tab. You cannot choose an image in the Library, and once the image is imported it will not appear in the Images folder of the Library but in the Backround folder. Images folder only has the SVG icons of the used hotspots, whereas the SVG folder remains empty. Once the image has been displayed for the chosen duration,  the hotspot is converted to a visited state but remains active.  It is possible to click another hotspot before the duration of the first has ended. If you want all displayed assets to remain you have to choose a long duration for each of them.
• Display Text: behaves the same way as Display image, you need to specify the duration. Very little formatting is possible, hence a suggestion in a previous blog post to replace Text b: y images with text in the wanted font and with controlled colors for the background. Hotspot will also have a visited state.
• Play Audio: you can import a clip, or get it from the Library (they are stored in the Audio folder). No need to define a duration, once an audio clip is started it will continue playing unless you launch the command 'Stop Triggered Audio' from another hotspot.  If you have several hotspots using the Play Audio command and the learner clicks next hotspot before the first audio is finished, that first audio will automatically be stopped. That is the normal behavior of those audio clips as I explained in 'Pausing Timeline and Audio Clips'

360 Video slide

When you insert a 360 video in a 360 slide, it will end up in the correct folder 'Video' in the Library (under Media). I couldn't find a 'Find in Library' option. The video is represented the same way as a Video Demo slide or a FMR slide in a software simulation, it is merged into the background of the slide (mention for Usage in the Library uses also 'Background of slide).

Of course, the location of the playhead is now more important than for a 360 image. You can have an image where only the first frame is used to stack all the needed hotspots. However that makes no sense for a video, where movement is crucial. It will not be easy to create an engaging experience if the video has already audio embedded, because each hotspot will pause the video, which means also the embedded audio. Adding slide audio is possible the same as for a static 360 slide. However synchroniang will not be easy neither.  I need more exploration of this type of slides, but here are some first tips:

• Try to offer audio only by using hotspots. I start the video with an inserted character that is set up to play audio, and have the video continue immediately after the audio is finished.
• If you have only one hotspot in a frame, activate also the option 'Continue playing the project' whether you use Display Image/Text or Play Audio.
• If you have more than one hotspot in the same location, and you use the Guided status, keep that setting only for the last hotspot to be presented. For the Explanatory status, you probably will need the playbar or a hotspot with the Continue command.

In the screenshot you see the video slide in its first frame. That frame has a character (selected) as hotspot which will play auio. The label indicates what the learner has to  do, but cannot be put on top of the character. When the audio is finished the video starts playing. It will pause again at 4.3 seconds which has two hotspots. The last hotspot has also Continue selected, status was here Guided.

Intro

Last week at the Adobe eLearning Conference in DC I presented two sessions about the Timeline. The first part 'Demystifying Captvate's Timeline' allowed me to explain the basics without having to rush as was the case in the Adobe Learning Summit at Las Vegas 2017 (watch the interactive version of that presentation in: Captivate's Timeline). The second part 'Mastering TImeline' had its focus on more advanced workflows, using micronavigation, advanced/shared actions and multistate objects. In the first part I didn't use any advanced nor shared action, just offered some small practical tips. For those who couldn't participate in the conference I will summarize those tips.In this article you'll find 3 tweaks.

Tip 1: Pausing all slides at the end

This request often appears in the forum, and is also useful when using Captivate for presentations  (as I usually do). The user has to take an action to continue to the next slide. Two possible situations: you are using a default playbar, or custom navigation. Both workflows are using a shape button on master slides. Shape buttons are the only interactive objects allowed on master slides. You can use them in non-responsive and responsive projects (both Fluid boxes and Breakpoint views).

With Default Playbar

• Open the Master slide panel
• Select the Main Master slide
• Add a shape button, with Alpha = 0 for the Fill and width = 0 for the stroke to make it invisible to the user
• Check the settings for that shape button in the Actions tab of its Properties panel, to look like this screenshot:
  

  
  
  No action is needed for this shape button, its unique use is to Pause the slide. Each shape button set up this way will pause slides using this master slide at the end of the slide, whatever its duration.
• Check if the daughter master slides have the option 'Show Main Master Slide Objects' checked. With the included themes, that is the case for most master slides, with the exception of the Title and the Blank master slide.
  

  

With Custom Navigation

If you use master slides with an inserted Back and/or Next shape button for custom navigation, you can use that shape button with the same settings as described under the previous workflow. Those buttons will have a Fill and perhaps also a stroke, and they may not be on the main master slide but on other master slides. You just have to check that each master slide has at least one shape button to pause the slide.

Tip 2: Reset a slide

This tweak can be used in several situations:

• to reset a knowledge check slide
• to reset a Drag&Drop slide configured as knowledge check slide
• to reset effects, including motion effects
• .....

In the second presentation I explained an advanced workflow using micronavigation, but this workflow is easier, though it will increase the number of slides, which means that you cannot use the system variables cpInfoCurrentSlide and cpInfoSlideCount to show the progess of the slides. Try this out:

1. Insert a short dummy slide before the slide that you want to reset. Give it a timing of 0,1sec (shortest possible).
2. On the slide to reset, insert a (shape) button which you can style as you wish.
3. The success action of that button should be: Go to Previous Slide'. When you click that button, the playhead moves to the previous slide which is so short that it is practically invisible. Since the content slide is re-entered it will automatically be reset for the situations mentioned above.

This workflow is also valid for all types of cptx-projects, responsive or not.

Tip 3: Avoiding frustration in Quiz

Quiz and score slides have a default pausing point at 1.5secs. That pausing point is visible on the Timeline, but is not present in the Timing Properties panel. Here is a short description of the 'role' of this pausing point:

1. On Quiz slides it is linked with the two-step Submit process (and Submit button). In the first step the playhead remains paused while the learner sees the feedback messages. In the second step, the playhead is released. If you keep the default Success/Last Attempt actions set to Continue, the playhead has to visit all the frames in the inactive part of the quiz slide (part after the pausing point) before reaching the next slide. You could change those actions to 'Go to Next slide', but sometimes (depending on the setup for transmitting the score, bandwidth etc) this could lead to problems.
   
   
2. On the Score slide the pausing point is linked with the Continue button. Contrary to the Submit pausing, the actions triggered by that button which you specify in the Quiz Preferences (If passing/failing grade) are only done when the playhead reaches the last frame of the score slide.

In both cases you can avoid frustrations by dragging the pausing point closer to the end of the slide timeline, but not completely till the end (leave a small inactive part). 

Moving the pausing point is even more required when you have slide audio on the question or score slide. In almost all cases, that slide audio will result in a longer slide duration than the default 3 seconds.  You have to know that it is not possible to pause slide audio on a quiz/score slide by a pausing point, as is possible on other slides when using an interactive object. You may not be aware of the pause at all, audio will just continue. Many users are confused by that.  If you leave the pausing point at 1,5secs, the learner will have to wait a frustrating long time when completing the Submit process (quiz slide) or leaving the score slide with the Continue button. Make sure to drag the pausing point in such a situation:

Tip 4: Forcing views

As a professor with a lot of experience in tutorials for adult learners, I really dislike this request that appears too often on the forums: how can we force a learner to 'view' all the content on a slide. Forcing viewing doesn't mean understanding, nor learning at all, can even have the opposite effect. But that is off topic.

You have to forget the default playbar in this situation. Each slide will need a Next button. The timeline of that button has to start after all content has appeared and all audio has been listened to. Timelne will look similar to this screenshot:

Such a setup will become very annoying if you allow the user to revist the slide: he will have to wait again until all audio has played and all content has appeared to be able to proceed. Is there a solution? Sure, but not without advanced/shared actions. Watch out for a next blog post, linked with the second part of the Timeline presentation. I will offer you a shared action that makes it very easy to avoid that boring situation on second and later visits. 

Intro

At the Adobe Learning Summit (Las Vegas - 24 October 2017) I was invited to present a session about the Timeline for advanced workflows. It is one of my favorite subjects (bit below my most preferred topic 'Advanced/Shared actions') because I see so many questions on the forum that are due to not or misunderstanding the Timeline functionality.

Tutorial

For those users who were not able to attend ALS2017, I converted my Captivate presentation into a self-paced learning tutorial.

It has been published as Scalable HTML5 project. Autoplay is turned off (not allowed in some OS), just click the triangle button to start the movie (with narration). You can watch it directly on any device from this link

The tutorial has at its end links to different published movies, examples using the described features of the Timeline. Several features are used in the movie itself: skipping audio on the dashboard (second slide) on later visits, Delay commands for automatically building lists on different slides. Be sure to use the circular button at the bottom to show the value of the system variable cpInfoCurrentFrame, to discover (some of) my secrets.

Feedback

I would appreciate feedback and welcome questions. Are you interested in learning more about the examples? Are the mysteries not totally clear to you? Please let me know... If you want a copy of the handouts created for this presentation, send a mail to info@lilybiri.com.

There is one exception: you can also click the radio button left of the slide timeline. In that case the slide will be hidden (with all its content) and it will not appear when previewing/publishing. It is an alternative work flow for using the right click menu on slide(s) in the Filmstrip, option 'Hide Slide'. With both work flows you'll see a dimmed slide in the Filmstrip and an eye icon (not a button) as indicator.

Eye button in the Properties panel: Visibility in Output  

If you want an object to be initially invisible in the published course, you need to click this button in the Properties panel (inspector) of that object, top left. It is almost the opposite button of the first because the object will not disappear on the stage at all. Why would you hide an object in a published course? Maybe because you'll want to make it visible later on.  Example: you want to allow navigation to the Next slide only after certain actions have been performed by the learner (like clicking hotspots, or entering text in fields). Showing an object will be done with the command 'Show'. Making an object invisible by using this second Eye button can also be done on runtime by the action 'Hide' and that is often a better approach.  Since you can show a hidden object, it means that the object is included in the published version which is not the case with a hidden slide. A hidden slide is not included in the published course.

Eye button in the Drag&Drop panel

When this button is set to 'active', and you did set up the Drag&Drop interactivity by defining the drag sources, the drop targets and the links for correct answers those three components are made visible: green rectangles for the drag sources, blue rectangles for the drop targets and blue arrows for the links. When you deactivate this eye icon, those indicators will disappear. Since it happens that Captivate deactivates that button without your consent, it is good to know how to make those indicators visible: click on the barred eye icon: 

Intro

Use Case - description

Scenario 1 

Standard Advanced Action ShowContent

Standard Advanced Action CloseContent

Scenario 2 

In this scenario aToggle button is used both for opening and closing the popup.

• You need an extra custom state for the popup button which indicates that it changes to a close button after having opened a popup:
  

  
• You'll need a variable to track the status: I will use v_visib, a Boolean, with value = 0 when the popup is not visible,
  and value = 1 when the popup is visible; since I used a shared action from an external library, that variable is created automatically.
  
  
• You'll need a conditional advanced action to be triggered by the Success action of the button:, this is the advanced action version created based on the shared action:
  

  
  
  

More Possibilities

An interactive video will often be spread over multiple slides, to offer navigation buttons to different parts of the video. It is not a problem to have the scenarios available on all slides: time both the button and the popup groups for the rest of the project, always on top.

I mentioned the possibility to group a close button with text, but groups with more objects are possible as well: image, shape, animations. Group all together, hide the group On Enter for the slide, and you only have to replace the single object in the scenarios above by the group. 

Turn the actions into shared actions, and keep them in a separate project. You can open the Library of that project as an external Library in future projects. Especially the toggle action, it will save time because you don't have to create the user variable.

Future use case, example of Pausing the timeline, will be about audio. It is more complicated because there are several ways to use audio in Captivate, perhaps I will need more than one post.

Intro

Seven years ago I started blogging about Captivate (with version 4 - 5). Most subjects are more advanced, you'll find many use cases for advanced and shared actions. Meanwhile I also have spent thousands of hours on the Captivate forums, answering questions ans solving issues. Moreover I am busy as a Consultant and a Trainer (for Captivate and other Adobe applications), both in live and online classes. Based on the combination of those 'Captivate' experiences with my former career as college professor, I planned to write this article to line up the three most important Challenges for any Captivate developer, especially for newbies.  It doesn't matter whether you are developing software simulations, soft skills training, responsive or normal projects, if you master those Captivate features you'll feel more comfortable and save a lot of time. Bonus for me: less questions on the forums :). Imagine standing before this natural stone porch, in the middle of the most beautiful desert in the world. You got that Captivate license, but how to start, where to go?

Challenge 1: Timeline

Why?

Resources

Nothing can replace a live (or virtual) training for this challenge, but recently I published a sequence of 5 articles on my blog and in the eLearning Community to clarify this subject.  Here are the links, not in the 'logical' sequence which I used for publishing, but ranked by importance:

Pausing the Timeline, why and how?

Captivate Timeline(s) in cptx-file demystified

Introduction

Color codes and shortcut keys

Captivate Timeline in cpvc (Video Demo)

Challenge 2: Quiz

Why?

Captivate quiz and score slides have pretty strict rules. A lot of functionality is built in the quizzing and score master slides. The two-step Submit process, the priority of the embedded objects cause a lot of problems for starting Captivate users. That explains why every blog post I ever wrote about Quizzing is very popular. Most of them, even after many years, are still visited daily. The challenge here is about the normal Quiz slides, not custom Quiz slides that are created using standard objects, widgets, variables and advanced/shared actions. Those custom question slides are challenging for intermediate/advanced users (watch out for a later blog post for those users). Drag&Drop slides, used as Question slides can be included in the starter's challenge because they make a quiz more engaging.

What a relief when the car transporting our food and cook was found after a long quest:

Resources

Some of these blog posts do need an update, although most of the information is still valid

Question Question Slides - part 1     with the new Review buttons in Captivate 9 the confusion Next-Skip is gone

Question Question Slides - part 2

Knowledge Check Slides

Drag&Drop tips

Drag&Drop Captivate 9 - InBuilt states

Challenge 3: Theme

Why?

It is one of the most hidden gems in Captivate: design of any project can be streamlined when using a custom Theme. A theme includes all object styles, master slides, skin and defaults for software simulations. All are based on a (custom) Theme colors palette, which can even be applied to most Learning Interactions. Creating or editing a theme before starting any project may seem a waste of time, but I guarantee that it will save a lot of time in the process. Small changes to the design, so often asked for, are done in minutes. In many circumstances a well-designed theme makes templates superfluous. 

Architects of Macchu Picchu knew very well how to prepare 'design' of their city. Sorry for my adding the acronym TQT (Timeline, Quiz, Theme):

Resources

Here are some links to get you started with Themes and Theme colors:

What's in a Theme/Template?

Theme Colors

Conclusion

This was my personal view on the stumbling blocks for Captivate starting users. I am not pointing to any step-by-step work flow which may seem astonishing. My focus is on what is often causing the most frustrations for the so-called 'newbies', whatever their experience with other applications. As a college professor I used Flipped classes long time before the word was invented: do not spend valuable training time by explaining processes that can easily be found somewhere (videos). Students do not need a trainer for them. Spend class time by taking away obstructions that are slowing down the learning process.

Intro

This last article about the Timeline is sort of a bonus for those who want to know 'everything' about the timeline panel. The color codes can be a quick visual help to recognize object timelines, and I personally use the shortcut keys quite a lot to avoid the many mouse movements to the different tabs in the Properties panel. 

If you have problems with the used terminology, maybe you missed some information from this articles, already published:

Captivate's Timelines demystified - Intro

Video Timeline demystified (cpvc)

Captivate's Timelines cptx-project

Pausing Captivate's Timeline (cptx)

Color coding

The color coding is the same for master slide timelines and slide timelines.  The hexadecimal code is just an indication because a lot of the timelines have a gradient fill..

• Audio timeline: dark grey (about #4E5156)
  
• (Master) slide timeline: beige (about #DBD7CE)
• Placeholder objects: orange (about #DCC399) with some exceptions (Content/Rollover Caption/Rollover Image)
• Content Placeholder: light blue (about #AFD7FF)
• Placeholders for Rollover Caption/Image: green (about #BFDD8B)
• Static objects: light blue (about #BEE8FB). Static objects are Text Captions, Text Animations, Shapes (not used as button), Highlight Boxes, Web objects, SVG's, Images, Videos, Animations, Characters, HTML animation. There are some exceptions
• Rollover Caption/Image have the green color like for the placeholder (about #BFDD8B)
• Rollover Slidelet is sort of a hybrid, between static and interactive: is also green (about #BFDD8B)
• Zoom object: also green (about #BFDD8B)
• Static widget/interaction: also green (about #BFDD8B)
• Mouse object: beige like the slide timeline (about #DBD7CE)
• Interactive objects: green (about #BFDD8B). Those include the buttons, click boxes, Text Entry Boxes, Shapes used as buttons, Learning interactions (static and interactive)
• Effect timelines: light red (#FBDAE1), turning to darker saturated red (#F584A7) when selected
  
  
• A selected timeline, with the exception of the slide audio  at the bottom, and effect timelines will always be blue (about #99BCBF)

Shortcut keys

I love shortcut keys, once published my favorites for moving/resizing objects (which are still functional). The timeline panel has also several shortcut keys, which can save time because you don't have to switch to the Properties panel all the time. Some of the shortcut keys also work for Effect timelines, but not all.
 

This shortcut key is not valid for individual Effect timelines

This shortcut key is not valid for individual Effect timelines but they'll move automatically with the object timeline   

Conclusion

Intro

This is the fourth post in a sequence of 5. The first post introduced features of all timelines, the second is focused on the specific aspects of the Video Demo Timeline, the third on the aspects of the normal/responsive projects (cptx) both for master slides and normal slides. To understand this article - perhaps the most important - I recommend to  read at least the first and the third article as a preparation. 

This topic is more suited for a live event: a real or a virtual training session. I expect a lot of questions, and those are easier to answer in a live event. I have presented several webinars for Adobe in the past (most about advanced and shared actions), but that practice seems to be discontinued since a while. If you want to participate in a meeting (Connect room), I'm prepared to organize it. Send me a note: either by mail (info@lilybiri.com), in the comments on this post, or use Twitter (my handle is @Lilybiri). In case of sufficient requests, I'll propose a date/hour (probably am PT, for users in USA) and will need an e-mail address for the invitations. As a bonus, will offer you some files.

Pause and Pausing points

Pausing the timeline means stopping the Playhead. However that can be done in in two ways, and they do not affect the items in the same way. Let me first explain what I mean by 'Pause' as opposed to 'Pausing Point'. You'll see that I compare them with two traffic signs: Pause with the red light, Pausing point with the Stop sign. But also in traffic, some 'items' do not respect those signs, legally or illegally. 

Pause 

This strict way of pausing can be achieved by one of these methods:

1. With the pause button on one of the default playbars.
   
   
2. By choosing the command 'Pause' to be triggered On Enter for a slide (doing it On Exit is not a good idea, because it will happen after the last frame, see previous post about events).  It can also be a (last) command in an advanced/shared action.
   
   
3. By using the Success event an interactive object (like a shape button) with the command 'Pause' either as a simple command or within an advanced/shared actions. Usually it will be the last command. 
   
   
4.  Alternative for 'Pause' command is to assign 1 to the system variable cpCmndPause (its default value is 0). This system variable controls the pause.

If you use a playbar, you'll see that the progress bar is stuck when Pause is encountered. To understand even better, I recommend to insert the system variable cpInfoCurrentFrame in a text container, displayed for the whole project (on top). 

UnPause?

You can use the Play button on the playbar, or need the command Continue, which is available as simple action and in the dropdown list in advanced actions.

Pausing point

1. Quiz or question slides: the pausing point is visible on the slide timeline, but not in the Timing Properties panel. Only way to move is by dragging. Default timing is at 1,5secs, and pause cannot be unchecked. Pausing point is linked with the two-step process triggered by the Submit button. However when selecting the Submit button, you'll not see the pause in the Timing Properties panel (as is the case for the D&D Submit button). Waiting is here for the user to click the Submit button, then to press Y or click on the slide
   

   
2. Score slide: same situation as for the quiz slides: visible in the slide timeline, not in the Timing Properties. Default timing is at 1,5secs. Pausing point is linked with the Continue button, but will not show in the Timing Properties panel of that button. Waiting here is for the user to click the Continue button.
   
   
3. Drag&Drop slide: is pausing at 1,5secs but the point is not visible on the timeline. You will not see it in the Timing Properties for the slide, but in the Actions tab of the D&D panel. It is linked with the Submit button, when selecting that button the Timing properties panel will show the timing of the pausing point. Waiting for the user to click the Submit button, or in case of Auto Submit waiting for a correct answer.
   

   
   
   
4. Interactive objects (click box, button, shape button, Text Entry Box) can have a pausing point, to be defined in the Timing Properties panel. That pausing point will be visible in the Timeline, and the part before the point is indicated as 'Active', part after the pausing point as 'Inactive'. Since a click box is invisible to the user, it has not inactive part, its pausing point will always be at the end of its timeline. Waiting is for the user to click either on or outside of the interactive object (click box, shape or normal button) or to confirm the Entry in a TEB. You can edit the pausing point by dragging in the Timeline or in a precise way by editing the Timing Properties panel. It is also possible to uncheck the Pause (see screenshot 3 in the Gallery).
   

   
   
   
5. Shape button on a master slide can have a pausing point. Since objects on a master slide have no duration, no Timing Properties panel, you have to indicate that you want it to pause, in the Actions tab of the Properties panel (see screenshot 4 in the Gallery). You can uncheck the pause there as well. The pausing point will be at the end of each slide, based on that master slide. It will not be visible in the timeline
   

   
6. Interactive widgets or learning interactions have a pausing point at 1 sec. It will not show up in the Timeline, you can find it in the Timing Properties.  Pause can be unchecked, but you'll not want to do that for this type of interactions.That is the place to edit or uncheck the Pause (see screenshot 5 in the Gallery). Static widgets/interactions do not have a pausing point. More info about difference  between interactive and static in: Widgets and Interactions
   

   

Bonus: You can download a (watermarked) pdf with this overview from PausingPoints.

UnPause?

It depends on the kind of pausing point:

1. For Question slides: the playhead is released after the second step of the Submit process and the actions defined in Question properties will be done.
   
   
2. For Score slide: similar, but after clicking the Continue button.
   
   
3. For Drag&Drop: exactly the same as for the Question slides, after clicking the Submit button.
   
   
4. For interactive objects on master or normal slides: if an advanced action is executed (Success/failure) the playhead is not released automatically. If you want this to happen you have to include a Continue or a navigation command like Jump to as last command in the action. If you use a simple action, the playhead will be released by default, but in CP9 it is possible to uncheck that default setting 'Continue playing the Project' (not done in this screenshot).
    

What is Paused?

Not everything is paused by the absolute Pause command, nor the Pausing points. Watch the interactive movie to understand better. Some items are never paused, some are paused by both Pausing points and the Pause command, some are only paused by the Pause command, not by the pausing points although there may be a workaround. 

The position of the playhead when pausing is important: objects for which the object timeline starts later than the pause will not appear until the playhead is released.

Same is the case for Effects which have a duration, a timeline: if the pause occurs while the effect is not finished, it will stall in the last position and continue only when the playhead is released.

Animations however are never paused, not even when you use the Pause command triggered by the On Enter event of a slide. They will always play.

Video clips inserted as Event video are totally independent: if they are playing when pausing, they'll continue to play. If a pause is occurring and the video is not yet started, the user will be able to use the Play button of the video control panel to watch the video. The only alternative way to pause event video is by using JavaScript (see Working with event videos). Video clips inserted as Multisynchronized video however will be paused by the Pause command and by a pausing point.

The situation is a lot more complicated for audio:

• Background audio is totally insensitive to Pauses or Pausing points: it will continue to play.
  
  
• Slide Audio: will automatically be paused by the Pause command, but not by a pausing point. It is possible to pause slide audio at a pausing point, to resume when the playhead is released if you check 'Stop Slide Audio' on the Options tab in the Properties panel of the interactive object.
  

  
• For the default pausing points on quiz slides, score slide, D&D slides you cannot pause the slide audio however. This seems confusing, and can lead to a problem. Slide audio clips automatically will increase the duration of the slide. You learned that the default pausing point of this type of slides is always set to 1,5seconds. If the playhead is released with the command 'Continue', it will have to visit all the remaining frames on the slide, those frames in the 'big' inactive part of the slide. To avoid that, I recommend that you change the default pausing time and make it just a little bit smaller than the slide duration. This is not necessary if the actions when releasing the playhead from its pausing point are a navigation to another slide, because the inactive part of the slide will just be skipped.
  
  
• Object audio: will be paused by the strict command Pause, but not by a pausing point! There is no workaround for this behavior for a Pausing point.
  
  
• Audio started with 'Play Audio' cannot be stopped not by Pause nor by a pausing point, the only way to stop it is by launching the command 'Stop Triggered Audio'. 

Why pausing?

This blog post has become very long, for which I apologize. For that reason I will write out some use cases, to illustrate the just described theory in later posts. You're welcome to post some ideas as well. Here are some appetizers:

• Instead of creating very long slides to fit the narrations, use the Play Audio command and have a pausing point on the slide. That can be a Next button, which offers total control to the user.
  
  
• Question slides with narration as slide audio: you need to move the pausing point.
  
  
• Create custom navigation: use shape buttons on the main master slide, only one of them needs a pausing point to give each user all the time needed to watch the slides.
  
  
• Create a slide with light boxes.
  
  
• Have multiple TEB's on one slide with a unique Submit button.
  
  
• Create a dashboard with buttons to display multiple vodcasts, images, podcasts.