We’ve previously written about Adapt, Evolve, gomo, Elucidat, Captivate 9, Lectora 16, and Articulate 360 – Rise, and have also published a feature-wise comparison of all these tools.

Lumesse CourseBuilder
Lumesse CourseBuilder is an online, paid tool for building desktop-first responsive eLearning content. It offers significant control over course structure and navigation. It provides five views and allows you to design only the largest and the smallest of these, with content for in-between views being automatically adjusted. CourseBuilder also lets you create multi-SCO courses as well as multi-lingual SCOs with language selection screens.

Features:
Structure: CourseBuilder has a five-level structure: At the topmost level is the course. A course can consist of one or more modules. Each module contains folders. You can create pages either within folders or directly under the module. At the lowest level of the structure are the elements and components that you use to display interactive and non-interactive content on a page.

Folders: CourseBuilder allows you to create (nested) folders within a module to help with content organization, sequencing, and branching. Folder types include:

1. Branch Folder – You can use Branch folders to organize content into continuous paths based on branching logic, and to create adaptive content flows depending on filter criteria.
2. Page Branch Folder – You can use a Page Branch folder to create a circular sub-section of content with its own landing page. Single pages inside a sub-section will return the learner to the landing page. If you link from the landing page to a folder containing multiple pages, then the last page from that set will link back to the landing page.
3. Random Folder – You can use Random folders to create question pools and draw a certain number of questions at random from the pool.
4. Quiz Folder – You can insert one or more Quizzes anywhere within a module, so you can use the Quiz folder for both knowledge tests as well as for end-of-module assessments. You can nest Random folders within a Quiz folder if you wish to draw your quiz questions at random from one or more pools. A Quiz folder can also contain “normal” pages – for example, scenarios for questions to follow.
5. Multipart Quiz Folder – You can set up a multipart quiz where each part has different scoring criteria. You need to add one Quiz folder for each part of the multipart quiz. These Quiz folders can contain Random folders. In order to pass a multipart quiz, the learner must pass all of its sub-parts. The aggregate score will be reported to the LMS.

Flow View:

CourseBuilder’s Flow View acts as a canvas where you get a visual view of your module structure and flow. You can drag and drop folders and pages to build or change the structure and sequence. You can also enter Editor View for specific pages by simply double-clicking on the page. Once in Edit mode, you can add elements and interactive components to the page and configure them as desired. A breadcrumb menu allows you to go back up the path to the main module flow view.

View Modes: CourseBuilder provides 5 breakpoints or view modes: desktop, tablet landscape and portrait, and mobile landscape and portrait.

You can follow CourseBuilder’s recommendation and manually design only for the two extreme modes – desktop and mobile portrait. The other in-between views will be automatically adjusted. Or you can choose to manually adjust your page layouts for all five view modes.

Skinning: CourseBuilder offers a set of default skins. These can be customized based on your requirements using CourseBuilder’s built-in Skin Editor. For example, you can choose which controls to include; set their position – which can be different for each view mode; and modify colors. You can also use custom buttons in place of the default ones.

The skin height and width for each view mode can also be changed depending on your set of target devices.

Modified skins can be saved for use in different modules and courses.

Page Layouts: The Editor View for a page is a WYSIWYG view. You can add content elements onto the page and set their relative positioning. You can then use the view mode icons to see and optimize the layouts for different screen sizes. In the mobile portrait view mode specifically, you can select the auto-layout option and CourseBuilder automatically creates a one column scrollable layout. If further adjustments are required, they can be manually done.

Content Elements:

• Text, Visuals, and Animations: CourseBuilder allows you to place text, static images, shapes, Flash animations, and HTML animations onto pages.
• Video: CourseBuilder supports .mp4 video files. You can also embed YouTube and Vimeo videos directly onto a page.
• Audio: CourseBuilder allows you to upload audio files in .mp3 format. You can also upload .wav or .ogg formats and they will be automatically converted to .mp3 files.
  You can also use the CBVoice feature to generate machine audio from text and the same text can serve as a transcript. There are many male and female voice types available to choose from, as well as different accents. (Note: CBVoice is an add-on product, and you need a CBVoice license to use this feature.)
• Interactive Tasks: CourseBuilder comes with a set of pre-defined interactive tasks through which you can add different interactivity/question types like matching, fill in the blanks, sorting, multiple choice, drag and drop, etc.
  Since some of these tasks (like drag and drop) might not work seamlessly on mobiles, CourseBuilder offers an adaptive option that changes the behavior of the component to work better in mobile portrait mode.
  When interactive tasks are included in Quizzes, you can assign different points to different options, thereby setting up a graded, as opposed to a binary, system.
• Simulations: CourseBuilder SnapIt allows you to capture screens to integrate software simulations. Capturing can be done either automatically or manually. Simulations can then be created in three types of modes, namely Show Me, Guide Me, and Test Me. (CourseBuilder SnapIt can be downloaded for free directly from your Home tab in CourseBuilder.) The simulations work well on desktops, laptops, and large tablets.

Animation Effects:

CourseBuilder allows you to add predefined transition effects – such as slide, bounce, flip, etc. – to images, text, and other elements on a page. You can also control the animation speed using the duration property. You can also animate the elements themselves, including movement, scaling, rotation, etc. If you add animations inside a MovieClip, you can play those in loops.

Fonts: CourseBuilder has its own (default) fonts for each skin. You can also upload custom fonts in formats like EOT (IE and Edge), OTF, TTF, WOFF, WOFF2, and SVG (Safari). These custom fonts can be used when customizing the skin and/or for page level content.

Triggers and Actions:allows you to use trigger points and actions to build custom interactivities. Any folder/page/element can be assigned a trigger/action.

Steps:You can use Steps to build the content on a page in a particular sequence. Steps act as timelines and each Step can contain one or more content elements. If your module contains audio, you can use Steps to achieve loose audio synching.

Search:CourseBuilder includes a search feature, which lets you search based on specific keywords. All pages containing the search keywords are listed as a dropdown menu from where you can directly jump to any particular page.

Branching and Filtration: CourseBuilder allows you to create complex nested branching through the use of the folders described above and/or using “Skip” conditions. You can also filter content, for example, by giving learners a selection (e.g. role, department, skill level) at the beginning of the module. Based on their selection, only certain parts of the content would be shown. CourseBuilder also allows you to create adaptive paths through a module based on pre-assessment results.

Media Library:CourseBuilder allows you to upload, tag, and manage images and graphics (e.g. .png, .jpg, .gif, .svg), audio files, videos, and documents (e.g. .docx, .pdf, .xlsx, .pptx) in a searchable global library. This library can be accessed from all modules. Updating a resource in the library automatically updates any linked instances in all or selected modules.

Navigation:CourseBuilder allows you to set either free or restricted navigation between pages. Navigation between pages is through Forward/Back functions, while content within a page is scrollable on smaller devices.

Menu:CourseBuilder allows you to create menus with any number of levels. You can include or exclude individual pages or folders from the menu. You can also choose to exclude a folder but still include all or selected pages from inside that folder into the menu. The only exception is the Random folder – questions inside a Random folder cannot be included into the menu.

Accessibility:CourseBuilder implements accessibility conforming to the WAI-ARIA specification. It automatically sets tab indexes and supports predefined keyboard shortcuts. It allows you to add ‘alt’ texts for images and other graphical shapes, and subtitles for videos, to be read by screen readers.

Multilingual Support: CourseBuilder allows you to create content in different languages. Once you create the Master Language version, you can export it into XLIFF format, then replace the text with text in a different language. You can then re-import the XLIFF into the module, and a new language version will automatically be created. CourseBuilder also supports exporting “changes only” to XLIFF. Only new or changed text from the Master Language version will be exported, and you can translate and then re-import it into a different language version.

You can also switch languages in the Editor View and change texts in the different language versions.

CourseBuilder supports publishing multiple language versions as a single-SCO/ a multi-SCO course, where learners can select the language they want to use.

Collaboration: CourseBuilder lets you assign different roles to users at course level. This allows users to co-author courses and also facilitates review.

Once you start a “Review Session” for a course, you can send an email with a link to the course to all those assigned “Reviewer” roles for that course. Reviewers and developers can add comments synchronously in a common review table. Developers also receive real-time notification of such comments.

Standards Compliance: CourseBuilder currently creates SCORM 1.2-, SCORM 2004-, and AICC-compliant output that can be distributed through LMSs. It also provides an option to publish courses directly to PENS -compatible LMSs using a PENS  profile. This requires you to set up a PENS profile connecting CourseBuilder to the LMS.

Packaging and Publishing: CourseBuilder courses can contain one or more modules. Each module is equivalent to a SCO. If the course has only one module, CourseBuilder considers it as a single-SCO course. If the course contains multiple modules, then CourseBuilder automatically packages it as a multi-SCO course. In both cases, the published output is in the form of a Zip file.

Import/Export:Courses can be exported as Zip files and then re-imported for editing and further development. Modules can also be archived (online and/or offline). Archived versions contain all information (including QA information etc) contained in the modules at the time of archiving.

Offline Access: CourseBuilder is an online authoring tool. It currently does not come with any other ecosystem components like an LRS or an offline player. So while content can be viewed when offline, learners must be online for any data to be tracked.

For offline viewing, CourseBuilder does give you an option to create a standalone package that can be run from a web server or LAN/CD-ROM/hard drive as an .exe file. When offline, data can be tracked locally across sessions; however, it cannot be sent to the LMS.

Observations/Limitations:

• CourseBuilder is suitable for text-based courses and courses with loose synching between audio and content. Since you can include multiple audio files onto one page, each associated with different steps, it’s easier to synch audio in different languages. You just swap in the step file in the different language, thereby avoiding the need to work with cue points or events each time. If you need to create content, which is closely synched with audio, you create them as animations and import them into CourseBuilder.
• The breadcrumb feature makes it easy to know where you are in the module structure and navigate between levels.
• The inbuilt CBVoice feature can come in handy when creating quick prototypes.
• The facility to import and export courses lets you to share courses between accounts, allowing for better client-vendor communication and project management.
• Both single- and multi-SCO output can be created. Modules can be reused/ recombined into different courses – either by copying or by linking them to multiple courses.
• If you have multiple media elements in one Step or page, the video currently being played needs to be manually stopped before playing the next one, i.e. the CourseBuilder player doesn’t automatically stop the current file when the next one begins playing.
• The SnapIt tool makes it easy to record simulations in different sizes. You can include simulations in three modes on larger devices; however, these will not display well on smaller devices.
• There is no support for dynamic linking of Google fonts.
• There is no live preview. Every time you add to or change the content, you need to regenerate the course preview. This increases development time.
• CourseBuilder currently doesn’t include any default Glossary or Resources features at Skin level. Resources can be included at module level by adding a custom button to the Skin and displaying a Document List when it is clicked.
• The current version does not include any gamification features.
• The current version does not support xAPI.

Platform Support:CourseBuilder version 8.3 output works on following devices:

Desktop Platforms:

• Microsoft IE 9, 10, 11
• Microsoft Edge
• Firefox 40 (or later)
• Google Chrome 40 (or later)
• Safari 8 (or later)
• Opera 32*

Mobile Platforms:

Android 4.1 or later:

• Chrome 45 (or later)
• Firefox*
• Opera*

iOS8 or later:

• Mobile Safari
• Chrome

Win8 PRO / Windows 10 (Intel-based tablets):

• Microsoft IE10, 11
• Microsoft Edge
• Chrome
• Firefox*
• Opera*

* Not fully tested, but expected to work.

Conclusion:

CourseBuilder works well for creating both simple and complex eLearning courses. It offers a high degree of control over the module structure, including branching and displaying content based on filters.

CourseBuilder allows you to define different content and behaviors for each of its five views, which means you can better optimize experiences for different devices. The WYSIWYG Editor View helps to visualize page layouts as you work, and the ability to select views in which to preview courses is a very useful feature.

CourseBuilder allows you to put together multipart quizzes, with questions for each part drawn at random from separate question pools.

By allowing separate audio files to be associated with each step, CourseBuilder makes it easy to sync content in different language versions. It also supports exporting “changes only” to XLIFF, allowing you to easily update content in different language versions.

With CourseBuilder, you can create single- or multi-SCO courses. You can also create a multi-lingual module as a single SCO with a language selection option at the beginning.

Next, we’ll be updating our comparative summary to include CourseBuilder, so watch this space.

The post Authoring Tool/Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: CourseBuilder first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

There are a lot of responsive authoring tools out there in the market. Some tools have been around for a while now and have released upgraded versions that generate responsive output. Others are newer tools designed to cater specifically to this need. You have a lot of choices!

So how do you choose the right tool to fit your specific business and learning needs? How should you evaluate a tool against your requirements? What factors should you consider?

Our latest eBook, “Which Responsive Authoring Tools Will Work for Your eLearning Needs?”, attempts to help you with this decision-making process. The eBook presents six possible cases, each illustrating a different set of requirements and tool recommendation. It shows how feature-specific information can be interpreted and linked to design requirements to facilitate tool selection and help make informed choices.

To download a free copy of the eBook – “Which Responsive Authoring Tools Will Work for Your eLearning Needs?“, click here.

The post Which Responsive Authoring Tools Will Work for Your eLearning Needs (Free eBook) first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

It just so happened that around that time, Articulate 360 was launched. And it contained a new responsive authoring tool called Rise.

Our team immediately started exploring Rise and created a couple of internal prototypes. Based on our experience using the tool, we shared our thoughts about its features, advantages, and limitations in a detailed post.

We have also updated the comparative summary to include Rise – so you can now get a view of seven responsive authoring tools at one glance. Check it out!

The post Authoring Tool/ Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: Comparative Summary Update first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

Just about then, Articulate released its latest version, Articulate 360, which includes several tools and resources. We shared our initial reactions here; and mentioned that we were exploring Rise, the new responsive authoring tool included in the Articulate 360 suite. Now let’s take a closer look at the features, advantages, and limitations of Rise.

Articulate 360 – Rise

Rise is an online authoring tool that supports an up/down navigation approach between screens, with scrolling of individual screen content where required. It includes pre-built lesson (i.e. page) templates optimized for different devices types and orientations, and also allows you to use learning blocks to create custom lessons.

Because Rise is a part of the Articulate 360 suite, it also comes with several other tools that allow you to include specific types of content into Rise courses.

Features:

Views: Rise has 5 fixed default breakpoints, allowing you to design for desktop, tablet landscape and portrait, and smartphone landscape and portrait views.

Themes: Rise comes with one prebuilt theme. You can customize this theme for any particular course to suit your organization’s branding requirements by adding a logo, choosing a different or a custom color for the pre-set design elements, and selecting the fonts for headings and body text.

Lesson Templates: Rise includes a set of pre-built lesson templates for interactive content presentation like timeline, process, and labelled graphic; videos; activities; and quizzes. You can also use lesson templates to embed external content like YouTube or Vimeo videos, demo simulations created in Storyline or other tools and published as videos, or even animations created in other tools and published as videos. There is also an option to link to external content, in which case you can link to almost any type of content which is externally hosted.

Learning Blocks: Rise also gives you the option to use learning blocks to create custom lessons. Learning blocks can be stacked below one another to create specific layouts. You can choose from the Block Library to include a variety of text blocks, static graphic/image blocks, gallery blocks, multimedia blocks, and different types of interactivity blocks like accordion, tabs, flash cards, and knowledge check questions.

Content: Based on the lesson or block you’ve selected, Rise creates the appropriate layout and includes placeholders for all the required elements. You can then go ahead and add relevant content and media in the placeholders.

Actions: When working in Rise, you don’t need to apply or code any triggers or actions. All functionality is included within the available lesson and block types, and already optimized for the five different views. At lesson level, you can use Buttons/Buttons stacks to add links to lessons within the same course, resources hosted on the organization’s intranet, or external web links.

Media: Rise supports .mp4 video files and .mp3 audio files to target a wider range of devices.

Navigation: Rise allows you to set either free or restricted navigation between lessons and sections. With free navigation, you can also use Buttons/Button stacks to implement branching.

Menu: On larger devices, Rise gives you the option to display the open menu on the left or make it accessible through a menu icon in the top bar. On smaller devices, the menu automatically collapses and is accessible through an icon at the top left of the screen. On opening, the menu shows the list of sections with the lesson titles and status.

Course Management: Rise shows you your course structure visually on a single screen. You can re-sequence lessons and also edit specific lessons from this screen. The visual course structure can also help you to estimate your course development progress.

Quizzes: Rise allows you to create separate quizzes with multiple questions. Questions and options can be randomized. The entire quiz is contained on one screen, with internal navigation between questions. Available question types as of now include text-based single-select questions (MCQs).

Standards Compliance: Rise currently creates SCORM 1.2-, SCORM 2004-, and AICC-compliant output that can be distributed through LMSs. You also have the option to publish a standalone version.

Development Preview: You can choose to review one lesson or the entire course. When in the PREVIEW mode, you can use the 5 device icons to choose which view to display so you get an idea of how your content will look and behave on different devices.

Output Preview: Rise allows you to share a password-protected link to a course to anyone inside or outside your organization. This allows other stakeholders to review the course prior to release.

Supporting Tools from the Articulate 360 Suite:

Peek: You can capture demo simulations in Peek and import them into Rise as videos.

Replay 360: You can create screen cast lessons in Replay 360 and import them into Rise as videos.

Preso: You can create training videos in Preso and import them into Rise.

Observations/Limitations:

• Rise is most suitable for short, text-based courses. You can include audio clips and videos; however you cannot use the tool itself to sync the appearance of screen content with audio.
• Rise does not allow adding background images/videos to lessons.
• Quiz question formats are currently limited to single-select textual questions (MCQs).
• There is no live preview available. Every time you add or change the content, you have to regenerate a preview of a single screen or the entire course.
• Rise supports limited fonts; you cannot add any custom fonts or font styles. Also, any font you choose for a title or body text it is applied at global level – you cannot customize screen-level text to have different font types.
• Rise doesn’t allow you to import, modify, or create new templates; you can only use the lesson templates and block types provided.
• Rise restricts you to use its own navigation features. Additional global controls and features like play/pause or transcript buttons cannot be included in the player navigation.
• Currently, Rise does not include any gamification features.
• There is currently no support for any specific accessibility standards.
• There is currently no support for creating courses in different languages.
• There is currently no way for reviewers to add comments or annotations. Also, the preview link for a course always remains the same, so reviewers will see the latest version of the course. This can restrict you from updating your course until you’re sure all reviewers have completed their review.
• Rise courses cannot be imported or exported. This means you cannot share source files with your clients or vendors unless you grant them access to your account (or vice versa).

Offline Access:

The current version of Rise does not allow courses to be viewed and tracked when offline.

However, if you don’t need to track any data, you do have the option to download a course onto a desktop computer and view it without being connected. You can also download a course onto a mobile offline player or embed it into a native application.

Platform Support:

Rise supports the following platforms and browsers:

Windows

• Google Chrome (latest version)
• Microsoft Edge (latest version)
• Internet Explorer 11
• Firefox (latest version)

Mac

• Google Chrome (latest version)
• Safari (latest version)
• Firefox (latest version)

Mobile

• Safari in Apple iOS 8 or later
• Google Chrome in Apple iOS 8 or later
• Google Chrome in Android OS 4.1 or later

Conclusion:

Rise is best suited for shorter, text-based courses with simple content presentation methods. The default theme and design result in very clean, crisp looking courses. It is user-friendly for non-technical people, and its pre-built lessons and learning blocks allow for quick and easy content creation.

Rise may not be the most suitable tool if your content is primarily audio driven, simulation based, or very rich in animation.

Since Rise is part of the Articulate 360 suite, you can take advantage of other tools from the suite to create and import certain content into Rise.

The post Authoring Tool/ Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: Articulate 360 Rise first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

As promised, in the last post of the series, we present a comparative summary. We have put together a feature-wise comparison, grouped under design considerations that we felt could influence the choice of tool.

So if you’re considering using a tool for your responsive eLearning development, and are evaluating options, we hope this data can come in handy by helping you analyze how different parameters could apply to and or affect your requirements.

Let’s consider a couple of use cases.

CASE 1

Requirement
An organization has recently implemented their LMS’s mobile app in a bid to extend availability of their courses to tablets and smartphones. They are looking for completely responsive courses and want to ensure optimal experiences on all devices. The nature of their content and learning objectives will require variety in the way content is presented. They also need strong accessibility features.

Recommendation
In this case, Lectora 16 would best fit the requirement. It allows you to design custom layouts and interactivities, which means you can have more variety in presentation methods. It allows you to vary the content, look and feel, and behavior of a screen on different devices, so you can custom design user-friendly experiences for each device type. It also provides Section 508 and WCAG AA accessibility compliance, and supports multiple screen readers for any audio-driven content.

CASE 2

Requirement
An organization needs to create a large number of courses within a challenging time frame. All courses will have a similar structure and length (number of screens). Content will be presented in much the same way, as the nature of the information is similar. The courses need to be created only in English, and will not include any audio. The client for whom these courses are being created needs to review them, and is also looking to make any minor changes to content themselves at later stages if required.

Recommendation
In this case, Evolve would be the most suitable tool to use. Since there is a large volume and relatively tight timeframes, efficiency is key. You can approach the Evolve team to get one or more custom themes created for these courses. You can then duplicate courses or import screens and simply change the content. Since there is a structured authoring interface, you don’t have to get into layouting or repositioning of content. This, along with the reusability, allows for faster development. Evolve’s Live Preview also saves on time since you can immediately see the updated output as you build your course. It also allows you to do a synchronous review with the client, exchanging and resolving comments then and there. The client can then import the courses into their Evolve account, and can make any required changes in the future without requiring staff with specific technical skills.

There are definitely a lot of parameters to consider when choosing a responsive authoring tool, and all the tools have their own strong points. For example:

1. Adapt Authoring Open Source – it’s free, and you can keep adding to the variety of components and other plug-ins from those shared by the Community.
2. Adapt Builder Freemium – it’s free, offers some theme customization options, and allows you to set different background images for each screen.
3. Adapt Builder Enterprise – it includes a theme builder and a greater variety of plug-ins.
4. Evolve – it has a live preview, which increases convenience and saves time. It also offers the facility to synchronously review courses and add annotations.
5. gomo – it allows you to publish a single multilingual SCO with a language selection screen.
6. Elucidat – it offers you a greater ability to customize the available gamification features. It also supports a greater number of screen readers.
7. Captivate 9 – it allows you to create content that is closely synched with audio, simulations in three modes, and also offers greater control over breakpoints.
8. Lectora – it allows you to define different behavior on different devices. You can create audio-synched content with a richer look and feel (including more typography) and custom functionality.

Most likely making a decision will involve evaluating multiple parameters and possibly weighing them against each other based on your priorities. We understand this and would be happy to offer our knowledge and experience to guide you in selecting the best tool for your responsive eLearning requirements.

Please note that we have updated this comparative summary to include Articulate 360 – Rise. You can access the updated version here.

The post Authoring Tool/ Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: Comparative Summary first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

I would now like to discuss the options you may have at your disposal in trying to make eLearning available offline with tracking. I’ll evaluate whether some of the Responsive Authoring Tools available in the market can help provide a solution for any of these options. And I’ll tell you about the solution that we have come up with to meet this need.

Option 1: Apps with Preloaded Content
If you have a one-time fixed set of content to deliver, you can package it into an app and make the app available through a private or public app store, with appropriate access credentials. The content gets downloaded along with the app and is therefore available offline. Tracking can be implemented by building in xAPI compliance, storing statements locally and then passing them to an LRS whenever there is connectivity.

Such a solution can work well if you want your new recruits to go through a set of documents, videos, and even short courses before they join; and you want to track if and when they have done so. Or you have a product launch in advance of which you’d like to share some information and administer a quick quiz to ensure your sales reps are well prepared. Or maybe you have some pre-reading material to be completed before attending a classroom session and need to ensure that everyone attending the session has gone through it.

This option can also be useful for providing performance support. You can pack a number of role-specific ‘how-to’ videos into an app which can be referred to while on the job, whether or not there is connectivity.

Option 2: SCORM/AICC-Compliant Wrapper App
If you are delivering content through an LMS and want to create fully responsive eLearning available on desktops, laptops, tablets, and smartphones in online and offline modes, you need a solution that maps to and exchanges data with your LMS.

One obvious solution would be an LMS offline app from your LMS provider. If you have that you’re covered.

However, if your LMS doesn’t have an offline app, you need a solution that does interact with your LMS. This would involve a wrapper app that can communicate with the LMS when online, for things like learner validation, course/content assignment, content hosting and download, learner data tracking, notifications, etc, and store data locally when offline. Developing such an app could be very challenging when you have different vendors for your offline app and your LMS.

Option 3: xAPI-Compliant Wrapper App
One way to overcome the challenges involved in the development of a SCORM/AICC-compliant wrapper app from a separate vendor is to go for an xAPI-compliant wrapper app. This reduces the need for interaction with the LMS to a large extent.

With an xAPI-compliant wrapper app, you can launch/download content from any web link. You can implement learner authentication through APIs from existing HR or other systems (or even LMS APIs if possible). And you can send learner data to a separate LRS that also has reporting abilities.

A solution like this would work best for focused content intended for a specific group of learners (say the sales team in a company).

Now that you know some ways in which offline and tracking can be implemented, the question that arises is how to go about developing any of these apps?

Can Authoring Tools Help With Any of These Options?

There are several tools out there that help you create responsive eLearning. We’ve covered six of them in a series of blog posts: Adapt, Evolve, gomo, Elucidat, Captivate 9, and Lectora 16.

Of these, Captivate, Lectora, and gomo offer offline and tracking capabilities – but ONLY when the content created is delivered through their respective LMS/portal.

Due to this constraint, all three tools fall under Option 2 above and can work only for organizations that use those specific LMSs/portals.

The Answer: Custom Development

To recap, if you’re looking for an offline app that integrates with your LMS (i.e. Option 2 above), then the best option is to look for an LMS which has its own offline app. Or if your organization is using Adobe Captivate Prime, CourseMill, or gomo central, you could deliver and track offline content through their respective apps.

If you don’t fit into those categories, then you’ll need to go in for an app with preloaded content or an xAPI-compliant wrapper app (i.e. Options 1 and 3 above). The only way to create these is through custom development.

And that’s just what we did. At Upside Learning, we’ve built a solution for viewing and tracking content offline using xAPI. It’s alot like Commence’s system for tracking sales and it works with APIs (from HR or other systems or LMSs if available) to validate learners and then allow them to download content onto their devices. The content is available offline and the solution tracks data and sends it to an LRS whenever the learners are connected.

For more see here how MangoMatter did a comprehensive round-up of all the top web hosting companies to provide better services to their clients.

Get in touch with us at elearning@upsidelearning.com if you’d like to know more.

The post eLearning: Offline & Tracking – What Are Your Options? first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

This video review from Tim Slade captures the most important new features:

The above video highlights the following key new features:

1. Ability to insert various slide types
2. New content library of assets
3. A new object called ‘dial’
4. Ease in managing motion paths
5. New trigger events

We at Upside Learning have been reviewing the various responsive elearning tools out there in the market (this is the last post in the series with the link to our other review posts) and therefore were looking forward to a Storyline version that helps responsive elearning development. Here are our initial reactions.

Storyline 360 has a responsive player, which squeezes the content to fit to a smaller screen, just like a video player. Take a look at the screenshot taken from Storyline website that depicts how content would be rendered on different devices via the responsive player.

I don’t find this to be an ideal solution as the text or interactive buttons would get squeezed to a very small size, thus making them unreadable or difficult to use. To be able to work with a responsive player, it would be best to design Mobile First and let the player handle it for larger devices, but this actually will not look well designed in my view.

I think folks at Articulate too realized that this would not be a good enough solution especially when you have loads of tools out there providing real responsive capabilities. So they added a new tool to the mix – Rise. In its description they say

Effortless responsive authoring
“Create fully responsive courses that adapt automatically to any computer, tablet, or smartphone, without any manual tweaking”

That sounds promising and exciting!

Rise has templates that you can choose from or work with blocks (image, multimedia, interactions) and create screens you want. It looks similar to what Adapt or Evolve do.

We are trying out Rise to compare if it is any better. Watch this space.

The post Responsive eLearning with Articulate 360 first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

In our earlier posts, we looked at Adapt, Evolve, Lectora 16, Elucidat, and gomo.

Captivate 9

Captivate 9, a proprietary tool from Adobe, supports a desktop-first approach with page turning navigation. It offers a lot of variety when it comes to content design, types of interactions, preview, testing, and packaging.

Features:

Content and Views:

Captivate 9 has three default breakpoints and also allows you the flexibility to add another two break points. You can modify the values and names of default and custom breakpoints. This means you can now design for desktop, tablet landscape and portrait, and smartphone landscape and portrait views. You can also define different screen heights for each view, and remove content as you move from larger to smaller views.

If you don’t want learners to view content in landscape mode on mobile phones, you can restrict this through the “Preference” settings. This will cause a message to appear advising learners that the course is best viewed in portrait mode.

One of the biggest challenges with responsive design is to maintain the relative positioning of content elements, and Captivate 9 solves this issue with its “smart positioning” feature. You can use this to set the position of a content element in relation to the course screen border or other content elements on that screen.

You can also set minimum and maximum sizes for objects so that they do not scale and look distorted, and align them horizontally and vertically.

Multi-State Objects: This feature allows you to set multiple states for content elements. This means you can design interactivities more efficiently without having to create multiple objects or showing/hiding them.

When you add states for non-interactive objects, each state can contain text, videos, images, animations, or any combinations of these. Using “actions”, you could then define which state of the object to show under which conditions – for example, on click of different buttons; or you could create an object and add different images or videos in different states, and then create a slideshow by allowing previous and next navigation between its states.

In the case of buttons and any other interactive objects, you can define custom states in addition to the predefined states (normal, hover, down). You can also define different states for draggable and droppable objects – from changing the look and feel to setting a draggable button to become an icon when being moved, for example, or an image when dropped.

Captivate 9 allows you to change the properties of multi-state objects in different views, so that you can have different background or text colors, for example, or different shadows or reflections.

Responsive Motion Effects: Captivate 9 allows you to add different responsive motion path effects and transitions for the same object in different views. You can hover over different effects to see how an object would move – almost like a mini-preview, and then add one or more selected effects. You can change an object’s motion timing through the timeline for each view. You can also disable, delete, add, or modify an object’s effects for specific views.

Asset Store: Captivate 9 comes with more than 50000 assets of different types that you can download and use – including people cutouts, interactions, themes, games, player skins, layouts, scenarios, and questions.

Assets are available in different sizes and formats and you can also import assets and eLearning templates from Adobe Stock and eLearning Brothers.

Assets can be used as is or you can customize their design and behavior to suit your requirements. You can also create custom interactions from scratch, and import custom(ized) templates from other projects.

SVG Support: Captivate 9 supports the SVG format, which allows graphics to be scaled up or down without loss of quality. It also allows you to edit SVGs “in place” using Adobe Illustrator, and save the changed SVG file in the project.

Media: Captivate 9 supports audios in MP3 and WAV formats, and videos in AVI, MOV, FLV, and MPEG formats. You can also import animation widgets (OAM files) into a project – so you can create interactive HTML5 animations in Adobe Animate CC, publish them as OAM files, and import them into your project.

Simulations: Captivate 9 allows you to record simulations and easily create See (demo), Try (training), and Test (assessment) modes. In the smaller views, for all simulation modes, Captivate automatically pans to focus on the area where the animation or action is taking place or where the learner needs to interact with the content.

Themes: Captivate 9 offers pre-built responsive themes. You can customize these themes to suit your design requirement or create your own themes and use them in multiple projects.

Navigation: Captivate 9 has back/next navigation through pages, with a course-level slider for desktops. The popup menu has a tree structure, and you can customize its look and feel. On mobile devices, you can use different gestures like double-tapping to bring the menu, scrolling down to view page content, pinching to zoom in/out, and swiping to navigate across pages.

Preview: Captivate 9 allows you to preview the content on stage or in a browser. On stage, you can click the view icons to see how your content would look, while the preview mode has a slider that you use to check the layout and behavior at different breakpoints. You can also preview your project on physical devices through Adobe Edge Inspect.

Geo-Location: Captivate 9 allows you to create content based on geolocations. You can set location parameters by integrating with Google Maps. You can also create custom geolocation variables in a project and use them to emulate geolocation functionality when previewing your project.

Multilingual Support: Captivate supports the creation of content in different languages including right-to-left languages like Arabic and double-byte languages like Chinese directly on stage. For creating versions in different languages, Captivate also allows you to export text content from a “master” project into TXT, XML, or XLIFF format. The text in this file can then be replaced with translated text in a different language, and the updated file can be imported into a different copy of the project.

LMS Preview: Captivate 9 allows you to test a course for SCORM compliance from inside the tool interface. The course will launch in a SCORM Cloud window; and below this you’ll be able to see the trail of communication between the course and the LMS as you go through the course. You can download the communication data log for your reference. Once you close the course, you’ll see the final LMS results. This helps save time while developing and testing, as you don’t need to keep publishing, packaging, and uploading the course to the LMS.

Distribution: With Captivate 9, you can publish SCORM-, AICC-, and xAPI-compliant courses for distribution through LMSs. For xAPI-compliant courses, you’ll need to ensure that your LMS is xAPI-compliant. You also have an option to publish directly to Adobe Captivate Prime LMS or Adobe Connect. You may also publish projects in formats like MP4, EXE, SWF, and PDF for distribution through the web, email, or other means. In these cases, data will not be tracked.

Observations/Limitations

• While Captivate 9 does allow you to set different heights for each view, you cannot set a height beyond 5000px. This means that you cannot have a completely scroll-based course. Also, the Captivate 9 work area has a maximum height of 1900px – meaning you cannot easily control or edit content in place below 1900px; so practically speaking, you would tend to have 1900px as a maximum height for any view.
• When it comes to fonts and text formatting, you will still need to go with system default fonts, as Captivate 9 does not support font embedding.
• If you have multiple videos on the same screen, only the first video (as per the sequence on the timeline) will play on mobile devices. The other videos will not load. One way around this is to place videos on separate successive slides. In case you are using the default player, the player “next” button will navigate from slide to slide. If you have customized the player, you could treat the three slides as one page with internal navigation between them and with the player “next” button programmed to go from the first video slide to the page immediately after the last slide.
• Captivate 9 doesn’t currently provide any way to define different behaviors for different views – for example, you cannot introduce interactivity on smaller devices if it is not present for the desktop version.
• Captivate 9 doesn’t currently allow you to add or modify content as you go from large to smaller views. You can only remove content. Even with multiple states, while you can change object properties in different states at view level, you cannot change the object contents.
• You cannot currently import PowerPoint projects into responsive Captivate 9 projects.
• Captivate 9 doesn’t currently have any collaborative features like joint reviews, or any gamification features like badges.
• Captivate 9 currently has limited accessibility support for responsive courses.
• xAPI-compliant courses will need to be launched from an xAPI-compliant LMS; Captivate 9 doesn’t allow you to pass data to external LRSs. Also, the data that gets tracked in xAPI-compliant LMSs is pretty much the same as for SCORM compliance.
• While you can technically create a multilingual course packaged as a single SCO, you would need to do this by creating slides with content in different languages – you could create language-wise sections, for example. This, however, would make for a very heavy course, adversely affecting performance.

Offline Access:

The current version of Captivate 9 does not allow offline viewing and tracking of courses.

However, you do have an option to publish your course as an app for multiple mobile platforms from within Captivate itself, using the Adobe PhoneGap service. Using this, you can publish your course for iOS, Android, and Windows RT (Metro apps) at one time.

Platform Support:

Captivate version 9.0.2 supports the following platforms:

HTML 5 Content:

Windows:

• IE 9, 10, or 11
• Microsoft Edge
• Chrome 43 (or later)
• Firefox 38 (or later)

Mac:

• Safari 8.0.6 (or later)
• Chrome 43 (or later)
• Firefox 38 (or later)

Mobile devices:

• iPads and iPhones using Safari (version as per iOS 8 (or later))
• Android devices using Chrome (latest) with Android 4.4.2 (or later)

Edge Inspect:

• Chrome 43 (or later)

Conclusion:

Captivate 9 works well for creating both simple and complex courses and supports close synching of on-screen content with audio and video. It also provides an effective way to handle simulations on smaller devices by automatically panning to focus on the areas where the animation or action is occurring.

The “smart positioning” feature provides a convenient way to ensure that content interrelationships are maintained across views, and the ability to restrict learners from viewing content in landscape mode on phones can come in quite handy.

You have the flexibility to design custom layouts and interactivities, and the multi-state feature makes the development process tidier and more efficient.

The asset store comes with a large variety of media assets and templates, which are constantly getting added to. In addition to including animations published as videos, you can also include interactive HTML5 animations as animation widgets.

The LMS preview feature helps save on testing time, and the integration with several other (Adobe) products and services can make some development tasks easier and quicker.

We have provided more details about Captivate 9’s new features here, based on our experience using the tool so far, and have also provided a summary of its accessibility features here.

With this, our series on responsive authoring tools comes to an end… well, almost. We will follow this up with a comparative summary, to wrap things up.

If you have any questions or suggestions please do share them in the comments section below.

The post Authoring Tool/ Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: Captivate 9 first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

Our earlier posts looked at Adapt, Evolve, Lectora 16, and Elucidat.

gomo

gomo learning provides two products that enable you to create, update, host, and track multi-device learning: gomo authoring and gomo hosting along with xAPI analytics. Combined, these form the gomo learning suite.

gomo authoring publishes single-source responsive and adaptive HTML5 eLearning content which can be accessed on desktops, tablets, and smartphones. It supports both a desktop-first approach with page turning navigation, or a scrolling navigation, topic-wise, and can be easily used by non-technical users.

gomo hosting allows you to distribute content instantly from the gomo cloud. Also, gomo has come up with an app for mobile devices, which allows for offline viewing and tracking.

Features:

gomo Content:

When designing in gomo, you can create content in one-, two-, three-, or four-column layouts in order to display it most effectively on different devices. You can set column widths as per your requirement, depending on the nature of your content and the primary target devices. You can also define content to be displayed or hidden based on device type – for example, you can choose to display an image on desktops and landscape tablets, but hide it on portrait tablets and smartphones; or you could define an alternative image to be displayed on portrait tablets and smartphones.

Themes: gomo comes with prebuilt themes. You can modify these themes to have your own design and branding. You can set different course backgrounds, theme colors, fonts, and sizes; and customize the navigation controls, buttons, and header and footer bars. You can save the modified theme and reuse it in other courses.

Templates: gomo offers a set of preconfigured templates that make it easy to create interactive screens. Based on the template selected, gomo creates the layout and adds all the required assets – all you need to do is to add content.

Assets: gomo has a large set of prebuilt assets – for example, Accordion, Carousel, Filmstrip, Image Wall, Comicstrip, Zoomable Image, etc. – categorized into layout, media, presentation, and question asset types. You can also use the iFrame asset to add third-party content directly into gomo – like YouTube or Vimeo videos, or Adobe Animate CC animations.

Content Blocks: gomo allows you to use content blocks to custom design screens. You can add any number of content blocks onto one screen, each with up to 4 columns. You can then place assets into each column of each block, and add your content.

Actions: gomo actions allow you to create branching content and control learner paths. You can link to screens or sub-screens, and link to resources (e.g. PDF files) or external web links.

Variables and Display Conditions: You can use variables and display conditions to customize default behavior and extend some features. If you need to use the same content in more than one place, for example, you can store that content in a variable and then use the variable across the course. Updating that content is then a lot easier, as you have to change it only in one place.

You can use display conditions to lock specific screens and ensure that learners view all the content on those screens prior to moving ahead. In assessments, you can use display conditions to require learners to answer the current question before bringing up the next one. And as mentioned earlier, you can use display conditions to define content to be shown or hidden based on device type.

You can also use display conditions to show simpler versions of screens when gomo’s “Accessible Mode” is on.

You can use variables and display conditions in combination to build up content on screen or to display role-specific content where content gets filtered based on a selected role.

Media: gomo supports .mp4 video files and .mp3 audio files to target a wider range of devices. You also have an option to play a video in the background and add assets on top of it.

Menu: gomo supports two types of menus: A floating menu (called TOC) and a screen-level menu, which can be accessed through a button on the navigation bar. You can have both or one of them in a course. The TOC shows the list of topics, while the screen-level menu lists the screen titles and progress.

Navigation: gomo allows you to set the preferred navigation direction (horizontal or vertical) for each individual topic. So you could have one topic where you navigate pages using next and back controls, followed by another topic where you scroll to view pages displayed one below the other.

Quizzes: gomo allows you to create a separate quiz or assessment section with multiple questions. The entire quiz is contained on one page, with internal navigation between questions. Available question types include multiple choice questions, graphics multiple choice, select from list, hotspot multiple choice, number input, and many more. Quiz results can be tracked through SCORM or xAPI analytics.

Global Components: gomo allows you to configure your course to add extras like Glossary, Help, Accessibility, Resources, and other components.

Collaboration: gomo allows you to define different user roles. Authors can work jointly on the same course and share content across courses. A useful content locking feature ensures that two authors cannot modify the same content at the same time. Additionally, gomo retains copies of older published versions, so you can access and share those if required.

Courses can be reviewed online by team members as well as clients and others from inside or outside the organization. Review comments are collated centrally for easy reference.

Course Management: gomo shows you your course structure visually on a single screen. This can also help you to gauge development progress.

Multilingual Support: gomo makes it easy to create courses in multiple languages. It supports the XLIFF format, so you can export the course in the default language content into XLIFF, then replace the text with text in a different language, and re-import the XLIFF into the course.

gomo allows you to see all screens of a course in all languages in the editor itself. You can directly add content in different languages within this multilingual view.

gomo allows you to integrate multiple languages into one course package (including right-to-left languages such as Arabic), so you can have one course (SCO) delivered through the LMS containing as many languages as you want. You can use gomo’s “language select” asset to allow learners to choose or change the language at the start of or at any point during the course.

Accessibility: gomo content on desktops meets some of the Section 508 and Disability Discrimination Act (UK) guidelines. It supports the JAWS screen reader, tab order, keyboard navigation for most interactivities, and the addition of “alt text” labels for visual assets. gomo also has a special “Accessible Mode” feature for visually impaired learners, which allows you to simplify pages by removing screen transition animations. There’s also another feature that allows you to add transcript texts for audio and video files. The gomo video player also supports closed captioning in VTT format, so that you can display timed captions on top of video content.

Hosting and Distribution: The gomo learning suite comes with integrated hosting and xAPI analytics. gomo hosting utilizes the Amazon CloudFront content delivery network. This uses the servers nearest to the learners to deliver course content, resulting in better performance.

gomo offers five different types of distribution methods:

• Existing LMS: There are two ways you can publish gomo content for your existing LMS:
  • You can publish a course with the complete source and upload it on your LMS. Whenever there is a content update, you’ll need to republish, repackage, and reupload the course on the LMS.
  • You can publish the course with the gomo SCORM wrapper. Through this, the package uploaded to the LMS will contain only the SCORM Schema definition files, manifest files, and course launch files. The content itself will remain in gomo cloud. Any content updates will be immediately and automatically reflected in the LMS.
    Note: You must have access to gomo hosting for this.
• gomo central: gomo central is the hosting service with integrated xAPI analytics. You can redesign it with your own branding and logo. Once you’ve created your learners, you can start tracking their data. Since data within gomo central is tracked through xAPI analytics, you can track a wider range of data like learner information, scores, device information, and other data.
• gomo central app: gomo central also has a mobile extension called gomo central app that learners can download from iOS and Android app stores onto their phones. Learners can login to the app and download content for offline viewing. With xAPI analytics, data for courses accessed offline is tracked and sent back to gomo central once there is connectivity.
• Direct Link Access: You can give learners direct access to content by sharing links or QR codes through email, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or other means. xAPI tracking will still take place, even if learners are not registered on gomo central.
• Website Embed: gomo allows you to embed content into a website using an embed code. Any updates you make to the course content in gomo will be immediately reflected on the website.

gomo content is compatible with PhoneGap, so you can also package your courses as native apps and distribute them through Apple and Android app stores. However, data will not be tracked in such cases.

Observations/Limitations:

• gomo is most suitable for text-based or audio-supported courses. Although you can include audio clips and videos, you cannot use the tool itself to synch the appearance of screen content with audio.
• Placing one content element (asset) on top of another is not possible, so you can’t place text over an image, for example. And if you want to create a button with an image in the background, you’ll need to include the button’s label text into the image as well, as you will not be able to overlay it.
• You cannot control how background images appear. Any background image you include for a screen will be on “repeat” – that is, a tiled view.
• If you select a theme that adds box-shadows to elements or columns, you will not be able to modify the theme to remove these.
• There is no live preview. Every time you add to or change the content, you have to regenerate the course preview. This increases development time.
• If you have multiple media elements on one page, the video currently being played needs to be manually stopped before playing the next one, i.e. the gomo player doesn’t automatically stop the current file when the next one begins playing.
• gomo offers limited fonts styles. Also, any font style you choose for a content element type is applied at global level – you cannot customize screen-level text to have different font styles for the same content element.
• gomo does not allow you to import or export courses. This means you cannot share course sources with clients or vendors unless you grant them access to your account (or vice versa).
• The TOC only shows the main course topics; you cannot have a TOC displayed as a tree menu with page titles and progress.
• Navigation buttons support only normal and hover states; they do not support the disabled state. This means you have to hide buttons instead of disabling them.
• Additional global controls and features like play/pause or transcript buttons cannot be included in the player navigation; you need to add them at screen level.
• gomo doesn’t allow you to import any new assets or templates. Also, any custom page designs you create for a course cannot be reused in other courses.
• gomo currently does not include any gamification features.
• While offline viewing and tracking is supported through the gomo central app, data is automatically sent to gomo central’s underlying LRS. You cannot configure xAPI data to be sent to any other LRS.

Offline Access:

• gomo provides support for offline viewing and tracking on mobiles through its central app, which is downloadable through Apple and Android app stores.
• Learners can login and access the courses assigned to them directly or in offline state. The central app supports offline learning, xAPI tracking, and dynamic content updates.

Platform Support:

gomo 3.3.2 supports the following platforms:

• IE 8+ on Windows XP onwards
• Safari 5+ (on Mac OSX 10.6+)
• Chrome (any version)
• Firefox (any version)

iPads and iPhones:

• Safari (version as per iOS release)

Android Tablets and Smartphones:

• Android 4.0.3 – Chrome and Default Android browser
• Android 2.3.3 – 2.3.7 – Default Android browser (smartphones only)

Windows Phones:

• Windows phone 8.1 and 10 – Default browser

Conclusion:

gomo is user friendly even for non-technical people and works well for creating text-based or audio-supported courses – that is, where the audio plays and all content is displayed at one go. It allows you create courses in either desktop first, mobile first, or a combination approach. You can also create a multi-lingual course as a single SCO, with a language selection option for learners.

gomo does support IE8 and Safari 5, as well as lower versions of Android, which can help target a wider range of devices.

gomo’s cloud-based learning portal, gomo central, combined with its mobile app extension, allows for offline viewing as well as tracking on mobile devices, which can be very useful for certain types of jobs or situations.

Like Adapt, Evolve, and Elucidat, gomo may not be the most suitable tool if your content is primarily audio driven, simulation based, or very rich in animation.

In our next and the last post of this series, we’ll take a look at some of the latest features and functionalities of Captivate 9.

The post Authoring Tool/ Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: gomo first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.

This time, we’ll take a look at Elucidat, an easy-to-use WYSIWYG tool for authoring responsive eLearning.

Elucidat

Elucidat is a true WYSIWYG editor, which means that what you see as an author is pretty close to what the learner will see. This type of interface helps speed up the development process.

Elucidat supports a desktop-first approach with page turning navigation. It includes a custom theme builder, pre-built templates, and collaboration tools. Let’s take a closer look at the tool features.

Features:

Easy-to-Use Interface: The WYSIWYG interface shows the page layout and design as the learner would see it. There are four views (desktop computer, landscape tablet/small desktop, landscape phone to portrait tablet, and landscape and portrait phone); these views span predefined screen width ranges, and you can choose which view/width to display while working in “Edit” mode. This reduces the need to keep generating previews and switching windows. It’s also easy to move content elements on the page to adjust positioning, size, etc. in different views.

The editor’s intuitive layout allows non-technical users to create courses independently with very little or no training. At most, technical expertise may be required where prebuilt templates need to be customized.

Themes and Theme Builder: Elucidat courses are based on themes. In Elucidat, the concept of a theme is extended to a set of functional templates with specific layouts and designs as defined by that theme.

There are 30 different standard interactions / page types, that fall into three main categories: content presentation (non-interactive), interactive, and questions.

Elucidat’s theme builder allows you to modify existing themes to fit your requirement, or to create new themes from scratch. You can alter interface elements, change page interactions, or create new page types. In order to do this, however, you do need to have skills in web technologies like HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, as well as an awareness of Elucidat’s framework and template structures.

You can also go in for Elucidat’s “custom theme” service wherein their team will create a set of templates and designs as per your specifications. You can also approach the Elucidat team for developer training on how to customize or create themes.

Preview: If you want to see how your course will look and behave on a specific device, you can launch it in “Preview” mode and select from the long list of device emulators (user agents) available. This can save considerable testing time.

Collaboration Tools: Elucidat uses roles to allow you to work on a project simultaneously with colleagues and clients. Roles include Administrator (Author), Author, Layout Designer, and Reviewer. You can control Author and Reviewer permissions so that they can access only certain projects.

Multiple Authors can collaborate to add comments for the same project directly in “Edit” or else in “Preview” mode. You can also share a review link with any number of Reviewers.

Authors and Reviewers can add comments on each element of the page. This means that all comments about the same element are automatically collated, helping to save analysis time. Authors can view all the comments in the “Review” section, and can mark them as resolved as they address them. They can also view all resolved comments by selecting the “Show resolved comments” button.

Elucidat also allows you to gift a project to another account holder or client. It retains your version of the project as is, creates a copy, and sends it to a designated email recipient. The recipient will receive an email notification with a link to the project.

Image Library: Elucidat has a huge library of free images and cutouts. It also allows authors to upload images and manage them centrally within the tool itself.

Media: Elucidat supports .ogg, .wav, and .mp3 audio file formats, and .mov, .m4v, .flv, and .mp4 video file formats. Each embedded audio or video file can be up to 45 MB.

You can choose to position the audio player either at the top or bottom of the page. Alternatively, if you don’t want the audio player to be displayed, you can select the “Off the page” option.

You can add subtitles for videos by adding synching cues manually in .srt files, and then uploading the files to the project.

Fonts: Elucidat supports the Google fonts API and provides a list of all the available Google fonts. It also allows you to upload custom fonts (as .woff, .svg, .ttf, or .eot files).

Navigation: Elucidat allows you to define rules for controlling user navigation. You can make completion of specific pages compulsory in order to access subsequent pages. You can also define different page completion criteria.

Gamification: You can use Elucidat’s custom badges, timers, rules, and advanced branching to add gamification features to courses.

You can upload icons or pictures as badges, and set accomplishment criteria – for example, that the learner has achieved a certain goal by reaching a specific page, or has completed a specific page based on the completion criteria defined for that page.

Elucidat supports non-linear navigation and branching. You can use these in combination with different rules to create more complex structures, for example, for exploratory and scenario-based courses, and control learner paths.

Rules for page completion can be based on score, pages viewed, number or percentage of pages completed, or results. You can define properties and values in combination with logical operators (AND and OR) to set different completion criteria; for example, you can define that a page will be accessible only if your learner gets a score greater than 50% on Page X, AND has seen 25% of the course pages.

Quick Deployment: With Elucidat, you can publish SCORM- and xAPI- (Tin Can) compliant courses; you can also publish courses in MOOC format or simply make them available online if no tracking is required.

Elucidat also has a unique feature called Rapid Release^TM, which allows you to update the course content in the LMS directly from Elucidat, saving you from having to upload files again and again.

When it comes to xAPI-compliance, Elucidat allows you to configure courses to support private or public authentication. In the case of private authentication, the LRS is inside the LMS. The course is uploaded to and launched from the LMS, which then uses the learner information to communicate with the LRS. In the case of public authentication, the LRS is outside the LMS. The LRS details are entered at publishing time, and the course needs to be designed to capture information from the learner (name, email id); together, these details are used to communicate with the chosen LRS.

Language Support and Localization: Elucidat supports authoring of courses in different languages (including right-to-left (RTL) languages such as Arabic) directly through the editor.

For creating versions in different languages, Elucidat also allows you to export text content from a “master” project into an XLIFF format. The text in this file can then be replaced with translated text in a different language, and the updated file can be imported into a different copy of the project.

Analytics: Elucidat offers built-in analytics that can be used to track learner progress. You can check how learners are responding to content, and use that information to evaluate your content design, question difficulty, etc.

Accessibility: Elucidat’s accessibility feature satisfies Section 508 in the US and the Equality Act in the UK. It fully supports JAWS, Windows Eyes, and OS X Voiceover screen readers. It also supports keyboard navigation and allows you to add “Alt text” labels to all media included in the course.

API Integration: You can easily integrate Elucidat courses with other systems through their API integration support. This can allow you to pass learner data between systems.

Faster Development: Elucidat’s theme-based approach, along with its WYSIWYG interface, pre-built templates, and configurable components help reduce development time.

Observations/Limitations:

Elucidat is most suitable for text-based or audio-supported courses. Although you can include audio clips and videos, you cannot use the tool to synch the appearance of page content with audio, nor can you include event-based audio (e.g. audio that plays on click of a button).

Elucidat allows you to use only one font type per course. This can be quite constricting from a design viewpoint. Also, if you’re using custom fonts, large font file sizes can affect content loading time, creating a sub-standard experience for your learners.

If you choose to have your audio player “Off the page”, there is no way to include audio controls into the course interface and hence no way for the learner to play/pause the audio. Also, on mobile devices where browsers cannot auto-play audio files, the learner needs to manually play the audio for each page. In such cases, “Off the page” is not an option.

The design of the default audio player cannot be changed, which means it may not match the look and feel of the rest of the course.

Any change that you make to a pre-built template will reflect in all instances of that template across the course.

When uploading audio and video files, you may find that there’s a time lag until you can see them in the editor. This is because Elucidat will automatically encode the file into a format supported by all major devices.

While you can create courses in different languages, each of these will be a separate SCO or package; you cannot have a single multilingual SCO/package with a language selection page.

There is no separate configurable assessment template. Each question, as well as the opening and results pages, need to be authored as individual pages. This leads to higher development time as you need to custom code to display results and any conditional feedback, and to collate the individual page results into a course score.

Elucidat doesn’t currently include any glossary feature.

Offline Access:

The current version of Elucidat does not allow courses to be viewed and tracked when offline.

However, if you don’t need to track any data, you do have the option to download a course onto a desktop computer and view it without being connected. You can also download a course onto a mobile offline player or embed it into a native application. Note that in such cases, the downloaded package will include the entire source.

Platform support:

Elucidat supports the following platforms:

• Chrome (any version)
• Firefox (any version)
• Safari (any version)
• IE 8+
• IE 7 (limited support with some minor functionalities likely to be unavailable)

For mobile devices, it fully supports:

• iPad and iPhone using Safari or Chrome
• Android devices using Chrome
• Windows devices using Edge browser

Note: You can run Elucidat courses on older iPhones; while the courses will function, you will likely find some minor differences in visuals.

Conclusion:

Elucidat is a quick and easy-to-use tool for creating text-based courses with non-synched audio and simple entry and exit animations. The WYSIWYG editor helps to visualize page layout as you work, and the ability to select specific device emulators in which to preview courses is a very useful feature.

In case you’re targeting IE7, Elucidat could be a good option. Also its API integration feature makes it easier to link to other systems and share data.

Like Adapt and Evolve, Elucidat may not be the most suitable tool if your content is primarily audio driven, simulation based, or very rich in animation.

Next time, we’ll look at gomo, another proprietary responsive authoring tool.

The post Authoring Tool/ Framework Selection for Responsive eLearning Development: Elucidat first appeared on The Upside Learning Blog.