Yearly Archives: 2014

AICC, SCORM , xAPI, CC/LTI, CMI-5…What Does It All Mean?

If nothing else, the growth of eLearning seems to correlate directly to the growth of bizarre acronyms.

Currently, there are three primary methods of tracking lesson data back to a centralized storage site and database. There are ultimately more than that, which I’ll mention at the end, but first is an overview of the top three methods for tracking eLearning progress and interaction.

Continue reading AICC, SCORM , xAPI, CC/LTI, CMI-5…What Does It All Mean?

Captivate: How to view the HTML5 version anywhere

When you publish an Adobe Captivate project to both SWF and HTML5, three HTML pages are written to the output folder.

Captivate uses the project title as the filenames for the SWF-version of the published files. Say your project name is “MyProject”… In this case:

  • The SWF output will be titled ‘MyProject.swf’ and its parent HTML file will be titled ‘MyProject.htm”
  • The HTML output is called from the ‘index.html’ or ‘index_SCORM.html’ file (depending on whether or not SCORM is enabled for the project).
  • The third HTML file will be called ‘multiscreen.html’.

The multiscreen.html file involves some trickery which evaluates the browser and/or system that is accessing the project, then displays what it believes to be the appropriate version (SWF or HTML5) for the device. If you publish boimsmanifest-multiscreenth versions to a SCORM .zip package, the ‘imsmanifest.xml’ file within that package specifies the ‘multisceeen.html’ as the primary launch file; so when the user launches the lesson from the LMS, the ‘multiscreen’ file launches first, the trickery is invoked, and the proper version is presented.

If you always want the HTML5 version to  appear, you can edit that manifest file and change this line:

<resource identifier=”SCO_ID1_RES” type=”webcontent” href=”multiscreen.html” adlcp:scormtype=”sco”>

to be:

<resource identifier=”SCO_ID1_RES” type=”webcontent” href=”index_SCORM.html” adlcp:scormtype=”sco”>

However (!), be aware that not all desktop browsers work well with Captivate’s HTML5 output, so be warned this may cause issues for non-mobile users.

When I’m developing Captivate content to be delivered to both desktop and mobile devices, I rely on the manifest and multiscreen files to do their job. When testing published output, I upload the unzipped files to my staging server…and when doing quick tests, I directly load the index_SCORM.html (or just index.html) file using Chrome to do a quick evaluation of how well the mobile output will perform.

Of course, once further along, testing is done on a variety of devices for true evaluation…

So in sum, to quickly check Captivate’s HTML output on your desktop, call the ‘index’ files directly.

Another addition to the eLearning niche

As pretty much the only writer at my previous employer, their company blog was one of my many responsibilities. Once I left, not only has their blog stagnated but I lost my primary platform for spewing whatever hopefully-useful drivel struck my fancy.

So time to setup something new. I’ve had ‘eLearning Chef’ registered for years now and let it languish, unloved, in the virtual ‘To Do eList’…and I’ve got server space, and always wanted to play with different blogging platforms (the former-company’s blog being hosted on Blogger), and wanted something a bit more personal than another Facebook account…

Anyway, not too much to write (or spew) at this point; moreso just to get a post up and settle on the overall ‘look-n-feel’ of the site. I do hope to keep this blog fairly fresh and current with at least somewhat regular news and thoughts on the whole eLearning scene.

Oh, and you probably didn’t ask but I’ll tell anyway – eLearning Chef arose simply from my initial LinkedIn profile. When I first signed up for that site, many years ago (way pre-IPO), everyone’s self-descriptions were so…formal. I wanted to do something fun, and eventually epiphanized (?) while making the family dinner that the process of deciding what to eat, preparing the various tools and process, and putting it all together…was very similar (generally) to what I do for a living.

Or at least, that was what my mind spewed at the time… So be ready for more of that!