Printing Options in Storyline

May 19, 2012

No previous knowledge of Articulate, so please bear with me.

I  stumbled upon SL two days ago, and can't walk away. I keep comparing the great features it has with the program I am currently using.

I've been searching for print options for various objects you may have on your stage.  I've looked under triggers, properties, etc.

I've searched the posts and have seen some answers with  Javascript, Flash, etc. I don't have these skills or programs, so these are not options.

Very simply, in Storyline, how can you print:

1 - A certificate with learner's name

2 - A visible slide

3-  Text boxes

4 - And yes, even a group of objects

Thanks!

36 Replies
April Caldwell

James,

Thanks for the response. I realize this option is for Flash output only, so that would include LMS, right (sorry if this is a dumb question)?

While the widget could prove useful, I'm wondering if there's more flexibility than having the PRINT button appear on the screen all the time. For example,  could it be made to work where the Print button appears based on a trigger. For example, on visibility of X, Show Print button.

Additionally, it'd be nice if the widget could be associated with objects, rather than a whole slide. This way, you would not have to build masks to cover up what you don't want the learner to print.

Thanks!

onEnterFrame (James Kingsley)

April,

Yes, this version is Flash only and will work in an LMS. We have the code for an HTML5 version but without an SDK from Articulate it's fairly complex to incorporated into your course. 

You could put the print button anywhere you want. I put it on the slide master for my demo but you don't have too. I am using a trigger/variable to show the button in my demo so you could alter that to meet your needs.

I am not sure what you mean by associating it with an object... do you mean printing only a section of the slide? Like a graph or image?

There isn't really anyway to set that up currently. 

Thanks

James

Phil Mayor

onEnterFrame (James Kingsley) said:

Yes Gerry... as request come in.

Phil, very nice work. 

Thanks James, TBH the inspiration came from you again.  You showed how to do it in flash, and we used that in a course we had just built.  I wanted to see if I could do it in Storyline without the flash file and it worked.  Credit where its due.
Kuriko A

Gerry Wasiluk said:

You can also create your button in Storyline and attach a Javascript trigger to to it.  See this KB article:  http://www.articulate.com/support/kb_article.php?product=st1&id=llwes8cn32vg

It has an example of the JavaScript to use for the print button.

I tried creating a trigger to 'Execute Javascript' and entered the suggested 'Print' code:    window.print();

However, it did not work at all in Internet Explorer.

And in Firefox, it brought up the Print button but then froze my computer, so that I couldn't select a printer from the drop-down list.

Do you have any suggestions for what I might be doing wrong?

Ray Handley

I have just tried it using Google Chrome and tumble weeds flew across my screen ..... basically nothing happened. What I want to do is show results from various quizzes and based on the results from these quizzes, inform the user what modules they need to do and those they don't need. I have this functionality working fine, but want to print this information. Printing the results slide just tells me results for all quizzes, so that option is not suitable. My client is not willing to pay for the widget (though it looks good), so if anyone has any suggestions that would be great.

Gerry Wasiluk

I'm hazarding a wild guess here but with all the different browsers out there and what they support (or how they are configured) I'm not sure there is a solution that will work 100% of the time across all browsers.  Hope I'm wrong . . .

For Flash and learners with Windows PCs and laptops, I've done the JavaScript print button--and, in one course, for printing out the completion certificate, I tell the learner if the print button does not work, to then try [ALT]-P or right-click on the slide and select print.  If all that fails, then do a screen capture and then print that out separately.

Not pretty sometimes . . .

Rica Lucio

Hi all,

I'm not familiar with JavaScripting, but would love to learn what script I need to put in to use that trigger.

I've gone to http://www.articulate.com/support/kb_article.php?product=st1&id=llwes8cn32vg and inserted the one necessary to print the slide, but it came up blank.

I've also gone to the example files and tried that thread, also with no luck or idea..

Please tell me what I'm missing. I've been banging my head around all afternoon.

Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Rica,

I'm not equipped to review your Javascript code, but you'll want to check that you're testing the published content within the intended environment as testing it locally could cause the javascript triggers not to fire as expected. You'll see additional information about testing your content here. 

Let us know if you need anything else! 

Kumiko Borman

Hi Ashley, thank for getting back to me so quickly! Actually the issue is not just for the certificate, but for all the slides (I attached a screenshot).  I'm using safari and yes, I'm testing on a server (not locally). The project is a standard default size. 

Ah, and changing the scale in print options won't do anything. 

Kumiko Borman

Thank you Ashley, it's not just a matter of single slide.  "any" slide (without javascript), when printed, only shows a part of an entire content.  I attached my file that includes 3 slides -  I first thought the printing was off just for the certificate, but the 1st slide (which has no javascript), when printed, gets cut off in the same way. 

It prints the whole screen fine from a windows machine.  I hope someone can help me...

 

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