Publishing Storyline Content in Canvas LMS

Jan 15, 2014

Hello! I just wanted to share a recent success I had with getting my Storyline files in to the Canvas LMS. Although I haven't quite found a way to use SCORM reporting features, this is an option to upload your presentations into Canvas that will allow for all of the great interactions we so love in Storyline!

The trick is, when you publish, you have to make sure to choose Launch Player in a New Window. Here are all of the steps I followed (including making it work for iPad).

In order for Storyline presentations to work in Canvas, you have to publish with these player options:

BEFORE you publish, you have to go in to the Player - Other - Launch Player in a New Window

If you choose Prompt to Resume, make sure to leave the "Ignore Flash Cookies in LMS" option UNCHECKED.

It should look like this:

When you publish, make sure to have LMS selected, and checkmark all the boxes in the Publishing for HTML5 and mobile devices.

In Canvas, you need to navigate to the course and page (assignment, module, etc.) where you will be adding the content. THIS IS VITAL. You have to be in the course you want to add the content in before you choose the FILE option on the left-hand side.

Choose "Files" option in the left-hand navigation.

Create a new sub-folder for the course and then choose the upload zip file. Upload the Storyline zip file into the subfolder.

Now create the assignment, announcement, module, etc. that you wanted to create. Choose Add File from the right-hand menu. Navigate to the subfolder you created. Once there, you need to find the "launch.html" file and click on it to add it to your assignment. If you want to allow iPad users to see your content, you also need to click on the IOSLaunch.html file and add it to the assignment.

Save your assignment.

Make sure you have popup blockers off, and then test it out. It should launch in a new window on all browsers. On iPad, you need to have the Articulate Mobile App to interact with the content.

Hope this helps!

55 Replies
Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Kat and welcome to Heroes! 

It sounds like your course is slow to open from your LMS? There is a compression that occurs when a course is published in regards to audio, video and images. Although the compression is done to help make your course load faster. Could you tell us more about how you're accessing the published course and if you see this behavior in different browsers? You may also want to test this out by loading the course to SCORM Cloud, which is an industry standard testing method for SCORM content. 

Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Joanna, 

If you receive an "Unable to acquire LMS API" error when launching Articulate content in your LMS, this may be caused by the version of Java that you have installed.

Some LMS’s use a Java API object to load content. Since content created in Articulate does not require Java, please do the following:

*  Contact your LMS provider and ensure that your installed version of Java is compatible with the version of the LMS you are using.
*  Ensure that you have published your content properly as described in the following article. 

Hope that helps and feel free to let us know if you need anything else! 

Kathy Cockcroft

This worked for me a couple of weeks ago but now I am adding a Storyline to a new course in Canvas and it keeps hanging - the player opens but that nothing else happens.  I have tried importing the new storyline into the player that I used originally but that hasn't helped either.

Any ideas or help would be gratefully received.

I just love Storyline and Canvas, it is shame we have so much bother trying to get them to work together.

Thanks.

Andrea Cohn

I originally posted this fix awhile ago. Since then we have noticed the more complicated the storyline is, the greater the chance of it not working. Eventually we had to purchase server space and link out to our storyline content. Definitely not ideal, especially since we cannot integrate with the gradebook! But we already had the content and had to make it work.

Andrea Cohn
Associate Dean of Library Operations
Harrison College
Sent from my iPhone

Kathy Cockcroft

Hi Ashley

I am using version 1. Sorry, when I say a new course, I meant I am creating a new course on Canvas into which I would like to use Storyline.

I have sorted it but I really cannot understand the solution.

I opened one of the SL files that used on another course, these all opened and worked as expected.

Using trial and error I have found that if I copy or import the first slide from one of these into my new project and the set the trigger to the next scene it works!

I have looked at player settings and they are the same in both.

Strange but true....

Thanks for getting back to me, I wonder if my strange solution will work for others.

Kathy

Sent from my iPad

Stanford Kekauoha

Has anyone else experienced this issue. I had the same situation where we had one course that plays just fine in canvas but a newer course would always hang up and never load.

I tried Kathy's solution but all that happens is the first slide from the working file loads but when I add any triggers or press next to continue to the newer content it freezes up again. 

I have spent close to two hours trying every single combination of hacks I could try to no avail. It really shouldn't be this complicated. Especially when I have one course that works and one that doesn't, even though I am using the same exact player, publishing and story settings.

Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Stanford, 

I'm sorry to hear that you've run into difficulty with this latest course, and it's taken some time to figure out. This thread is a bit older, so I"m not certain that other users are still subscribed to assist but with that in mind I did want to ask a few other questions to help figure out next steps for you:

Are you using Storyline 1 or Storyline 2? Are you on the latest update of whichever version you're using, Update 10 and Update 7 respectively? 

Have you looked at testing it in SCORM Cloud to see if it loads and behaves normally there? Since it's an industry standard for LMS testing it's a good place to start to rule out issues with the file and isolate it to how the LMS is behaving. You could use this article to walk through the troubleshooting/uploading steps.  

Have you reached out to Canvas or their Support to see if there is additional information that they may have?

Stanford Kekauoha

Hey Ashley, thanks for responding. I am using storyline 2.7. I have not tried uploading to scorm cloud, I will give that a shot to troubleshoot, though I am certain it is an LMS issue.

It seems that Canvas doesn't offer much in the way of support. Im gonna try a few more things. I will update this thread If I find a solution that works for me. Thanks.

Kevin Thompson

Hello, Stanford.  Do consider submitting a support case to Instructure. They were helpful in diagnosing a problem recently with an Articulate Presenter loading problem. If you send them a URL, they will likely be able to view a diagnostics console that shows what is/is not loading as expected. 

Stanford Kekauoha

Thank Kevin for the response.

It seems as though I have fixed it, at least for me. I started with a new .story file and added one element at a time from the non-working file and uploaded it to canvas until it broke.

I have found that the second I add a .jpeg file the storyfile in canvas freezes up. So I changed all my images to .png files and it works great. Hope this helps!

Mitchell Woll

I do not think this works anymore with Storyline 2 (update 9). When I attempted to launch the file using "launcher.htm" I receive error messages and nothing appears. When I try "story.htm" the file appears but does not work properly. The first slide displays but when I perform any interaction, the wheel appears like Canvas is thinking.

Tim Danner
Mitchell Woll

I do not think this works anymore with Storyline 2 (update 9). When I attempted to launch the file using "launcher.htm" I receive error messages and nothing appears. When I try "story.htm" the file appears but does not work properly. The first slide displays but when I perform any interaction, the wheel appears like Canvas is thinking.

 

We just started moving some of our courses to Canvas, and I've encountered the loading issue (spinning wheel) for content published in Studio '13 when uploading through Files. Oddly, we don't have the issue with the content published in Studio '09. Our workaround, which isn't a good one, has been to publish the '13 material for LMS and upload it through the Canvas SCORM tool. The problem now is that the content is housed in the Assignments area and displays in the Grades, when it's neither an assignment nor something that would be graded. But, at least it plays and we can add it to a module.

Holly Jean Greene

I could use some help. :)

I'm having problems with the way in which my SL2 files are posting in the Canvas gradebook.  

Tracking is set to incomplete/complete when I publish and my Canvas gradebook is set to post incomplete/complete.  Yet, when student's complete one of my online lectures, it's posting in Canvas as incomplete - and posting an X in the Canvas gradebook. 

Should I publish differently?  Change a a setting in the Canvas gradebook?

Thanks!