Storyline 360: Working with Triggers

Triggers make things happen. They're the keys to creating activities in Storyline 360. And we made them super easy to use so that you can build interactions without any coding at all. Just choose an action and decide when you want it to occur. For example, you might change the state of a character when the learner clicks a button.

• Adding Triggers
• Adding Conditions to Triggers
• Managing Conditions
• Understanding the Sections in the Triggers Panel
• Selecting Multiple Triggers

• Editing Triggers
• Disabling Triggers
• Copying and Pasting Triggers
• Copying Triggers by Duplicating Objects
• Pasting Conditions Across Triggers
• Deleting Triggers
• Rearranging Triggers
• Grouping Triggers
• Collapsing and Expanding Objects and Sections

Adding Triggers

At their core, triggers are pretty simple. A trigger has two main elements:

• What action occurs?
• When does it happen?

To create a trigger:

1. Click the Create a new trigger icon in the Triggers panel, or go to the Insert tab on the ribbon and click Trigger. The trigger wizard will guide you through the process using a series of drop-down lists, as shown below.
2. Select the action you want to occur and fill in the related parameters, such as the object that’s affected. For example, you might change a character’s expression.
3. Choose when you want it to happen—e.g., when the learner clicks a button.
4. Optional: You can add conditions to your trigger so it only occurs in certain circumstances. Learn more about conditions below.
5. When you’re done, click OK.

Tip: Check out this resource to learn about the available actions, events, and conditions.

Adding Conditions to Triggers

If you want to trigger an action only when certain criteria are met, you can add one or more conditions to it.

1. If the trigger wizard isn’t already open, double-click the trigger you want to edit in the Triggers panel.
2. Click the + if drop-down list on the Conditions card to add your first condition. A condition can be based on a variable, an object on the slide or any of its layers, or the window in which the slide is displayed, as shown below.
   
   
3. After selecting a variable, object, or window, click the underlined portions of the conditional sentence and make your selections from the drop-down lists. For example, you might want your trigger to occur only on the condition that the state of a button is not visited, as shown below.
   
   
4. Repeat the steps above to add as many conditions as you need. Then decide how your conditions should interact. Should they be AND conditions where all the conditions must be met? Should they be OR conditions where only one condition must be met? Or should they be a combination of both? Click AND or OR to switch back and forth, as shown below.
   
   
5. New: Create conditional triggers with alternative actions. As of November 2022, you can add an optional "else" action. Here's how. In the trigger wizard, click + Add Else. Storyline 360 automatically adds a default action based on the main action. Click the default "else" action to change it to a different one if you'd like.
6. Click OK to save your changes and close the trigger wizard.

Managing Conditions

It’s easy to reorder, duplicate, and delete conditions. Here’s how.

Reorder Conditions

Change the order of conditions in the new trigger wizard without deleting and recreating them. Just drag them up and down the list. Install the November 2019 update or later for Storyline 360 to take advantage of this time-saving feature.

Duplicate Conditions

When you need multiple conditions that are similar, save time by duplicating them. Create the first condition, as shown above, then hover over it and click the Duplicate Condition button that appears. Use the inline editing lists to tweak the new condition as needed.

Delete Conditions

Hover over the condition you want to delete and click the Remove Condition button that appears. That’s it!

Understanding the Sections in the Triggers Panel

It’s helpful to know how the Triggers panel is arranged so you can quickly find the triggers you’re looking for. The Triggers panel is divided into sections based on the “when” parameter in your triggers. The following table lists sections in the order they appear in the Triggers panel.

Section	Description
Slide Triggers	Slide triggers always appear at the top of the Triggers panel. They often rely on the timeline of the slide or layer—e.g., when the timeline starts, ends, or reaches a certain point.
Key Press Triggers	Key press triggers occur when the learner presses a specific key after clicking the slide or layer.
Variable Triggers	Variable triggers occur when a variable changes. For example, you might show a layer when a true/false variable changes to true.
Unassigned Triggers	If you accidentally leave the “when” parameter blank, your trigger will appear in this section so you can immediately see which triggers are incomplete.
Object Triggers	Object triggers apply to objects on the slide (images, characters, text boxes, etc.), and they generally occur when the learner performs an action, such as clicking a button, hovering over a hotspot, or dragging an object. Object triggers can also occur when other events take place—e.g., when the state of another object changes, an animation completes, or an object leaves the slide.
Player Triggers	Player triggers always appear at the bottom of the Triggers panel. They apply to the built-in navigation buttons: Previous, Next, and Submit.

 

Here’s an example of the Triggers panel with each of the sections defined above:

Selecting Multiple Triggers

Select multiple triggers and edit them all at once. Easily copy and paste, move, disable, and delete triggers in bulk.

Here are five ways to multi-select triggers:

• Click an object on the slide to select all the triggers associated with it.
• In grouped view, click a "When …" event to select all the triggers in that group.
• Ctrl+click to select multiple triggers that aren't next to each other.
• Shift+click the first and last triggers in a series to multi-select all the triggers in between.
• Press Ctrl+A to select all the triggers in a section of the triggers panel, such as Slide Triggers or Object Triggers.

This feature is exclusive to the new trigger workflow. Install the January 2020 update or later for Storyline 360.

Editing Triggers

You can easily edit your triggers right in the Triggers panel. Click the segments of each trigger description, and then choose an option from the drop-down list or enter a value in the field. Here’s a demo:

You can also edit triggers in the trigger wizard. Just double-click the trigger you want to edit. Or, select the trigger and click the Edit button at the top of the Triggers panel. After making your selections, click OK to save your changes and close the trigger wizard.

Disabling Triggers

Temporarily disable individual triggers when you’re troubleshooting an interaction that isn’t working or when you’re experimenting with new ideas. Simply hover over the trigger you want to disable and click the Disable Trigger icon that appears (it looks like a lightning bolt with a slash through it). Click the icon again to re-enable your trigger. When a trigger is disabled, its text is struck out so you can tell at a glance that it’s disabled.

Disabled triggers won’t work in your published output. If you need them to work, remember to re-enable them before you publish.

Compatibility Tip: Disabled triggers are exclusive to the new trigger workflow in Storyline 360. They’ll be present but hidden if you open your project file in the classic trigger workflow in Storyline 360 or Storyline 3.

Copying and Pasting Triggers

Save time by copying and pasting triggers from one object to another. Then make any necessary adjustments to the new triggers.

1. Select the trigger you want to copy in the Triggers panel.
2. Copy the trigger by pressing Ctrl+C on your keyboard or by clicking the Copy button at the top of the Triggers panel.
3. Select one or more objects on the slide where you want to paste the trigger, then press Ctrl+V on your keyboard or click the Paste button.
4. If you need to tweak the pasted trigger, click the segments you need to edit in the Triggers panel or double-click the trigger to open it in the trigger wizard. See the section above to learn more about editing triggers.

Copying Triggers by Duplicating Objects

Another way to quickly copy triggers is to duplicate an object that already has the triggers you want. Just select the object on the slide and press Ctrl+D on your keyboard.

This is helpful when you need several variations of an object that you’ve already customized to fit your course. For example, let's say you need several buttons that look the same and perform similar actions.

Pasting Conditions Across Triggers

Save time by copying conditions from one trigger and pasting them on another.

1. Copy the trigger that has the conditions you want to reuse.
2. Select one or more triggers where you want to paste the conditions.
3. Right-click the selected trigger(s), scroll to Paste, and choose Paste Conditions from the context menu.

This feature is exclusive to the new trigger workflow. Install the January 2020 update or later for Storyline 360.

Deleting Triggers

To delete a trigger, select it in the Triggers panel and do any of the following:

• Press the Delete key on your keyboard.
• Click the Delete button at the top of the Triggers panel.
• Right-click the trigger and select Delete from the context menu.

Rearranging Triggers

You can add triggers to slides, layers, and slide masters. You can also add multiple triggers to a single object. The order of all these triggers is important and determines when they execute.

• Slide master triggers execute before slide and layer triggers.
• When there are multiple triggers on the same object that are triggered by the same action (e.g., when the learner clicks a button), triggers execute in the order they appear in the Triggers panel.

To reorder triggers, use the Up and Down arrows at the top of the Triggers panel, or simply drag triggers up and down the panel with your mouse.

Grouping Triggers

You can group triggers together by event (e.g., when the learner clicks a button or when the timeline starts) so triggers are easier to see and understand. They’re also easier to troubleshoot if your interaction isn’t working the way you expect.

To group triggers by event, mark the Group box at the top of the Triggers panel. Uncheck the box if you want to ungroup your triggers.

Here’s a comparison of the same triggers ungrouped on the left and grouped on the right.

Collapsing and Expanding Objects and Sections

Collapse all the triggers for an object or even an entire section of the Triggers panel when you need to focus on specific triggers. Click the triangle to the left of an object to collapse or expand its triggers. Click the arrows to the right of a section to collapse or expand the whole section, such as Slide Triggers or Object Triggers.

Want to learn more about working with triggers? As an Articulate 360 subscriber, you have unlimited access to live online training webinars and recorded videos on a variety of e-learning topics. Check out Articulate 360 Training to register for webinars and search our video library.