Adding reference material to an e-learning course
Feb 09, 2011
Got a good question today about how to attach reference material to an e-learning course, so I thought I'd post here in case it was a question others might be wondering about.
A good way to add supplemental information (like a Word or PDF document, or even a link to a web page) is via the Attachments feature in Presenter. This creates a tab at the top of your course player, where learners can get to the supplemental information you provide. Here's a tutorial on how to do it, and here's an example of a course where an attachment has been added. (Just move past the intro slide, and then you'll see the Attachments tab on the upper edge of the player). You can also change the name of the attachments tab if you want, by editing the text labels on your player. The text labels related to attachments are items 55 through 58 in the text labels list.
If you do add attachments, keep in mind that when you publish, you should make sure to test the course in the environment for which it's published - i.e., if you publish for Web, upload the course to a web location and then test it from there ... otherwise browser security restrictions may prevent the attachment from opening.
6 Replies
For some thing things, we are finding it's better to use AP attachments as links to existing web pages with linked documents on them instead of adding the actual documents to the course itself, especially if the documents are used outside the course and produced by someone else.
Easier to change the document in that one spot and you not have to republish the course. Of course, if they then move the web page . . . .
That's a good point Gerry! And a nice solution since the Attachments feature lets you add either files or links. On a somewhat related note, for folks who prefer to go that route (placing reference material on webpages that you link to), Justin had a cool idea that he shared awhile back. If you want more flexibility for organizing or rearranging your attachments, you can go with an FAQ interaction built in Articulate Engage. Here's his tutorial about that, for those who might be interested in checking it out.
Justin rocks! When I have had docs that I want to attach but are not already stored online, I have also used the tip that he shares here: https://player.vimeo.com/video/204933051 ...where you enter the name of your file (rather than a full URL), and then after you publish, you place the PDF in the same folder as your player.html or launch_presentation.exe.
Thanks Jeanette Sam and Gary for your advice, that's wonderful ...will give it a try! Christine
Like Gerry indicated, if your resources may be updated more often than you would like to edit and republish your course, then you may want to investigate whether or not your LMS will allow you to attach additional course materials to the actual offering.
I use the FAQ as a tab method as in Justin's tutorial, but have multiple files (docs and pdfs) linked to in it. The way I've done it is under the hyperlink, typed the file in as " data/downloads/filename.pdf " (without the quotes) for each file.
At first, I then copied all the files into the data/downloads folder after publishing - but that got to be a pain,
so in some courses I also added the files under the regular attachments feature, but in the player templates settings the attachment tab is UNchecked. That way when publishing, articulate gets to do all the work of putting the files in the right spot & the FAQ tab becomes the Attachment / or resource tab.
This discussion is closed. You can start a new discussion or contact Articulate Support.