I need some help. One of my clients is trying to open the zipped version of my storyline course (extracted files) and she is reporting that is only showing a blank screen. When I open it, it works perfectly. Does anyone have any suggestions off the top of their heads about why this might be happening? I asked her what browser she is using. I'm using IE. I believe they have a different network than we do.
Yes, actually. The problem is that she's viewing the output files. If you intend to distribute the content for viewing locally, you may want to publish to CD and share the content.
If you view published Storyline content on your local hard drive or send it to someone else to view on their local hard drive, you'll encounter security restrictions from the computer, web browser, Flash Player, and network that'll cause various features of your content to fail.
To properly test your published content and share it with others, upload it to the environment for which it was published. Please review the following article for details:
OK, but I was publishing it for Web, sorry I forgot to mention that, and I've done this multiple times with several other people and none of them reported issues with the file opening. I thought by sending her a Zipped folder it was sending her all the content she needed to view the module. The majority of my end users can view the content on an LMS or SharePoint site but this one is a contractor who is outside our internal network which is why I'm going through this process with her.
Your contractor is accessing the course directly from the .ZIP file and has not extracted its contents to a local folder prior to launching the story.htm file
If you did not publish for HTML5 or the contractor does not have a HTML5 supported browser, the fall-back playback mode is Flash. Flash has some strict rules local-playback testing through a browser. I'd research how to modify the Flash Player Security Settings to add the contractor's local hard-drive\folder as an allowable exception
I know she has extracted the content and even if she didn't in my tests, it still opened if it wasn't extracted. Thanks for all of your help, keep the ideas coming! I've already asked her what browser she's using but am still waiting on a reply. The next question is to figure out what to do if she can't resolve the issue so that she can actually view the training.
Because different browses have different restrictions, you've really been lucky if you haven't encountered this issue in the past. Still, viewing local content, especially when published for web, causes issues like this. Zipping the files won't change this. The problem occurs when the content is launched.
Are you not able to upload the content? Have you tried publishing it for CD and sharing it with her? If so, does she run into the same problem or does it run properly?
If you're able to share the project's .STORY file here, I can upload it to our system and we can test it out that way. You could even share the link with her to see if it loads this way. If it does, it's an issue of loading the published output on her machine.
I am experiencing a similar issue with SL3. I publish a course for Web than upload it to an internal cloud/drive. Originally all of my published files would launch perfectly for people but now my courses are becoming stuck at a black screen with just the player being shown and no content in the content window.
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Hi Anna!
Yes, actually. The problem is that she's viewing the output files. If you intend to distribute the content for viewing locally, you may want to publish to CD and share the content.
OK, but I was publishing it for Web, sorry I forgot to mention that, and I've done this multiple times with several other people and none of them reported issues with the file opening. I thought by sending her a Zipped folder it was sending her all the content she needed to view the module. The majority of my end users can view the content on an LMS or SharePoint site but this one is a contractor who is outside our internal network which is why I'm going through this process with her.
Two thoughts off the top of my head:
I know she has extracted the content and even if she didn't in my tests, it still opened if it wasn't extracted. Thanks for all of your help, keep the ideas coming! I've already asked her what browser she's using but am still waiting on a reply. The next question is to figure out what to do if she can't resolve the issue so that she can actually view the training.
Hi Anna,
Because different browses have different restrictions, you've really been lucky if you haven't encountered this issue in the past. Still, viewing local content, especially when published for web, causes issues like this. Zipping the files won't change this. The problem occurs when the content is launched.
Are you not able to upload the content? Have you tried publishing it for CD and sharing it with her? If so, does she run into the same problem or does it run properly?
If you're able to share the project's .STORY file here, I can upload it to our system and we can test it out that way. You could even share the link with her to see if it loads this way. If it does, it's an issue of loading the published output on her machine.
Let me know how it goes!
Thanks
OK, I tried publishing it for a CD and just sent her the files. Fingers crossed that it works!
Sounds good! I hope it goes well
Anna, I am having the exact same issue my customer. (It was like I was reading my own problem!) Did the solution work?
I think it did work because the next call I got from the client she said they were able to open it. I'd try publishing for a CD Michael.
I am experiencing a similar issue with SL3. I publish a course for Web than upload it to an internal cloud/drive. Originally all of my published files would launch perfectly for people but now my courses are becoming stuck at a black screen with just the player being shown and no content in the content window.
Hi Justin,
Could you try publishing for CD? The publish to web feature is designed to host the content on a web server or similar, and if folks are trying to view it outside that environment they could run into security issues with the browser(s).
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