Bookmark issues with course in LMS

Hi Thijs

here is a response from Articulate staff to another user - this may help you troubleshoot your issue

It sounds like the reason why you always resume to a specific slide in the course is that you've exceeded your suspend data limit. Your LMS might be imposing limits on suspend data. Older LMS specs, such as SCORM 1.2, have outdated restrictions on suspend data.

We recommend publishing for the latest edition of SCORM 2004 or Tin Can API (also known as Experience API). See this article for more information.

I recommend that you try to republish your course for SCORM 2004 3rd Edition or 4th Edition, both of which support much longer suspend data. Let me know if that fixes the issue!

Hi,

Thanks for your reply. I've dealt with suspend date issues of SCORM 1.2 before, but I thought it was related to the amount of actual data that is stored. For instance, we used to work with Smart Builder and SB would store all variables and input text (string) to the suspend data, therefor it would exceed its limit. However, in this case. There aren't any variables stored in the suspend data, are there? Or does Storyline store variables that I can't see or influence? Are all the ansers stored as strings? My course is only 15 questions long, none of them are input text, all of them are multiple choice, true false or multiple response. Apart from that I only have 4 variables I've created manually. I can't hardly believe it's too much for my suspend data, since I've created much bigger courses in Smart Builder. Can you elaborate on what information is stored in the suspend data and how Storyline uses it? And what other solutions could there be, since I can't make my clients just go and change their whole LMS system, because a few courses don't work properly.

Thanks

Hi Thijs

I can't elaborate on how the suspend data and Storyline variables work - sorry. Perhaps you would be better to log a support ticket with Articulate and upload the course privately.

Thanks. I've found another discussion on the subject, but I don't really think it has anything to do with my problem: https://community.articulate.com/discussions/articulate-storyline/scorm-1-2-suspend-data-seems-wonky-to-my-pea-brain

Or at least, I can't really believe that a course that is so small can have issues with the suspend data.

I've also found out if I quit the course several times ( like 2 or 3 times) and anwser a few questions each time I'm in  the course, eventually it will be able to keep track and save my progress. I'm hoping there is some sort of solution for this problem, even if it does have something to do with the suspend data. The discussion above (the link) is quite old and a few things that are mentioned are quite strange and disturbing, like why storyline uses so much data per quesion to save the resume state. And there is no way to influence it, other then jumping to a whole lot of hoops to hopefully try to reduce it a bit. And it is also quite alarming that these limitations of Articulate Storyline aren't mentioned or discussed more. A lot of companies still use a LMS that isn't SCORM 2004 compatible, and however I feel Storyline has a lot more to offer than for instance Lectora, it seems to be imposible to build a reasonable course that is compatible with SCORM 1.2. I really hope Articulate will work on all its flaws and short comings. Cause unfortunately, apart from this issue, there are a lot more.

Thanks for your help so far.

Not sure if you have seen this troubleshooting blog

Thanks

I'll get into it. I might try to find some sort of way to alter the export files and mess around in the code. If anyone has any tips, please share.

Hi Thijs,

Thanks for reaching out here and sharing a fair amount of detail about what you're running into. As Wendy mentioned, I'd also advise working with our Support Engineers so that we can take a look at your .story file and how it's tracking and reporting. You can upload it here. 

Hi there,

I am experiencing the same issues noted in this thread, but have not had any success eliminating the issue. In addition to this when the course is launched via LMS (Saba) if a user is unsuccessful two times when attempting a quiz the 'continue' button disappears leaving the learner in a loop of reviewing quiz and closing the course. Any guidance would be appreciated.

Hi there Cecilia! I'm happy to help you get to the bottom of this.

Let's first tackle the bookmarking issue. Can you tell me more about what's going on? When you re-launch the course in Saba, do you find that it restarts on the wrong slide?

Now, on to the case of the disappearing "Continue" button. I'd like to take a closer look at your file to see what could be causing that. I see you've already opened a support case--smart idea! You can attach the Storyline file to that support case by clicking here. 

Hi there,

You are correct...when the course is relaunched it does not consistently resume at the appropriate location. Particularly past module 7.

The disappearing continue button is happening after the module 2 quiz.

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Thanks Cecelia for uploading your files to your Support case. 

I also just wanted to let you know that replying via email will include your signature. You can edit out your contact information from your post if you'd like!  

Hi,

I'm experiencing a similar issue. I have two courses that both have issues with seemingly bookmarking upon resuming a course in our companies LMS.

Course 1 has about 50 screens, 4 knowledge checks and a 5 question final assessment where learners must score above 70% to pass. Similar to dozens and dozens of other courses I've created for them.

However, these last two function fine until the QAing the bookmarking. On course 1, regardless of how far I got, or others, it would take you back to about a third of the way through. Course two stopped about halfway through.

At first I thought maybe a bad scorm. I restarted and made a new one and same issue. Then I thought maybe a bad screen and deleted a few screens near where it stopped and it just randomly stopped a little further along in the course the next time.

Then I thought maybe it's our LMS, but the bookmarking issue was exactly the same in ScormCloud.

Then I thought maybe it was my version of Storyline since I just updated it last week. But then the second course had a similar issue before the update.

I checked the forum here and saw an issue about suspend data. I'm not sure I fully understand that, but at 10MB the scorm doesn't seem too large.

I'm at a loss... any thoughts?

Tim

Hey Tim,

Your hunch about suspend data is likely the culprit. Your LMS has a limit to the amount of data it can hold. If you have a course that goes beyond the limit, the LMS won't remember anything that happened after the learner reached the limit, and it'll resume to the wrong slide.

Did you publish with SCORM 1.2? If so, republish your course for SCORM 2004 3rd Edition or 4th Edition, both of which support much longer suspend data.

After making that change, let me know if you see a difference!

Also, a few LMS's may have an override that permits more characters than the SCORM 1.2 specifies.  Recent versions of Moodle come to mind.

However, not all LMS's have this and, for those that do, it usually is an advanced admin function to turn this on.

Hi Alyssa,

And thanks, as always, for the quick response.

While I don't know much about suspend data, it does seem strange that such a small scorm package (less than 7MB) would cause the bookmark issue when I've published courses nearly 10 times as large.

There are about 60 screens in the second of two scenes (a short intro and a 5 questions test), many with interactions, but again, nothing unusual compared to our other successfully published courses. No media files or anything fancy about the course.

Unfortunately our LMS only takes scorm 1.2 so republishing as something else is not an option.

It seems odd that we also are having the same issue with another course - both after I recently did an upgrade.

Would there be a way I could upload the file for someone to take a look at?

Thanks!

Thanks Gerry. I have a feeling our older LMS and lack of adequate support staff would be able to help with an override, but I like the idea!

Hey, Tim! We can absolutely take a look at your file. You can send it to us privately by clicking here. 

Hi Tim, 

I was wondering if you found a solution for this issue and wouldn't mind dropping me a quick line or two if so. FYI, I'm starting work on a long course that has to be hosted in SCORM 1.2 and the current design calls for a lot of user defined variables which I'm concerned won't all be saved (due to relatively limited suspend data in 1.2) in a bookmarking situation. Any feedback/lessons learned would be much appreciated if you get a chance!

Thanks - Bill

This old post I started has some nuggets on what you can do to try and reduce resume data (and how to count it).  Just excuse my verbosity.

https://community.articulate.com/discussions/articulate-storyline/scorm-1-2-suspend-data-seems-wonky-to-my-pea-brain

Another little note if it helps, if you have any states or animations on a master slide for questions, then have several questions your suspend data will grow massively, as you are multiplying all the stored information from your master sheet per questions in the course, an issue I had when working on some courses that I considered to be small!

If you test on scorn cloud you can see the data that is being stored, I'd recommend checking this and copying the suspend data into word (or something similar) and do a character count.

If you're bookmarking is not working then it is very likely that it will not store any variables, especially if they are changed after where ever your bookmarking is returning you too.