Clearing "Resume where you left off"

Normally, when a course is updated, the player's resume is automatically reset.

(because the resume data from the previous version don't fit to the new version*)

did you checked resume & updating a course on your LMS ?


* this is very often a problem, if you want to correct an error of the course

A lot of LMSs now have the option to reset resume data when you upload an update, You can edit the same message toilet them know if it is their refresher to press no.

Our problem is that our course catalog size exceeds our tiny 3-person team's ability to update every course every year, so sometimes it is literally the same course that someone takes this year that they will take again next year. This is the situation in which the "resume" feature takes the learner right to the end of the course (since they completed it already last year).

What I'm looking for is a way to reset the page where the course will resume to, or maybe a way to check how long ago the course was completed and disable the "resume" or reset the page where it will resume to, if the last completion was, say, more than 9 months ago.

The player loads before the course, it might be possible, never really looked to see how resume loads. I will have a look over the weekend to see if I can find something.

Sent from my iPhone

Phil, that would be awesome. Thank you!

One more bit of info that might be relevant: we don't use a SCORM LMS here. Everything is published for "web" and there is a "Get Credit" button at the end of each course that records the completion into a homebrew training/tracking system.

This means two things:

1. We could potentially put a trigger on this Get Credit button to reset the resume feature or resume-to page.

2. For any solution to this problem to be useful to us, that solution must involve only Storyline or maybe JavaScript features; it can't require LMS features.

there is no method to reset the resume feature by a trigger (javascript)

if you don't use a LMS, the resume values are stored in "Local Storage" of the user browser

if the Key has changed (it is enough to change one char/image in the course) or the "Local Storage" is cleared (e.g. by the user or by Group Policy) -> resume is not available

Thanks Jürgen,

Just so I'm clear, are you saying that there is no way to change the Key via a trigger and no way to change the value of the Key either? How does the Key get changed when the course is updated and republished?

I didn’t get a chance to look over the weekend.

The player loads before the course so a trigger is not going to work. Are you tracking and storing. the bookmarking data?

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Hi Phil,

I'm inferring from your post that it is the Player that presents the "Resume where you left off?" question. Is that right?

If that's so, then a trigger at runtime to check whether or not to present that question is not going to work, but perhaps a trigger at the end of the course that clears the resume data could work, so that when the course loads next year, the player no longer thinks there is a reason to ask the "Resume?" question.

But I still would need to know how to clear the resume data. Jürgen's post suggests it's stored in local storage as the value of a particular Key. Is there a way to change either the key itself or its value via a trigger? Jürgen seems to be saying "no." Yet when the course is updated and republished, that does somehow change the Key.

If it's truly not possible to clear or change the criteria for when the "Resume?" prompt appears, it could be a feature request for Articulate. Maybe we could have a setting in the Player menu that sets a time limit for the "Resume?" question--if the course was last attempted within the specified time, the "Resume?" prompt is active; if the course was last launched longer ago than the specified time, then the "Resume?" prompt is turned off and the course begins at the start again. 

I remember pulling the completion date from the resume data a long time ago, my plan was to use that to reset the course, I just don’t know how yet.

Sent from my iPhone

Cool. Thanks Phil. No pressure. But obviously the ability to manage the "Resume?" question is of interest to me and my organization.

if you change any text/image/video/trigger in the course and publish to web, storyline creates a new key

if you now start storyline, there is nothing for the new key in the"Local Storage"

-> no resume possible available - even if the learner has previously worked through the course

@ Jürgen is local storage persistent? I thought anything could remove it. The user is coming back 12 months after completing. If it is persistent it should be as simple clearing local storage on before unload when the user completes the course.

Sent from my iPhone

yes, local storage is persistent until the user cleans it

or with a firefox addon https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/clear-storage-button/

more infos for local storage

some more tests - here are the result a a small example

 - create a course with 5 slides
 - publish and start (on localhost)
 - visit the first 3 slide
 - close course
 - start course -> resume available

 - change on char on one slide
 - publish (same domain 'localhost') and start -> no resume available
 - visit the first 3 slide
 - close course
 - start course -> resume available

result:

-> two different keys, same values (the first three slides visited)

the current ID (local storage KEY) is stored in html5/data/js/data.js

it seems to be possible to overwrite the ID on data.js*

the course is starting and resume without problem with the customized ID

but i would not change the structure of the course or the storyline variables in any case

*with a post processing script (or by hand)

the trick for reuse an 'outdated' resume state after update course (Text changed) also works with LMS

just tested on SCORM cloud with a storyline scorm 1.2 course

Storyline creates for every publish a new Resume-ID, even if nothing has changed

so all resume infos are lost, when you publish an old course - without any changes - with the current version of storyline*

(tested with Storyline 3.6.3 & 3.7.1)

* e.g. to fix the Firefox start error, which is fixed with Storyline 3.66.28355.0