Grouping and dragging objects

Nov 22, 2021

Laura Coulter
By Laura Coulter

I am creating a software simulation where I need a window to be draggable and still be able to click on something in that draggable window. 

I used some tips I learned through these discussions to create a draggable object.

  • Create a layer
  • create a hotspot that covers the entire layer
  • set object on top of hotspot
  • right click on object to uncheck drag reset
  • set trigger on object to show layer unassigned when object is dragged over hotspot

This works most of the time. Today, the object offsets by quite a bit when I click and drag. That's one issue.

The other is that I need to make something on that object clickable. One of the tips I read was to make a pseudo hotspot (since hotspots can't be grouped or dragged).

  • I drew a shape over what was to be clickable
  • removed the outline and fill
  • set a trigger to move on to the next slide when overlay object was clicked
  • Then grouped the two objects. 

This seemed to solve all my problems on Friday. I was able to drag the window with only a very small offset and then successfully click the line I needed in that freshly-moved window. Monday, the offset is huge and the clickable object doesn't seem to be moving with it.

I created a fresh story to see if there was something in my file that was tangled and to format the clickable object so that it was visible. Still no luck, I've attached my test file here and you can see it in action here: https://360.articulate.com/review/content/f50c6bc8-c88b-4fbb-a0bb-2e46be91b7bc/review. There are three slides with three different builds. 

I'd really love to be able to drag a window over and still be able to click something in that window. If you can see what I'm doing wrong or know what I need to do to make this work, I would appreciate the help. 

4 Replies
Jackie Ha
over 2 years ago11/22/21 at 10:31 pm (UTC)

Hello, 

I took a look at your story file, and I think I've figured out how to get it to work the way that you want. In the second slide, the trigger on the Draggable Object Grouped layer says

"Show layer unassigned When the user drags Draggable rectangle over HS all surface", but it should be "Show layer unassigned When the user drags Group 1 over HS all surface".

Even though you had grouped the rectangle and star together, the trigger was only telling Storyline to drag the rectangle around, not the whole group. Also, when things are grouped together, the "Drag Return" option is checked on the group as well, so you'll have to make sure to uncheck that after grouping. 

Also, in case you there are times when you want to have a draggable object, but don't want to have to click to get it to appear, this is how you would set it up:

  1. Create an additional layer (it will stay empty and have no triggers on it).
  2. Create your window with objects on the base layer and group everything together.
  3. With the group selected, right-click and uncheck "Drag Return".
  4. Create a trigger that Hides Untitled Layer 1 (or whatever you name it), When user drags Group 1 (or whatever you name it) over Hotspot.

There was not any offset when dragged around the screen, and everything moved together. Hopefully this works for you!

Gerry McAteer
over 2 years ago11/23/21 at 3:10 am (UTC)

Hi Laura, this is another way to have a 'popup' drag-able window and have elements within the window which are 'clickable' i.e. hyperlink and button. I haven't used layers but have used states instead. Set the state for the 'popup' objects to 'hidden' as default and use a button, object, hotspot to trigger the state change to 'normal'. Also make the slide a  drag and drop freeform slide. See example 

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