I'm trying to set one of my elearning slides so that the Next button (on the player) doesn't appear until four objects on the slide have been visited. Any help would be appreciated.
I just realised the rest of my post above didn't appear - sorry. If you are using storyline 1 you can't hide the button, but you can add a visited state to your four objects and then trigger the next button to only jump to next slide when state of all four objects are visited. See attached SL1 sample. hope this helps
Hi, Michelle - Looks like you are getting some great advice from Wendy; please let us know how things work out or if you still need additional assistance!
Thanks for your reply. I'm using S2, and am quite new to Storyline. How do I change the intitial state of the Next button to hidden or disabled. I know how to change the state of objects on the slide, but not the inbuilt Next button.
Hey Michelle it's easy with SL2 - you will find the player next and prev buttons listed in the objects list when you go to create a trigger. Scroll right to the top of list. Trigger is change state of next button to 'hidden' or 'disabled' whichever effect you are after when timeline starts on slide. Then another trigger to change state to normal when all your objects have been visited. Hope that helps.
I have 9 boxes on the screen, each is an image, has a visited state and jumps to a slide when user clicks. There are 11 slides in the scene: slide with all boxes, a slide for each box to link to and a slide for the next button to go to after it becomes normal.
I have the slide programmed to disable the Next button when timeline starts, change the state of next button to normal when all boxes are visited
each box has triggers to jump to a slide and change the state to visited.
I know when you use the wizard that "State of..." is one of the options for the When part of the trigger, but it doesn't work. There is nothing to make it happen. States do not initiate triggers. They are very useful in conditions.
Write your trigger to change Next to Normal when the timeline starts if all those objects are in their desired state.
FWIW: You do not need to write a trigger to set the state to Visited, the built-in visited state does that for you. That said, "Visited" state is not always stable, especially if you visit other slides, and especially if they have branching on them. I prefer to use a custom state, like "Completed". If you do that, then you will need a trigger to set it.
Write your trigger to change Next to Normal when the timeline starts if all those objects are in their desired state.
THIS!! This just wrapped up HOURS of trying to find a solution to my next button not returning to normal after a series of scenes had been visited. Somebody give Walt a raise. :)
Added triggers for each box "Change state of [box #] to Selected when user clicks."
Don't. All objects that have a selected state have built-in magic that changes their state to Selected when you click it, and back to Normal when you click again. The same goes for Hover, and the other built-in states. Creating your own triggers to do the same thing will only confuse SL, and a confused SL will often create some incredible, unbelievable, but seldom useful results.
I know when you use the wizard that "State of..." is one of the options for the When part of the trigger, but it doesn't work. There is nothing to make it happen. States do not initiate triggers. They are very useful in conditions. This is a known bug that doesn't work if there are more than five triggers on a slide.
The trigger you need is "Change state of Next to Normal When user clicks Box1 on condition state of Box2 is Selected, AND state of Box3 is Selected AND ... etc. "
You seem to be the guru of resolving this issue. I'm running into the same problem. I have a slide with 6 buttons that branch out then circle back to the original "menu slide". I want to disable the next button until all of the branches have been completed.
I thought I had tried all of the solutions above but it's just not working. I'm still fairly new to Storyline (about 6 months using it). I have attached my file here....any help would be greatly appreciated!
Hi Amie! Thanks for sharing your project file. You've done a really good job so far, and this setup is one of the most common challenges that designers face. Since you had all the foundations in place, it was really easy for me to make a few changes to get it working.
First, I eliminated all the triggers to change those shapes on slide 1.2 to Visited. Because Visited is a built-in state, you don't have to do any work to trigger it! Storyline does it for you.
Next, I added a condition to the trigger to change the state of the next button to disabled. As it was, that trigger was going to fire when the timeline started no matter what. I added the condition of "if Slide2Complete is equal to False."
I changed the trigger to set "Slide2Complete equal to true" just a bit. Instead of adjusting it "when the state of 2, 3, 4, etc" are Visited, I made the action "When user clicks Rectangle 7." The user clicking is a more reliable action than a state changing.
Then, I added the conditions of "If the state of Rectangle 2 is equal to Visited," and the same for the rest of the rectangles. I didn't include Rectangle 7 in the conditions since you'll be clicking on it anyway.
Finally, I moved that trigger above the trigger to jump to slide 7.1. If you jump to slide 7.1 first, the trigger to adjust the variable to true won't ever fire.
I'm attaching the modified file so you can see exactly how it looks and so you can give it a test! Let me know how that works for you.
This works great when I utilize the jump boxes you added. When I go through as a learner would starting with rectangle 7 the "next" button never enables? (Watch the video and answer the questions). At least it doesn't work in the preview offered by storyline?
I'm wondering if I should use this but guide the learner through by numbering the sections so they click on the final section last.
It seems to have an issue with my idea of allowing the learning to choose the sections in any order they'd like.
Good catch! We can certainly switch the triggers to when the timeline starts on this slide, which will allow the learner to navigate in any order as you mentioned.
51 Replies
Hi Michelle
Set the initial state of the Next button to hidden
Create a trigger on the slide - change state of Next button to normal when state of 'all of xxx are visited'
Hi Wendy
I'm using the Player Next button, not my own. Can I change the initial state of the player Next button?
Michelle
If you are using SL2 yes...SL1 no
Hi Michelle
I just realised the rest of my post above didn't appear - sorry. If you are using storyline 1 you can't hide the button, but you can add a visited state to your four objects and then trigger the next button to only jump to next slide when state of all four objects are visited. See attached SL1 sample. hope this helps
Hi, Michelle - Looks like you are getting some great advice from Wendy; please let us know how things work out or if you still need additional assistance!
Regarding usability and best practice, it would be better to disable the Next/Prev buttons rather than hide them altogether.
Thanks, Bob!
Hi Wendy
Thanks for your reply. I'm using S2, and am quite new to Storyline. How do I change the intitial state of the Next button to hidden or disabled. I know how to change the state of objects on the slide, but not the inbuilt Next button.
Hey Michelle it's easy with SL2 - you will find the player next and prev buttons listed in the objects list when you go to create a trigger. Scroll right to the top of list. Trigger is change state of next button to 'hidden' or 'disabled' whichever effect you are after when timeline starts on slide. Then another trigger to change state to normal when all your objects have been visited. Hope that helps.
Yay, it worked - thanks a million :-)
Yay - glad you got it sorted...
So glad to hear you are all sorted out now, Michelle! (Thanks for the assistance, Wendy!) :)
Hello,
I have 9 boxes on the screen, each is an image, has a visited state and jumps to a slide when user clicks. There are 11 slides in the scene: slide with all boxes, a slide for each box to link to and a slide for the next button to go to after it becomes normal.
I have the slide programmed to disable the Next button when timeline starts, change the state of next button to normal when all boxes are visited
each box has triggers to jump to a slide and change the state to visited.
the next button does not change to normal.
Change the trigger that sets Next to normal.
I know when you use the wizard that "State of..." is one of the options for the When part of the trigger, but it doesn't work. There is nothing to make it happen. States do not initiate triggers. They are very useful in conditions.
Write your trigger to change Next to Normal when the timeline starts if all those objects are in their desired state.
FWIW: You do not need to write a trigger to set the state to Visited, the built-in visited state does that for you. That said, "Visited" state is not always stable, especially if you visit other slides, and especially if they have branching on them. I prefer to use a custom state, like "Completed". If you do that, then you will need a trigger to set it.
Walt,
Thank you, thank you , thank you!.that did it!
Wendy,
I had a problem just like this one and your 2-year-old post solved it. Thank you so much.
LaVon
Great to hear LaVon and good luck with your project!
Write your trigger to change Next to Normal when the timeline starts if all those objects are in their desired state.
THIS!! This just wrapped up HOURS of trying to find a solution to my next button not returning to normal after a series of scenes had been visited. Somebody give Walt a raise. :)
I second that NIcole :-)
Hey everyone! I'm having a hard time figuring out how to get this to work with SL3.
Pretty simple Click & Reveal slide. I want the "Next" button to appear only after the user has clicked on all four of the boxes.
Added triggers for each box "Change state of [box #] to Selected when user clicks."
Added trigger to Next button "Change state of next button to Normal when state of [all boxes] are Selected"
and yet it doesn't work.
I'm obviously missing something... attached file for some help.
Thanks!
Added triggers for each box "Change state of [box #] to Selected when user clicks."
Don't. All objects that have a selected state have built-in magic that changes their state to Selected when you click it, and back to Normal when you click again. The same goes for Hover, and the other built-in states. Creating your own triggers to do the same thing will only confuse SL, and a confused SL will often create some incredible, unbelievable, but seldom useful results.
I know when you use the wizard that "State of..." is one of the options for the When part of the trigger, but it doesn't work. There is nothing to make it happen. States do not initiate triggers. They are very useful in conditions. This is a known bug that doesn't work if there are more than five triggers on a slide.
The trigger you need is "Change state of Next to Normal When user clicks Box1 on condition state of Box2 is Selected, AND state of Box3 is Selected AND ... etc. "
You need one of these for each box.
Hey Walt,
You seem to be the guru of resolving this issue. I'm running into the same problem. I have a slide with 6 buttons that branch out then circle back to the original "menu slide". I want to disable the next button until all of the branches have been completed.
I thought I had tried all of the solutions above but it's just not working. I'm still fairly new to Storyline (about 6 months using it). I have attached my file here....any help would be greatly appreciated!
Amie
Hi Amie! Thanks for sharing your project file. You've done a really good job so far, and this setup is one of the most common challenges that designers face. Since you had all the foundations in place, it was really easy for me to make a few changes to get it working.
Slide2Completeis equal to False."Slide2Completeequal to true" just a bit. Instead of adjusting it "when the state of 2, 3, 4, etc" are Visited, I made the action "When user clicks Rectangle 7." The user clicking is a more reliable action than a state changing.Then, I added the conditions of "If the state of Rectangle 2 is equal to Visited," and the same for the rest of the rectangles. I didn't include Rectangle 7 in the conditions since you'll be clicking on it anyway.
I'm attaching the modified file so you can see exactly how it looks and so you can give it a test! Let me know how that works for you.
Hey Crystal! Thanks for getting back to me!
This works great when I utilize the jump boxes you added. When I go through as a learner would starting with rectangle 7 the "next" button never enables? (Watch the video and answer the questions). At least it doesn't work in the preview offered by storyline?
I'm wondering if I should use this but guide the learner through by numbering the sections so they click on the final section last.
It seems to have an issue with my idea of allowing the learning to choose the sections in any order they'd like.
Amie
Hey Amie,
Good catch! We can certainly switch the triggers to when the timeline starts on this slide, which will allow the learner to navigate in any order as you mentioned.
Check out your updated file attached.