Random positioning of Objects on Slide

Hello Siddiqui, welcome to the community!

Not sure which type of question you're trying to randomize the answers for, but from what I can see all of the free form options have an option to shuffle the answers, and when testing it seems to work.

Take a look at the highlighted option below and see if it does for you what you need - 

Thanks Brian for your suggestion.

Let me try to explain via example.

I have four draggable shapes like

1. Square
2. Circle
3. Triangle
4. Rectangle

and there are four drop zones on the slide, one for each shape. 

Now what I would like to achieve is to have the draggable shapes appear on slide at random places instead of fix every time the quiz is run. Is this possible?

Thanks.

Ok, here is my first try. 

Invoking a trigger when story starts to change the position of objects, but the position is changing to a fixed place not random. 

Hi Siddiqui,

I spent a half an hour trying to get the 4 shapes to change positions if the person misplaced them and clicked on a try again button... couldn't do it.  I could get them to change in preview mode when I clicked replay the slide.  But that option is not available in the published version.  So here's an easy fix.  It's not fancy, but will do what you want.

Create slide 1 with the 4 objects in their original position.  Create 3 copy slides move the 4 objects to different positions.  If the learner misplaces them have the "try again" button take the learner to the next slide with the 4 objects rearranged.  This continues for 4 slides.  If they still can't get it they go back to slide 1 and start over.  Of course, if they do get it right the correct slide takes them to a slide outside this loop.

Hint:  just copy the original slide 3 times.  Move the objects in each of the 3 copies.  The targets remain unchanged.  All you have to do is create the interactions once and you got it.

Sorry I didn't have a more "elaborate" solution.  I'm going to play with this to see what I can do.  Thanks for filling my night

Alan

Thanks Alan for giving it a try. 

I will definitely implement the solution suggested by you if randomization of objects cannot be achieved. It will give me different scenarios but not true randomization. 

Let's see if someone posts a better solution.

Hi Again,

I spent the last half hour playing with the project and still couldn't get it to do what we want it to do.  I did discover that repeating the cycle after 4 slides isn't going to work unless you set each slide to reset to original settings when the learner comes back.  Hopefully, they will get it before the 5th attempt is necessary.

Sorry I couldn't offer a better solution, but I know this one works and it's easy.  I'd like to learn if one of the real gurus has a solution.

alan

Is there any reason something like the attached .story file won't work for this situation?

I mimicked Siddiqui's requirements (four objects, four dropzones), and then set the answers to shuffle, and when I preview this I am able to replicate the results that Siddiqui is trying to achieve.

Let me know if there is some reason that this approach wouldn't work...

Hi Brian,

Thanks for taking time to help me out. 

The drag items are changing positions in the story you have kindly provided, but the drop zones the rectangles are keeping there positions. What I am trying to achieve is to randomize both. 

Working on a story which has a beach setting and lots of litter on it like cans, paper, bottles etc. There are three garbage bins one each for paper, glass and cans. Player will have to put the corresponding items in these bins. With shuffle answers option the draggable items can be randomized, but is it possible to change the position of bins also. One way is to use slide layers but than again how to load a layer randomly every time the quiz is run.

Thanks for the help, hopefully someone has a solution or workaround. 

I'm not familiar with your course content, so can't really speak to it, but if I were in your position I would probably ask myself how important/critical it is for the bins to change position. 

Normally when I design I start with my "perfect world" ideas, but then when it comes down to it if the tool(s) don't support all of these ideas I will look at how important they are as well as does it really improve on the design enough to spend the time trying to find a workaround or a tool that will enable me to do it.

Hi Brian,

I was able to do what you did, but I have a question.  When I previewed the interaction and placed the objects in the wrong rectangle, I got the sorry, try again layer and the objects remained where they were.  They did not return to the center of the slide in a random order.  I set it up so the learner had 4 tries.  When I hit replay, the objects were rearranged in the center.  But when I published the slide the objects remained in the rectangles and did not return to the center in a random order.    When I tried your interaction, the same thing happened.  How can I make the slide repeat and have to objects rearranged in the center, so the learner can try again?

Hi Alan - give this a try if you can and let us know if it affects the behaviour on retry attempts.  For your quiz slide, go to the slide properties dialog and change When revisiting to Reset to Initial state.

I haven't tried it yet but I believe it should work...

Ok, did a quick test and wasn't able to get the items to reset on retry just with the slide properties change by itself.

So in addition I tried changing the button trigger on the Try again layer to jump back to the quiz slide, and this seems to work.

Here's a screenshot, and I've reattached the updated .story file.

Let me know your thoughts!

Hey Brian,

I tried it and got the same results I did.  The objects go back to the center, but in the same location where they started.

After fooling with this for over an hour, I just decided it was easier to create 1 slide, copy it 3 times, move the objects to different locations, and go to the next slide if the objects were placed in the wrong rectangle.  If they got it right they would get out of the loop.

I'm an old guy and the easy answer works for me 

doh!  Alan, you're right, they are in exactly the same position every time (smh...).  Another worry I would have is how it may affect limiting the number of retries.

It seems like there should be an easier way to get the objects to reset (and randomize) on retry, but if there is I'm missing it.

Agree with you and if the tool does not have an option than I need to find a work-around

From a pedagogic and logical point of view it's obvious that being able to randomize both question and answer (drop object and target) would be superior to only randomizing one or neither, because the learner would have to re-think both question and answer each time rather than relying on their positions only. 

If the software doesn't do that, OK, but let's be clear it would be better if it did have that feature.

Hi Michael and Norah, 

This thread is a bit older, but the drag items are not reset/reshuffled on a second attempt. If you use the method mentioned above to "jump to slide X" to reset everything, they'll return to their initial starting location. You're welcome to share your thoughts on this set up by submitting a feature request.