Set the default slide timeline length

May 06, 2019

Hi,

I just downloaded storyline 3 this weekend and am being asked to evaluate it for our school's needs (i.e. no prior experience with storyline).  I noticed that the default slide playtime length is 5 seconds (at least when importing powerpoint content).  Is there any way to change that default?  I can change it by alerting the html5 output javascript files (altering post-publish), but was hoping perhaps there might be a better way.

I realize I can manually edit every slide to change this value to whatever I want - thousands of slides etc. - but that just doesn't sound like much fun.

Thanks!

Michael

 

6 Replies
Ned Whiteley

Hi Michael,

Personally, I wouldn't get too hooked up on the default slide timeline at this stage. The slide isn't going to suddenly disappear after five seconds unless you have a trigger to jump to the next one when the timeline ends.

As you add more content to your slides, particularly things like video and audio, which have their own timelines, your slide timeline will automatically adjust to suit. In addition, most people rely on the built-in Next / Previous buttons or create their own in order to navigate around their courses, so at times the timeline is almost irrelevant.

The only time I get concerned about it is if I want to use the timeline to trigger some events on my slide and that can sometimes be on only a couple of slides in an entire course, so manual editing of the timeline when needed really isn't a problem.

What I suggest you do is to build a short test course as part of your learning process, leave the timeline on each slide alone as you do it and see how you go. Also, to assist you as you go, I would highly recommend selecting the Learn tab at the top of this page and then select Articulate Storyline (1, 2 and 3) and then the tutorials at the top of the page (green background). here you will find plenty of resources to build your skills and confidence in using the program.

Lauren Connelly

Hi Dorothy!

It looks like Ashley shared some tips here!

Here's her response just in case you missed it:

When you add in audio, Storyline will extend the timeline to match the time of the longest audio piece. So instead of adjusting the timeline of all your slides ahead of time, let Storyline do it once you add in the audio! 

If you need to update the length of the timeline for slides that have shorter audio use these steps:

  • Start to drag your timeline to the left and,
  • then press your LEFT Arrow key.  

This should trim out the empty space bringing the timeline to the end of your audio. Let us know if that helps! 

Karen Westphalen

Hmm, I just had the same question as Michael, and none of the responses really answered it for me.  It really WOULD be nice to set the default slide length.  For example, I set up a bunch of triggers in my current project.  I haven't added content (audio files, etc.) yet, but I'd like to check to make sure all the triggers do what I expect them to.  When I go to preview the project, I have to wait 4 seconds for each slide to reach timeline completion.  I'm not blessed with tremendous patience, so it'd be nice to set the default to 1 second (a time increment that's greater than zero but pretty darn short) so that testing the project triggers takes less time.

Ned Whiteley

Hi Karen,

I agree that this might be useful for testing, but I don't believe that there is anything you can do at present to achieve this other than manually adjusting each slide. However, the alternative is to add an additional, temporary trigger for testing purposes only.

I assume you have triggers set up, for example, to jump to the next slide when the timeline ends. If you were to temporarily add a trigger to jump to the next slide when timeline reaches 1 second, this would enable you to test your triggers out. If the trigger is going to work when the timeline reaches 1 second, it will work just the same if it is set to when the timeline ends, only that will happen a little later.

Once you have created that trigger, you can then copy it into each of the relevant slides and you should be good to go. You can even leave the original trigger in there and it shouldn't make any difference when you test it as the 1 second jump will take preference. Just remember to remove the temporarily added triggers once you have finished testing.

My only other concern is, if you have to wear all that safety gear every time you test your triggers, what exactly are they triggering and are your fellow workers safe ??

Hope this helps and have a Happy Christmas.

Van Tolar

Hi all,

I just posted a solution to this same issue in the Setting slide duration for ALL slides discussion.

Using this solution, you can specify the timeline length of all PowerPoint slides in one single action. When you import the slides from PowerPoint, Storyline automatically overrides the default 5 second timeline with the timeline you have specified.

This discussion is closed. You can start a new discussion or contact Articulate Support.