Trigger to Initialise/Reset ALL Variables in Storyline 360

Sep 11, 2018

David Tait
By David Tait

I've been building an interaction today that uses a lot of variables. There's a point in the interaction where the learner has the chance to reset everything and I've had to add a LOT of triggers to reset the variables.

With this in mind I came up with a new feature request. It would be great if there was a trigger to reset either all developer-created project variables (obviously excluding Storyline's system variables) and/or have a check list of variables used in the project where a developer can specify which variables they want to reset via a trigger, i.e. reset variable X, Y & Z when button clicked, timeline starts etc. I believe this would save developers a lot of time and would help keep this element of a build clean.

I've requested the new feature here, if anyone else likes the sound of this I encourage you to do the same thing.

58 Replies
Ray Cole
almost 5 years ago04/26/19 at 10:02 pm (UTC)

I have often wished for something similar, and I would support David's feature request. 

I recently had an idea for a possible work around. Instead of variables, create objects that are off-stage, for example, a set of simple rectangle shapes. Give these objects states that represent the values of interest. E.g., for each True/False variable, create a True and False state on an object instead. You could then use triggers to change the state of these objects instead of using triggers to assign values to variables. And you could check the current state of the object instead of checking the value of a variable. The advantage is that you could reset such "variables" simply by jumping back to the current slide, as long as you had Reset to Initial State set for the slide. In this way, these off-stage objects become like a set of local variables, but no triggers are needed to reset them en mass except the jump to slide trigger.

Alex Connor
almost 5 years ago06/17/19 at 1:26 pm (UTC)

Hi :D

I would still really benefit from this functionality but after some further occurrences of the issue in practice, I think it would be great if the enhancement could incorporate a tick box style selection method for when you don't necessarily want ALL variables to be initialised/reset.

Scenario:
A project has 2 distinct sections with a total of 10 user defined variables - 8 variables that affect only 1 of either sections and the remaining 2 affect both simultaneously.

If you were attempting to Initialise/Reset multiple variables in the project but not necessarily all of them, a selection method would be the way to choose whether you want to Select All or Select Multiple

Whether this looks better as 2 distinct triggers or 1 that can handle both is for the software developers to work out but I think this would enhance this functionality if considered :)

For me the focus of this enhancement should be to reset any selected variables to their default values. I think initialising text and number variables to new values will always have to be 1 at a time situation as you need to define what the new value will be which is then the same as the functionality we have now - unless I'm mistaken in which case my bad!

Kirby Phillips
almost 5 years ago06/20/19 at 12:18 am (UTC)

For the love of everything yes. I've been wanting this for yeaaarsss. And now that Storyline has split out Project vs Built-in variables, it seems like it wouldn't be too hard to add it as a feature. 

All my work lately has been escape-room like games, sims, and other variable-driven work where I gotta reset all 50-100+ variables at the end with Javascript --- which is faster than triggers, but a master "Reset all Project Variables" one-and-done trigger would be dreamy. 

Jean-Christophe Goyette
almost 5 years ago06/25/19 at 1:51 pm (UTC)

I support this request, because it can get tedious to reset each variable individually, as you just cannot reset more than one variable per trigger.

We have drop-down menus when we wish to check the state of multiple objects. Would it be possible to have something similar for variables?

"Adjust variable of [all variable checked] to False when user clicks."

It can be separated by variable type, be boolean, numeric or text.

Articulate Creator 2
over 4 years ago08/27/19 at 10:51 am (UTC)

I'd also love to have a function to reset or change all (user created) variables, or multiple defined Variables in one trigger. Add me to the "petition"!

We have an interaction in our training courses, that relies on multiple variables, and if we use that more than once in a project we have to reset all variables to their initial state. Currently that's quite tedious to do.

Andrew Baloga
over 4 years ago11/12/19 at 5:41 pm (UTC)

I have submitted requests for this functionality on several occasions.

Another feature I'd like to see is a text editor for the Triggers pane. When creating multiple triggers that are identical in function but require a variable change, it would be faster to edit than with the current method — and you could also incorporate comment lines.

Imagine the possibilities. (:

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