Forum Discussion
Can Rise dynamically reference an externally hosted file?
Hi All đź‘‹
We’re exploring an idea for a suite of off-the-shelf compliance courses built in Articulate Rise. Businesses purchasing the courses would have the option to localise them by adding their own policies, procedures or other organisation-specific information.
Ideally, the Rise course would display or link to a client-specific PDF or similar file stored outside the course. The client could then update or replace that file without us needing to edit and republish the Rise course each time (ideally, that is!).
For example, could the Rise course look for a PDF with a specified filename at a known URL or server location and display it within the course, in a pop-up or via a link?
Has anyone successfully implemented something like this in Rise?
We’d be interested to know:
- Whether Rise can dynamically reference an externally hosted file
- Whether the file could be displayed within the course rather than opening separately
- Whether the client could replace the PDF while retaining the same URL, allowing the updated version to appear automatically
- Whether there are any LMS, SCORM, browser security or hosting limitations we would need to consider
We’re hoping to create a simple way for each business to incorporate its own documents without requiring a customised version of the course to be republished. Any examples or alternative approaches would be greatly appreciated 🙏
thanks for any replies and happy to clarify further as I realise this might be a strange idea! :-D
3 Replies
Rise is not going to look for the documents, if you use URLs and change the file at the location that will work but would have to open seperately, also url has to stay the same.
You could embed in an iframe or html block, again url would have to stay the same may get cross origin issues.A Rise code block could dynamically reference and display an externally hosted file under certain circumstances. There are a bunch of things that would need to be setup related to the things you raise in your other bullet points; but it's possible.
The technical answers above cover the how — iframe or embed with a stable URL, watch for cross-origin issues. The question I'd add from compliance work is version integrity. If a client swaps the PDF at the same URL, every learner who already completed attested to a different document, and your completion records no longer prove which version anyone saw. I'd use versioned filenames (policy_v3.pdf, not policy.pdf) instead of overwriting, and treat a document swap as a course update: republish and decide up front whether existing completions stay valid. Also plan for caching — same-URL swaps are the classic "I updated it, why are they seeing the old one" support ticket.
