Forum Discussion
Layers Not Displaying Properly During Authoring But Display Properly in Preview
I have three layers on each slide that are visible depending on what the user clicks:
Correct - The user sees a feedback layer and continues to see the base layer.
Incorrect - The user sees a feedback layer and continues to see the base layer.
Interrupt - The user sees a navigation layer without the base layer.
For the Correct or Incorrect layers, the user sees only one or the other.
PROBLEM - Suddenly, after I have created a slide, the layers do not appear correctly when I click on them in the Slide Layers panel. Specifically, the base layer is not shown when I click on the Correct or Incorrect layer. The "Hide objects in base layer" box is NOT checked. The behavior is inconsistent from one slide to the next.
BUT - When I preview the scene, the layers DO appear properly. What shows is supposed to show. What is supposed to be hidden is hidden.
CLUE 1- When I go back to earlier versions of the program, the erratic behavior now appears on slides that used to behave properly while authoring.
CLUE 2- The last time I clicked on the Articulate360 icon on the desktop it immediately went through an install routine. Login was routine.
HELP - I have a lot of work to do before a fast approaching deadline but I am afraid to proceed with this erratic behavior occurring.
Version v.3.99.34516.0
Thank you, Frank
Forgot the attachment.
If the "Revisited" dropdown is set to "Reset to Initial State," the base layer and additional layer behave as expected when returning to a previously created slide.
5 Replies
I've had that happen to me. Scary, indeed. Fortunately, the fix was easy. I had inadvertently clicked the eye icon for the base.
When you deselect that, it's telling the program that you don't want to see the base while you're editing. So if the area to the right of "(Base Layer)" is blank, click it so the eye icon—and the base—will show.
FYI: This post has more info about visibility control/concerns: https://community.articulate.com/discussions/discuss/cant-see-the-base-from-a-layer-or-is-it-just-dimmed-is-that-what-you-want-heres-/825929
Thank you for replying, Judy. I believe the problem is elsewhere.
The erratic behavior of hiding/unhiding and dimming the base layer only happens in the Slide Mode. When I preview the scene, all the slides behave as expected. When I close the Preview Mode, and go back to the Slide Mode, the erratic behavior returns.
Each of my slides is created from a couple of "generic" slides that I copy and paste from the end of the scene. Yet, the erratic behavior varies from one slide to the next. If the parent slide is copied repeatedly, the mistake should show itself consistently on all its children.
Further, when I open an earlier version of the program that I created days ago, the erratic behavior again exhibits itself in the Slide Mode. The layers displayed properly when I created the slides. Again, the slides play correctly when previewed or published.
Up to this point, I have created hundreds of slides for my first program without issue. This just started out of nowhere yesterday.
Kind Regards, Frank
The eye (visibility) icon I described in my previous reply only hides the base when editing in Slide Mode. The base would still appear when previewed or published.
And if that icon is deselected when a slide is duplicated, it will also be deselected on the copy(copies). So the same behavior would "show itself consistently on all its children."
If you look at the erratic slides in your project, and the eye icon isn't visible, the problem is what I described before.
If the eye icon is visible (and no other setting hides the base), but the base doesn't show when you view a layer, then the slides may have been corrupted.
- In that case, contact support: https://access.articulate.com/support/contact
Hello again, Judy. I think I have this figured out.
Your were right, on one of my three "generic" slides the visibility button had somehow disappeared so those new slides copied from it did not behave as expected in the Slide View.
But what was still confusing was when clicking my "Interrupt" layer, the base layer was still visible even though the "Hide objects in base layer" was checked. (See attachment.)
THE AH-HA MOMENT.
When one first creates a slide and clicks on such a layer, it behaves as expected. The base layer is hidden.
If one goes elsewhere in the scene or the program then comes back to a previously created slide, the base layer suddenly is visible when it shouldn't be.
It turns out this happens when the layer properties box "Revisits" drop-down is set to "Resume Saved State." When it is set to "Reset to Initial State" then the layer behaves as expected while it the Slide Mode.
Problem Solved.
Bonus Lesson Learned: "Revisited" setting can be different in each layer.
Thank you for your patience, Judy.
Forgot the attachment.
If the "Revisited" dropdown is set to "Reset to Initial State," the base layer and additional layer behave as expected when returning to a previously created slide.
