Forum Discussion
Moving a story file
I created the majority of a module using the 30-day trial version of Storyline, and I have five days left on the trial. My client has since purchased Storyline and sent it to me on a laptop that they would like me to use to develop the rest of the course.
I tried moving the course to the new computer by copying the STORY file up to dropbox and then downloading it. When I opened it on the new computer, there were quite a few problems with the file, especially with the fonts. I had created the course using some purchased templates that I then modified to create the look and feel we wanted, and in many cases the font sizes and other characteristics seemed to have reverted to the original formatting.
I'm guessing it's possible that some of this may have been an issue of not moving the templates along with the STORY file, but are there other issues that come when files get moved. Is there some step for moving them that I missed? I can't find anything when I search the Articulate site using a "move story files" search.
In Studio, there was some way of packaging the files before sending them to someone that got around the strange things that happened when transferring files. I don't remember if that was something from Articulate or a plug-in I found.
Thanks for any help! I'm in crunch mode to deliver this first module in a few days and having trouble with the computer I'm working on, so I'd really like to be able to move this project to the new computer ASAP, but I don't want to have to reformat all of the content on 40+ pages.
I was working locally in the My Articulate Projects folder. It's Windows 7 in Parallels on a Mac, but it's a virtual machine, and I can't imagine that Articulate thinks it's anything other than a regular Windows 7 computer.
Hi Ruth,
Different computers, all accessing the same files from the network drive, it'll be important for each person to download or copy it from the network and then work off the local drive. If you're all going to be working on separate parts of a file, you may want to divide it up so that there are not any version-ing issues where another user may overwrite your changes when placing the file back on the network drive.
I understand about working on the local hard drive and version control. Maybe what I'm asking is so basic that it isn't getting through: simply put, in the past, when a coworker has taken a project file created on my computer and worked with it on his computer, occasionally sound files that I had imported into the project file seemed to disappear (even though they appeared in the timeline, they did not play, and he received a message that it could not be found).
My question is: Does my coworker need to have all the sound files, images and other media assets (although already imported into the project file), organized on his computer in the exact same folder structure as they are on mine, in order for us both to be able to edit the file without weird issues occurring?
Thanks.
Hi Ruth,
If you're sharing the .story file as previously described and each individual is opening it to work on from their local drive, any media (image, sound, etc.) that you've inserted can be moved and used within the project itself. A link to a local file, though will not be accessible. They also wouldn't be able to access the original media file outside of Storyline.
You may also want to look into the back up methods described here, especially if you're able to use dropbox. You could house the project files there in a shared folder (although for versioning purposes, you may want to implement a method where the individual needs to update the file with the date/time at the start to ensure you're both not overwriting the others work.).
OK, well I don't know what else to say. We did share using Dropbox, and my coworker did not have the original media (image, audio) files on his C drive, as they had already been imported into the project file by me -- so according to your response, the audio should not have disappeared when he tried to work with the project file. That was my expectation as well; which is why I was baffled when several audio files disappeared. (Twilight Zone music...)
Hi Ruth,
Are all the images and audio files still in your original file? If you'd like to share it with me I'm happy to check and see what happens on my end. You can post it here in the forums or you can send it along to me by submitting a support case and including the following syntax at the beginning of the Description section -
::ashley::
That way it'll be assigned to me and I'll be able to investigate further.
We do eLearning storyline projects for clients with external pdf files that they provide and we link to from storyline. When the project is done, they request the authoring (story) files. When the files get moved to their computers the pdf links are all still pointing to our local drives so they have to relink them all. Is the discussion in this thread still true of Storyline? It is an inconvenience to our clients. Is there a better way?
Hi A,
Thanks for reaching out here. It's been reported as an issue in Storyline 2 after update 4 (we're currently on update 7). This issue is not present in Storyline 1 Update 10. For Storyline 2, as a workaround after you attach the resource file, publish the .STORY file. The resource will then be saved in the .STORY file.
We'll include this thread in the report filed with our team so that we can keep you posted once there is additional information to share.
Ashley,
Regarding linking PDFs, are you saying when you publish the file, the PDF gets embedded into the .story file? That has not been my practice. We have them hosted on a shared drive, and it ALWAYS points to the shared drive.
When we then share with a client, we lose the links, so we have had to keep them together (this is up through Storyline 2 version 7.
Thanks!
Hi Alex,
It was broken in Storyline 2, as I mentioned above for linking within the .story file and then sharing that - but when you publish the course, the file should be included as a part of the publish process regardless. We don't recommend working on a shared drive though - so that may be a part of the issue you're encountering. I'd look at working on local project files and ensuring you're linking and publishing locally as well.
The issue in regards to the link within the .story file is still in the hands of our QA team, so I'll be sure to share any updates here once they're available.
Thanks -- we have a few developers working on it though -- so it forces us to link to a shared drive. We pull down the .story file, but the links remain the same, it's the only way for them to consistently pull regardless of who publishes.
If we linked it to a webserver, it would always keep the weblink and wouldn't actually import the file into the storycontent folder, correct?
