Forum Discussion
Next button disabled when viewing previous slides
Most of the slides in my project have animations. I want the next button in the player disabled until all animations have completed, so I have set triggers to disable the next button when the timeline starts and set it back to normal when the timeline ends. The slide properties are set so that the learner will "Resume saved state" when revisiting. This is because I don't want the learner to have to watch all the animations again when revisiting the slide. When viewing the slides from beginning to end, the next button works fine. However, if I press the previous button to view the previous slide, the next button is disabled permanently. Is this because the timeline isn't running anymore since the slide is set to resume saved state when revisiting? Is there a simple way to fix this?
17 Replies
Hi Michele,
What I would do is have a T/F variable that changes when the timeline ends, then have the trigger to disable/enable the next button to change if the variable is not equal to false.
- Timeline starts
- Variable is set to false
- Next button is disabled if variable is not equal to True
- Timeline/animation ends
- Variable changes to true
- Next button enables
- User progress to next slide
- User decides previous slide was awesome and wants to revisit
- User goes back and can review the slide once again but is now free to progress forwards at their leisure as the Next button is active because the trigger hasnt initiated due to the condition based on value of the T/F variable
Thank you Darren, this solution worked great for us.
Hi, Michele -- Thanks for your question! It looks to me like Darren's suggestion should work nicely for you, but if you were looking for something else, you are always welcome to share your own file to help illustrate what you are after. :)
Hi Michele!
I was just helping a colleague with this very same issue! We found a simple solution that doesn't need variable:
- Create Trigger: Change state of next button to disabled When the timeline reaches 0.5 seconds.
- Slide Setting: When revisiting - Resume Saved State
We found this worked like a charm, but you'll have to double-check if you try it. Hope this helps!!
OMG! This is brilliant! I have been tearing my hair out for days trying to solve this. All other posts with variables, states, whatever, wouldn't work for me. Problem solved! Awesome Diana and thanks for sharing :)
p.s. We also found out that you only need this "workaround" if you are disabling the next button when the timeline of the slide starts and enabling the next button when the timeline ends.
If you are enabling the next button based on the state of other objects (e.g. all buttons visited), then it seems to save it's normal state when you revisit the slide.
Thanks for sharing that here - and including the additional piece about the workaround Diana.
Diana's work-around seems to work, but it's really a pain. Has this been fixed in Storyline 3?
@JoEllen - I totally understand it's a pain, but if you have a lot of slides that are affected, you could add the trigger to a master slide and then there isn't a lot of extra work. :-) That being said, hopefully the issue has been fixed. Good luck!
Hi JoEllen!
Thanks for your question. I've just tested these triggers in Storyline 3 and Storyline 360, and it looks like the next button is disabled when you revisit the slide. I'm sorry this is giving you headaches, and I'll be sure to update the report to include Storyline 3 and Storyline 360.
As a workaround for now, I'd suggest adding these triggers to the Slide Master, like Diana suggested:
- Change state of next button to disabled When the timeline reaches 0.5 seconds.
- Change state of next button to normal When the timeline ends.
Hi all,
Great news! This has been fixed in the latest updates for Storyline 3 and 360. You'll see the important fixes and new features in the release notes here for Storyline 360.
Launch the Articulate 360 desktop app on your computer and click the Update button for each application. Details here.
Updates are free for Storyline 3 licensees and you can download the latest update here. You can also view the entire list of Release notes for Storyline 3 here.
Please let us know if you have any questions, either here or by reaching out to our Support Engineers directly.
I have tried all of the suggestions above and am still having a problem with the Next button being disabled when the user hits the previous button then revisits the slide. I started out using the TF variable then removed the variable and tried changing the Next button to Normal once the buttons were visited.
Everything seems to work just fine until I hit the previous button. If I hit the previous button, the Next button is disabled when I return to the original slide. I have my slides set to resume slide.
I am wondering if I do not have the updated version of Storyline 3. How can I check that?
Hi, Dawn, and welcome to E-Learning Heroes! ✨
You can check your current version of Storyline 3 by:
- Open an existing Storyline project or create a new one.
- Go to the Help tab on the Storyline ribbon and click About Articulate Storyline.
- You should see the version number on the bottom right of the screen that pops up.
The latest version is build 3.11.23355.0, released October 2020, which you can download from here.
I'd also be happy to take a look at your .story file, if you feel comfortable sharing it here, to see if there's anything we can do to help with the Next button behavior in your project.
