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JustinDael's avatar
JustinDael
Community Member
2 months ago

Replicating file menus / simulating software

Good morning/evening, we've been doing a lot of software simulations in Storyline lately and was hoping someone might have a better way than what we're doing. Firstly, I'd like to get out of the way that what we are *not* looking for is the Screen Capture tool. While it would be functional, it seems like the lazy, bare bones way to make the same product. My personal standards wouldn't settle for a file menu that did not, for instance, drop down when you click File and then highlight each item as you went down. 

Now, of course we can do it the slow way. Create a dozen text boxes, as well as the accompanying hover state, put them on a layer, etc. But the problem there is maintaining some form of consistency. Sure they can all by 17 pixels apart on the Y, but now say we need to add one in and suddenly need to add 17 to each one after? 

Hopefully what I'm saying is making sense, because the tedium is close to killing me.

  • The highlighting could be handled by the built-in "hover" state in the States tab on objects in a more optimized way. I use a combination of variables to control drop down reveal transitions, combined with a tuned MenuItems layer to achieve similar effects on my software simulation courses