Text Entry-Simulation

Rochelle,

Ron is correct. These are text variables that are meant to be reused throughout the course (e.g., global). As Ron suggested, add the following triggers on the slides that use the text variables. When the user completes the exercise and returns to try the whole thing again, these triggers will fire and the variable will return to blank.

Here's a good explanation from Nancy Woinoski

Variables are global values that function independently of the slides they are on. If a user enters a value for a variable it will persist until something tells the variable to change.

The idea behind this is to enable Storyline to use the value captured on one slide in another part of the course - Say, for example, I have a field on the first slide in the course in which I have the user enter their name. Because the name is stored in a variable, Storyline remembers what the user entered and I can then display their name anywhere in the course. If the variable value was tied to the slide, then having the slide properties reset to the initial state would wipe out the value the user entered and I would not be able to display in other parts of the course.

The downside to this when using variables in the exercise I was describing in the original post is that when a user goes back to try the exercise again, Storyline remembers that the user has already entered values for the variables and retains that information so you have to add triggers to change the values back to their original values to reset them.