tutorial on 508 compliance?

I want to thank you ALL, Jon, Steve, Jeanette, and Laura for starting and working on this topic. 

Jon, thanks for starting it and continuing to "push" for more knowledge in 508 as it relates to Storyline.

Steve, thanks for all the information about 508 and its "real" intent.

Jeanette, thanks for the tutorials and specific how-tos.  I so appreciate your tutorials!!!!

Laura, thanks for your additional questions/needs.

I have bookmarked this page and have a feeling I'll be visiting it again.

Make it a great day!

Alicia

Hey Jon! Re: your question about imported Engage content, yeah, since those are treated as web objects when you import them into Storyline, there isn't really a way for screen readers or tab navigation to pick up that content. Probably best to rebuild the content in Storyline if you need the interaction to be accessible. Or, if the interaction is simple, you might consider this approach instead: add a shape or button on top of your web object, and add Alt Text to describe the interaction content. The object won't be visible to sighted learners, since web objects cover up slide content - but it should still get picked up by the screen reader. 

Regarding your question about the sidebar menu - yeah, having that visible for every slide could get cumbersome to someone using a screen reader, since it will be read for every slide. If you need to show a menu, you might instead consider building it manually on a separate slide, and then create a trigger that enables learners to use a hot key to jump to the menu if they need it. (Of course you'd need to tell them up front about the hot key so they know it's available.)

Thanks, Jeanette. That helps; it's always good to have options.

Yesterday I tried to add a "next" button to the interactive slide, on the bottom margin but the button didn't show up at all when I published it, so I'm not sure how to add an alt-text button on the slide. I did add such an item on a regular slide, slide, a drag and drop, to explain the action, which seems okay to me. But I can't seem to get a button or shape to "stick" on the interactive slide.

The reason I was trying to add a "next" button is that the framework doesn't appear under the interactive slides and I am "stuck" there when published. If I immediately use the rt-arrow key, I move to the next slide. But if I mouse-click on a tab of the slide, the rt-arrow key then moves me through the tabs and I can't get off the slide. 

So I guess those are two separate questions-

How do I add a button or shape on top of the Engage slide?

How do I get the "previous" and "next" buttons to appear under the interactive slide?(Or otherwise move off that slide.)

Jon if you're wanting to add a button on top of an imported Engage interaction, unfortunately that doesn't work well -- it won't be visible to the learner, since the imported Engage interaction (which is actually a web object) will always appear on top of any other slide objects when you publish your course. However, you should be able to turn on the built-in Prev/Next buttons on your player, though, by clicking the gear icon on your base layer to open the Slide Properties, and then select Prev and Next:

I added the previous and next navigation as you suggested. When I preview the slide, they appear but when I publish the project, they are not there. I'll put a couple of screen snips in for you. First is the "published " one and then the preview. When published, the framework is missing.

Hi Jon, on that first screenshot, it looks like maybe you're viewing the content as published from Engage (?) rather than the published output from Storyline. Could that be the case? if you are indeed publishing the imported interaction from Storyline, does the Storyline player appear for all slides except the Engage interaction slide? (I haven't seen that behavior before so I'm really puzzled!) Another possibility is that if your system's DPI is set to something other than 96, this can sometimes cause elements of your published output to appear skewed or missing. 

If none of that info helps, would you mind submitting your project to our support team for a bit more troubleshooting? Thanks!

Thanks for the response. I am publishing in Storyline, after importing the interactive slide from my "assets" file. I checked and my DPI is set at the default setting of 100%. I had originally imported an entire PowerPoint that I had used in an Articulate project, just to see how it would look in Storyline. There were several Engage slides in that one. When the slide didn't work with the player, I deleted it and imported the Engage slide alone, from my assets folder from the other course. It still doesn't work properly.

I'll submit the project for troubleshooting. I probably have something set incorrectly. I usually find my mistakes once I post a question, ironically enough, but this time I can't figure out what I did wrong.

Jon

Problem solved by Vira the Storyline guru. Vira sent me a link to the course posted online and it was fine. For those of you who may find yourself in the same tiny boat some day, here's the explanation:

Engage slides placed in Storyline are web objects and may not appear properly when viewed on the local drive. I don't have access to a website or an LMS to post the course and see if it works, being just a small fish here. So Vira suggested  I publish it as a CD and everything looks fine now.

Sooo....I'll have to "test" my courses in CD mode if I add any Engage slides, and then send the first draft off to the client's LMS, where I think I can assume it will work. If not, I'll hear about it soon enough. It all worked fine in preview mode and also when Vira put it online, so I think these slides will be okay on the LMS.

Thanks Vira!

Jon

Jon,

Finally I feel like I have something worthy to share on here! You mentioned that you don't have access to an LMS for testing your course....  try Scorm Cloud  -  http://scorm.com/scorm-solved/scorm-cloud-features/  

You can start out and try it for free (and upload a limited number of courses to store in your 'library'), or there are monthly pricing plans.  

Once you are registered, and log in, you can upload a LMS published version of your course (that has been zipped), and then 'launch' the course to test it in the ScormCloud LMS. When you finish viewing the course, a reporting page will appear to verify you completed the course and give other diagnostic information.

You can also send an email invite with a link for someone else to test the course this way. 

We have found in MOST cases that courses in ScormCloud  perform almost exactly like they do in our LMS.

Hope that helps.

I'm going to post this one more time.  When recording "Try Mode" simulations, the screencast mode cannot be removed or edited.  I need a workaround regarding the labeling of these screens for 508 compliance. Any ideas?