Videos not playing in published course. HELP!!

Sorry... https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B01QMpEkkogXWVpBTmthMWhVcXM/view?usp=sharing

Hey there folks,

I am having the same problem.  I am on a Windows 10 Desktop.  My course content and video files are saved locally with a short file folder path.  I have tried AVI/MP4/WMV in powerpoint and I can play the video no problem in PowerPoint but when I publish it or preview it in Articulate it doesn't work.  I have reinstalled the entire Articulate suite to see if that would help - it didn't.  I have also checked for updates, there are none.  My current version of Articulate 13 is update 9 1702.2417.

I would prefer not to post video here...please email me for PM.

Sorry you're getting hung up, Joanna! It sounds like you've already done quite a bit of trouble hooting on your own, so let our team take it from here. Could you send us your Articulate Package privately through this link? 

I am finding a similar problem, but it is with consistency of playback. I have a video in a course set to play automatically when the user reaches the second slide -- it plays most of the time, but sometimes the progress bar just moves forward without the video playing. If the user scrubs the progress bar, it immediately starts playing as it is supposed to, but not everyone knows to try that. This happens in both Articulate Review and in our LMS. The course is set to open full screen and the story size is 960 x 540. Storyline 360 latest version. HTML5 playback.

Hi Will and Kim, 

I took a look at Joanna's case as the most recent post here, and since you're both using Storyline and not Presenter it's likely different (she wasn't inserting the videos through the Presenter tab, but through Powerpoint which is likely the cause of her issue). 

Will, what browser are you viewing the videos in? The automatic playback is something that we've seen recently in Safari.  

• If you're using another browser, could you share a bit more about that and a link to your course in Review?
• Also what settings have you set up for the videos playback - I assume you're using the Video properties of start automatically or a trigger to play when the timeline starts?
• Is it only on this second slide that the video doesn't load? Does refreshing the browser cause it to play immediately? Are any other slides running into this?

Kim, I'm sorry to hear that, and I saw you did some initial testing of this issue with my colleague Eloisa. If you'd like to continue working with her to resolve the issue or help us understand the cause we'd be more than happy too. If not, I also understand that and I hope you have a happy Thanksgiving. 🙂

Regarding the browser, I am seeing this in Chrome and IE 11. 

Unfortunately it isn't really easy for me to share my course because it is internal facing. I would have to recreate it which I don't have time to do. Basically there is one intro slide that must be advanced manually, followed by a slide that contains a video filling the entire presentation area. The video starts automatically (Video properties). It uses the built in seekbar rather than the video controls.

To get the video to play, all the user needs to do is scrub the seekbar a tiny bit, or go back a slide and come back. But unfortunately some people don't intuitively try this trick.

By the way, my video has captions, so maybe the captions are the culprit?

The good news is that I think I did find a potential workaround for my issue with videos not playing on occasion.

Here is what I did:

I scooted the videos, set to play automatically, back one second on the timeline so they start at one second in. This seems to have fixed the issue, at least in my very limited testing. My theory (superstition?) is that it gives the code a little time before trying to play the video. Either that, or it is wishful thinking on my part. I'll let you know if I see the issue again.

Hi Will,

If you set the videos to not play automatically then they'll wait for a user input to play, but the slide timeline will still start.

The method you described of starting the video a second (or even half a second) into the slide timeline is something I've seen other users mention for audio issues where it's taking the browser/device/connection a bit of time to catch up with the loading of content. Another good method for testing that it to play it from a few different set ups and connections to see if there is a noticeable difference in playback. 

So it seems that this is an on-going issues that has yet to be resolved. I am working with Storyline 3 and have the same problem; videos not automatically playing. I have tried every trick and tip mentioned previously and none of them work (moving it one second into the timeline, publishing as Flash with HTML backup, even adding a .25 second automatically moving forward slide BEFORE the video slide...).

WHAT is the issue and what is the resolution for it? And, before I am asked, no, I cannot provide a copy of what I am working on as I work in aviation and this is confidential information/training we are developing for an OEM.

If all fails, like others, I will just have to move into Captivate or PowerPoint.

Hi there James,

Really sorry for the trouble you're running into. Is this problem happening after the course is published? If so, what web browser were you using?

Some recent changes in Google Chrome and Safari have affected how video autoplay is handled in Storyline 3. The articles linked there include steps you can follow to fix this issue.

Let me know if that helps, or if the problem is happening in a different browser. We'll keep digging if we need to!

Hey James!

We added support for Chrome's new behavior to yesterday's update for Storyline 3. Install the latest update and republish your course.

Learners using Chrome 66+ now see a play button when they launch or resume a course with a video on the first slide. Clicking the play button starts the course and allows the video to play. Videos on other slides should autoplay as expected.

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