The initial published PDF from my RISE module requires significant editing, fundamental page breaks not in the right place, alignment of images, interactive boxes placed in error. The RISE PDF is a valuable tool for us, the PDFprovides end-user a workbook/guide of the course materials.
I'm looking for design tips or other options to spend less time revising the PDF.
Hi Cleon, we create a PDF for each of our online courses. Every time a course changes we need to republish the PDF. So I create and edit PDF's a lot.
So I completely share your frustrations with the Rise PDF output.
To date I have not found that doing things differently in Rise has any meaningful impact on preventing issues in the PDF output.
Manually editing PDF's is a also a huge problem as pretty much each sentence is it's own text box. So making edits on one page does not cause content on other pages to flow. Bullets in bullet lists are not part of the text, but a separate object, etc. It's all rather painful.
Converting PDF's to Word solves some problems such as content flowing from page to page, but it still requires a lot of manual editing.
We also create a PDF export for each of our online courses.
We then use Abbyy a software tool to convert exported PDFs to MS Word documents. This works better than importing PDFs directly into Word as it has extra functionality that makes for a more compact Word document.
Once in MS Word, we used to use Find and Replace, using the Special Characters options to strip out blank paragraphs and unwanted carriage throws.
But, better than that, we've found a more powerful option and now use an Add-in for MS Word called 'Kutools', this strips out framed text and all manner of weirdness created during the export of a PDF from Rise.
On average we can knock the stuffing out of a biggish RISE module (the equivalent of two-three hours study) that initially generates a 150 page Word document, and shrink that to around 15 pages of keynotes in about two hours of our time. Once done, we re-PDF it for upload to our LMS for our students.
When we change the module we find it relatively easy to either repeat the process or just patch the WORD document with the changes.
This is a lot better for us than the way we used to work, fumbling through the PDF with a PDF editor.
And, as a footnote, the new Editor Assistant that comes packaged with the latest version of Word is significantly better than the free version of tools like Grammarly.
I work in a regulated industry and we need to exactly reproduce the contents of the Rise course in the PDF. That's our biggest problem as we cannot summarize. In order to save time, we have now decided to simply delete pages that contain interactions as they have little value on paper. We unfortunately don't have the time to make the PDF's look nice and pretty.
Yes, I understand, we occasionally work for regulated bodies too, and here we just strip out unwanted paragraph, section and page breaks with Kutools, and drop quizzes and interactions.
We still meet compliance requirements and the final materials don't look fancy, but it satisfies the requirements, and it's still a bit faster than the old hand-editing we used to do.
We've worked for some organisations that have wall-to-wall archives of materials stored for compliance and regulatory reasons. One day, I'm going to find out if anyone ever looks at them!
this was helpful information and discussion. My Rise course was a flashcard glossary of terms and definitions - which put a frame around each card. Unfortunately when published in Rise, the page breaks were in the middle of flashcards and couldn't be edited in the pdf. Even converting to word doc did not help - because it separated the frames around the cards as two separate objects divided by page break. :-(
We are also in a regulated industry and need the PDFs for our MLR process. They take a lot of time to edit or make notes. Wanted to add to this thread to see future comments
Thanks so much for sharing how your team is using the Export to PDF feature. It sounds like you need more control over the page breaks in the exported document. We'll let you know if we make this change to the PDF export feature in the future!
yes, whether the pdf or word export, instead of having a page break to show the new cards that didn't fit on the previous page, it broke the card they were disjointed. I was unable to join them even if I added my own page break. Thank you for the consideration and reply.
Items that break oddly over two pages for the most part are not fixable.
Like the card example you gave. At one point images were also broken in half with one part at the bottom of the page, and the other half appearing at the top of the next page. I don't recall if that's still an issue or not.
There are many issues with PDF exports in general.
Thanks for following up on this request and Happy New Year to you!
We don't have any updates on this just yet, but we'll let you know if we make any changes that help! Here is our current Articulate 360 Roadmap of in development and planned features.
I am currently working with a non for profit in South Africa who does not always have access to the internet. In order for them to access their content at all times, a pdf is the way go. However, I cannot present them with a PDF that doesn't flow properly and is misaligned. Has there been an update for PDF export corrections? What is the point of having this as an option if it is not going to function correctly?
I too, still find Rise PDF output problematic for accessibility purposes, especially Table Headers. Adobe auto and manual tagging seems to really botch Rise's PDF outputs.
Thank you both for sharing your thoughts with us! We don't have any updates at this time. We'll be sure to notify this thread if we make this change to the PDF export feature in the future!
Watching for updates. The current PDFs are really not useful as published. Sadly I find screen shots and copy pasting the text of a large course takes less effort.
16 Replies
Hi Cleon, we create a PDF for each of our online courses. Every time a course changes we need to republish the PDF. So I create and edit PDF's a lot.
So I completely share your frustrations with the Rise PDF output.
To date I have not found that doing things differently in Rise has any meaningful impact on preventing issues in the PDF output.
Manually editing PDF's is a also a huge problem as pretty much each sentence is it's own text box. So making edits on one page does not cause content on other pages to flow. Bullets in bullet lists are not part of the text, but a separate object, etc. It's all rather painful.
Converting PDF's to Word solves some problems such as content flowing from page to page, but it still requires a lot of manual editing.
Hi Karl and Cleon,
We also create a PDF export for each of our online courses.
We then use Abbyy a software tool to convert exported PDFs to MS Word documents. This works better than importing PDFs directly into Word as it has extra functionality that makes for a more compact Word document.
Once in MS Word, we used to use Find and Replace, using the Special Characters options to strip out blank paragraphs and unwanted carriage throws.
But, better than that, we've found a more powerful option and now use an Add-in for MS Word called 'Kutools', this strips out framed text and all manner of weirdness created during the export of a PDF from Rise.
On average we can knock the stuffing out of a biggish RISE module (the equivalent of two-three hours study) that initially generates a 150 page Word document, and shrink that to around 15 pages of keynotes in about two hours of our time. Once done, we re-PDF it for upload to our LMS for our students.
When we change the module we find it relatively easy to either repeat the process or just patch the WORD document with the changes.
This is a lot better for us than the way we used to work, fumbling through the PDF with a PDF editor.
And, as a footnote, the new Editor Assistant that comes packaged with the latest version of Word is significantly better than the free version of tools like Grammarly.
Regards,
Stan
Hi Stan, thanks for those useful suggestions.
I work in a regulated industry and we need to exactly reproduce the contents of the Rise course in the PDF. That's our biggest problem as we cannot summarize. In order to save time, we have now decided to simply delete pages that contain interactions as they have little value on paper. We unfortunately don't have the time to make the PDF's look nice and pretty.
A big course for me is around 700 pages in a PDF.
Hi Karl,
Yes, I understand, we occasionally work for regulated bodies too, and here we just strip out unwanted paragraph, section and page breaks with Kutools, and drop quizzes and interactions.
We still meet compliance requirements and the final materials don't look fancy, but it satisfies the requirements, and it's still a bit faster than the old hand-editing we used to do.
We've worked for some organisations that have wall-to-wall archives of materials stored for compliance and regulatory reasons. One day, I'm going to find out if anyone ever looks at them!
All the best, Stan.
this was helpful information and discussion. My Rise course was a flashcard glossary of terms and definitions - which put a frame around each card. Unfortunately when published in Rise, the page breaks were in the middle of flashcards and couldn't be edited in the pdf. Even converting to word doc did not help - because it separated the frames around the cards as two separate objects divided by page break. :-(
We are also in a regulated industry and need the PDFs for our MLR process. They take a lot of time to edit or make notes. Wanted to add to this thread to see future comments
Hi Cheryl and Jennifer,
Thanks so much for sharing how your team is using the Export to PDF feature. It sounds like you need more control over the page breaks in the exported document. We'll let you know if we make this change to the PDF export feature in the future!
yes, whether the pdf or word export, instead of having a page break to show the new cards that didn't fit on the previous page, it broke the card they were disjointed. I was unable to join them even if I added my own page break. Thank you for the consideration and reply.
Hi Cheryl,
Items that break oddly over two pages for the most part are not fixable.
Like the card example you gave. At one point images were also broken in half with one part at the bottom of the page, and the other half appearing at the top of the next page. I don't recall if that's still an issue or not.
There are many issues with PDF exports in general.
Hi All
@Alyssa Gomez - Happy New Year!!
What's the latest update on improved PDF exports from RISE?
Hi Cleon!
Thanks for following up on this request and Happy New Year to you!
We don't have any updates on this just yet, but we'll let you know if we make any changes that help! Here is our current Articulate 360 Roadmap of in development and planned features.
Staff,
I am currently working with a non for profit in South Africa who does not always have access to the internet. In order for them to access their content at all times, a pdf is the way go. However, I cannot present them with a PDF that doesn't flow properly and is misaligned. Has there been an update for PDF export corrections? What is the point of having this as an option if it is not going to function correctly?
I too, still find Rise PDF output problematic for accessibility purposes, especially Table Headers. Adobe auto and manual tagging seems to really botch Rise's PDF outputs.
Hi Nick and Kev,
Thank you both for sharing your thoughts with us! We don't have any updates at this time. We'll be sure to notify this thread if we make this change to the PDF export feature in the future!
Luciana, There have been posts (complaints) here on this issue for FIVE YEARS! It's a most basic feature that a lot of folks need.
Watching for updates. The current PDFs are really not useful as published. Sadly I find screen shots and copy pasting the text of a large course takes less effort.