White Scrren with a grey exclamation mark

Jun 28, 2012

Hi Everybody,

I am curently making about my 5th Storyline module, but it is the first one where all screen capture is being done through Storyline.

Sadly it isn't going well. While making the module and previewing video tutorials I have made I have been getting a grey exclamation mark with a white background - like this:

 It covers the whole training module sceen and not just where the video is to display. When in preview I can just close the preview and open it up again and most of the time it opens ok and plays properly. To be clear, in preview it only occurs when I click to view a video. This wasn't too big a deal, just frustrating so I carried on.

I have since published the module and uploaded it to the LMS. I am now getting the issue on the LMS, initially the same deal as with the preview option. I'd open a video tutorial and the screen shown above would appear. I would close down the training (only option since all navigation is gone) and re-open it. While very unreliable It was opening fine when re-opened but then the exclamation screen popped up and I did the close and open module I had been doing but now everytime I try to open the training module that screen pops up - and not just when I try to view a video tutorial it's all the time now making the training impossible to view.

Adobe would point to this being a problem with bad flash development. As I said this is the first module I am making with all Storyline screen/video capture and I am concerned this fault will keep occuring in future modules. Even if I can figure out how to get the training module to work again through the LMS it isn't reliable enough to pass onto a client.

Is anyone else getting this fault when using storyline to do their screen/video captures?

87 Replies
David Corbeil

James,

My research shows this may be an error from Flash if occurs in preview.  Also see where it was noted to possibly be java related. On the Java issue it was believed to be LMS communication.  My suggestion would be to confirm both are the newest version.   

"If it really is a Java issue I would suggest bringing this to the attention of your LMS."  JW

David.

James Brandwood

Thanks for the responses - it is always nice to know your not the only one with a certain problem.

I tested the same training on our virtual enviroment (where all standard users work from) after I had IT check Flash Player wasthe latst version. I was deliberately trying to crash the training to make sure it was going to be reliable and I only managed to crash it once. When I did it restarted fine and I couldn't crash it again.

This is great news for deploying the course and I am going to have IT update my work laptop

on another forum - http://community.articulate.com/forums/p/9117/85659.aspx#85659

Linda suggests these settings which I will be checking with IT.

1) We upgraded our users to the latest Flash version.

2) We adjusted the settings in Flash to allow for unlimited storage from the LMS website

3) We made our network deployed updates keep settings for Flash persistent

(Edit: sadly this didn't fully correct the issue, but did make it a bit more stable and prevents flash from crashing totally on all applications until I restart my computer. It would seem the problem is not entirely with flash player).

James Brandwood

I just posted this in another forum about crashing when in preview:

http://community.articulate.com/forums/p/13695/87021.aspx#87021

But will add it here too as I have found that the video crashing in preview is from the same training module that is getting this exclamation mark problem. I do not get this problem with any other videos/training modules except the one that has issue with previewing so I think it is relevant here.

"I have just had some module come back from UAT for a few minor fix ups and noticed that I am able to use the 'preview scene/slide' function fine on all parts. I can use the timeline preview fine as well (although it still does't update when you move things around and then press play).

This got me thinking so I went back to the module with the crashing issue and found that I can actually do all preview types on all the tutorials except the one I created last and that was crashing in the preview (all tutorials are made of several videos all recodred in Storyline). Even though updating flash has made this tutorial crash less... actually it crashes just as often but doesn't freeze Storyline when it does. Anyway I have come to decide that the problem is not with flash but is with one of the videos that makes up the tutorial.

Of particular note, the tutorial causing the problems has a lot of trimming done to the screen recording in video encoder. I did this to add a few parts to the screen recording that I had overlooked in the first recording. As this is only trimming and not cutting away the video (a feature I actually really like) all the combined videos would make for a very very large file size for the tutorial.

In conclusion I would suggest thet either a particular video has become corrupt for some unknown reason, or the file size is too large to play the preview correctly, or that with all the trimming Storline is getting stuck on the switch between videos.

Either way if you are getting this error I would suggest you update flash and re-record your screen capture with as little trimming and joins as possible."

Nick Elkins

Hi Ashley,

That was my original thought, as well. However, I'm curious if that's the best practice for really large organizations. This particular company has several thousand people that will be viewing this course. If their IT department has their system locked down, do they simply lose the ability to view the published output?

Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Nick,

If they're not able to access it through one of the browsers/Flash versions mentioned or the hosting server is blocking the associated MIME types as mentioned for the videos - then yes, they'll run into difficulty accessing the course.

The browsers mentioned are pretty standard - so I'd be curious to know what environment they were viewing it in that caused problems. 

Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Nick,

The issue with Flash player 16 was just in terms of opening Articulate software, and it did not impact the published content and viewing it within a server or LMS. Are you able to replicate the issue with the exclamation mark on your own system? If not, what is different in terms of how you both are viewing it? 

Nick Elkins

Ashley, it appears the client is getting this when viewing the course in W7/IE9 from HTML5 output. His IT department says there's no way they can update to a newer browser or to download a flash player for their environment. 

I assume the fact that this is IE9 with HTML5 is the reason this is happening, but not 100% sure. Any further thoughts?

Thanks!

Ashley Terwilliger-Pollard

Hi Nick,

You mentioned HTML5 - are you sending them the story_html5.html link? If so, that'll override showing them the Flash output - and Internet Explorer isn't one of the supported browsers for HTML5. I like to use a site such as html5test.com to see how different browsers behave. 

You also mentioned they couldn't download Flash player - but then that they have Flash in that particular browser - so I'd just want to confirm. 

Johnnie Mae Jones

Hi Community,

I am having the same issue - receiving the exclamation mark during video screens.  I have several screens, but everything worked fine until I installed the recent upgrade for Storyline 2.

I have seven topics on the menu, after going through 3 - when I run the 4th topic, first the screen flashes between green and the content and then the exclamation mark page appears.

We are currently using IE 8.  But, when I run the course via Chrome, it works fine.  Our company is migrating to IE11, but it is not complete as of now.  Could using IE 8 be the problem?

Any help is appreciated.

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