It’s a well-designed, perfectly executed, fully-featured lesson set that meets all of your learners’ needs. Now you need to get it to the people. But hold on! You’ve used one of the preset Camtasia production settings, and the output that you get on the screen doesn’t match your expectations.

It’s an unpleasant surprise.

You feel all your hard work has been for nothing. What’s worse, the clock is running, and you’ve assured your customer that their training materials is “Fantastic! No, really. It’s amazing. You’ll be really pleased.”

This is a relatively common situation e-learning developers encounter (according to people who have contacted me on this subject) so in my view, it’s worth exploring a little further: why does this occur, how can it be overcome, and how can it be prevented from happening in future projects?

The underlying reason for poorly-rendered content typically manifests itself long before a content developer clicks on the Camtasia Production Wizard ‘Finish’ button. To understand the reason, we have to look at the context: we must begin with Rapid E-Learning as an approach to developing courseware, and we must look at Camtasia as an authoring tool.

An overview of Rapid E-Learning

Traditional learning content development methods (see Figure 1) involve using subject matter experts (SMEs) working with instructional designer who, in turn, designs a learning intervention. A digital media development team then builds the interactive solution based on this design. The quality assurance team evaluates the solution against the design and test plan. This “waterfall” approach to content production can lead to long and costly design and development cycles, which can reduce the effectiveness of material with critical timelines or where content regularly changes or is updated.

Figure 1 Traditional E-Learning Content Development Model
[Click to enlarge]

Rapid E-Learning (REL) takes a different approach. While the definition of rapid e-learning differs among experts, generally it’s considered to be e-learning that can be developed quickly and inexpensively. REL uses tools and processes that decrease development time dramatically. Traditional courseware development timelines are measured in terms of months whereas REL timelines are measured in terms of days and weeks. This makes it an attractive solution for many companies. This can be a time-consuming process, even if a project runs on-time, with a minimum number of contributors (see Table 1).

Table 1 Production Logistics

In contrast, the Rapid E-Learning Approach can be defined as

the process of developing content quickly and inexpensively. REL uses tools and processes that decrease development time dramatically. Traditional courseware development timelines are measured in terms of months whereas REL timelines are measured in terms of days and weeks.

(Archibald, D. 2005)

Jennifer de Vries sees e-learning as being

…like the desktop publishing industry of 20 years ago, when desktop publishing was relegated to the one person with the big computer who knew the specialized software and laid out all of the documents. Then MS Word came along and it included many desktop publishing features, giving everyone the ability to create reasonably attractive material on a PC using this very simple software. I think rapid e-learning tools are going to transform the e-learning industry in much the same way, so that e-learning development will become more accessible to the general public.

(Fournier, J. 2005)

In essence, her opinion (which is one that I share), is that the tools used to create e-learning are at a point where they are on the cusp of a tipping point and become much more commonly used.

Figure 2. Where Rapid E-Learning Fits
[Click to enlarge]

These tools – Camtasia among them – are known as programming-free authoring tools. They are typically (though not exclusively) built for non-technical authors that don’t have programming skills. These systems are often template- or form-based and are very easy to learn and use. They are very efficient and productive tools if you need to quickly enable subject-matter experts and training professionals to develop e-learning content without knowing a programming language.

More…
___________

References:

Archibald, D. (2005). Rapid E-learning: A growing trend. Learning Circuits Magazine. [Internet] Available from: http://www.astd.org/lc Subscription required. Accessed 14th July 2006

Fournier, J. (2006). Rapid E-Learning Grows Up. Learning Circuits Magazine. [Internet] Available from: http://www.astd.org/LC/2006/1206_fournier.htm Accessed 20th July 2009

–

Rather, it is an approach to content development that enables SMEs to author content quickly and efficiently, typically using learning professionals as coaches and assistants in the process.

The two tenets of rapid e-learning are:

1. Ease of development 
2. Short development time frames

The key to successful rapid e-learning is having tools and templates that make it easy for practically any expert to quickly create effective learning materials.

However, rapid content authoring is only part of the story. The end-to-end content design, development, delivery, management and maintenance cycle demands a broad range of skills (I talked about some of these here), and a number of computer applications to support and leverage these steps of the e-learning development process.

In my never-ending pursuit of enhancing performance when using the Rapid E-Learning methodology, I regularly assess new applications, tools, and utilities to assess their value in my learning and development content production procedures. Here are the applications I’m going to evaluate over the next few months. Of course, I’ll blog my views on them over that period of time. Interestingly, only a few of these apps are ‘pure’ e-learning development tools; the others I intend to use to facilitate aspects of the content development process, rather than to actually develop learning materials.  

Serena Prototype Composer 2009
Serena Prototype Composer is an application planning, modeling and prototyping environment for non-technical users to visually define their application needs, including business processes, activities, user interfaces, requirements, and data. Models can be derived from existing resources such as Web applications and can be published as running prototypes as well as Microsoft Word specifications.

WebCAT
The Web Category Analysis Tool is an open source utility that allows designers and usability engineer to test a proposed or existing website or CMS/LMS ontology or categorization scheme. This enables  knowledge managers (and instructional designers) to determine how well taxonomies, categories and learning content objects are understood by users. WebCAT is a variation on the traditional card sorting paradigm, where  users are guided to generate a category tree or even a folksonomy.

Stanza Desktop
Stanza Desktop is an e-book publishing tool, designed for generate digital publications, including electronic books, newspapers, PDFs, and general Web content for a range of hardware platforms. It supports HTML, PDF, Microsoft Word, and Rich Text Format reading, as well as all the major e-book standards: unprotected Amazon Kindle and Mobipocket, Microsoft LIT, Palm doc, and the International Digital Publishing Forum’s new EPUB Open eBook standard. According to the developers, Stanza is designed to to make reading on your Macintosh, PC or mobile device an “enjoyable and hassle-free” experience.

iWebkit
iWebKit is a GNU-licensed file package and content framework designed to enable those without the time or the programming skills to use the iPhone SDK to create iPhone and iPod Touch compatible websites and webapps. According to the developers, the kit is accessible to anyone – even people without any html knowledge. and is simple to understand thanks to the included tutorials. We’ll see.

Microsoft Learning Content Development System
The Microsoft Learning Content Development System (LCDS) is a free-to-use tool that enables the developers to create interactive, online courses. The LCDS allows anyone to publish e-learning courses by completing the easy-to-use LCDS forms that seamlessly generate highly customized content, interactive activities, quizzes, games, assessments, animations, demos, and other multimedia.

PowerManual
PowerManual addresses the needs of presenters, trainers and anyone  who uses PowerPoint on a regular basis. PowerManual enables you to produce high quality documents  in a range of formats, including Word, PDF and HTML.PowerManual enables the creation of cover pages, logos, custom headers and footers, document pagination, on-the-fly slide updating, as well as PowerPoint slidestack management.

As I said, I’ll be reviewing the apps, testing and reporting on their functionality, ease-of-use, suitability of purpose, adaptability to e-learning, and so on. I’d like to hear your opinions: do you already use some or all of these tools? What do you think of them? Are you going to evaluate them yourself, based on my suggestion? Are there any other tools in the same space that are more effective?

Let me know what you think by commenting in the space below.

–

Here’s what the Forum will cover:

It wasn’t long ago that e-Learning developers thought that putting a simple Flash animation and a small sound file into their e-Learning offerings was really leading-edge stuff. But today much more advanced technology, like higher bandwidth, gaming, and immersive learning techniques, is easily available. And, ever-more-sophisticated learners, who are demanding more effective and absorbing e-Learning programs, are pushing for adoption of advanced media techniques.

This Online Forum will show you how to use audio, video, animation, and other technologies to enhance the engagement and “stickyness” of your e-Learning offerings. You’ll see real-life examples, and learn various design approaches for effectively using media. This Online Forum is your best chance to focus on improving the e-Learning you create for your organization, and to…

• EXPLORE how using different media tools and processes can enhance your e-Learning offerings,
• DISCOVER how better use of media enhances a wide variety of topics and formats,
• EXAMINE the design and development of media-use techniques to achieve specific goals,
• LEARN how other organizations are using media to build engagement into their e-Learning programs, and
• ENSURE that your e-Learning meets both your learners’ and your organizations’ goals.

I’m pleased to announce that I will be presenting the Forum session on using audio in e-learning. Called Integrating Audio into E-Learning Courseware, session participants will learn the audio production lifecycle, see examples and demonstrations, and get hints, tips, and tricks-of-the-trade to enable you to produce high-quality audio for your courseware. You’ll  learn how recording subject matter experts as they describe a process, task, or activity, when well-recorded and produced can, in most cases, be integrated into courseware without taking the extra steps of hiring a professional voice-over artist to re-record the narration. This can lead to considerable savings in time and money, as well as reduce the time-to-market of courseware.

In this session, you will learn:

• Why use audio in e-Learning?
• The uses of non-linear editing tools
• How to record audio
• How to produce audio
• How to integrate audio into commonly-used rapid e-Learning applications and podcasts

When learning with multimedia, research shows that visual imagery is better retained when accompanied by verbal information; that learners are better able to integrate information via multi-modal instruction. Called the Six Principles of Learning, it describes how information encoded and transmitted using both visual and auditory channels reduces the cognitive load on the learner, so their working memory can process information more effectively.

However, most e-learning professionals perceive that creating and integrating high-quality audio is a highly-specialized activity outside of their expertise. But now more than ever, e-learning technology and content production skills are a key requirement for learning professionals who wish to interact with their audience.

So join me on Thursday by clicking here to register for the event. if you haven’t already registered, I’ll be delighted to see you there.

–

It’s gratifying to see that this series about integrating sound and narration into rapid e-learning authoring environments is being so positively viewed, and hopefully my suggestions are being folded in to your workflows as you create e-learning content for your audience. But firstly, why use audio at all?

The Science Bit

According to Colvin Clark & Mayer (2002) there are six different "broadly applicable" media element guidelines to follow when undertaking e-learning instruction. These guidelines are:

1. The Multimedia Principle: Use words and graphics rather than words alone.
2. The Contiguity Principle: Place corresponding words and graphics near each other
3. The Modality Principle: Present words as audio narration rather than onscreen text.
4. The Redundancy Principle: Presenting words in both text and audio narration can hurt learning.
5. The Coherence Principle: Adding interesting material can hurt learning
6. The Personalization Principle: Use conversational style and virtual coaches.

The Modality principle

When learning with multimedia the brain must simultaneously encode two different types of information, an auditory stimulus and a visual stimulus. These two sources of information do not overwhelm or cognitively overload the learner’s capacity to acquire information. Rather, psychological research has shown that verbal information is in fact better remembered when accompanied by a visual image.

Baddeley and Hitch (1974) proposed a theory of working memory which hypothesized two largely independent subcomponents that tend to work in parallel – one visual and one verbal/acoustic. As we know from everyday life, we can simultaneously process information from our eyes and ears; replicating this phenomenon in an educational context can be beneficial for learners.

This dual-coding theory, first proposed by Paivio (1971) was applied to multimedia and e-learning by Richard E. Mayer and his associates. Mayer has demonstrated (2002, 2004) that learners are better able to integrate information via multimodal instruction. In a number of studies, Mayer and his colleagues tested Paivio’s dual-coding theory using multiple media channels. They found that students learning via multimedia (animation and narration) consistently did better on transfer questions than those who learned from animation and text-based materials. That is, they (the learners) were significantly better when it came to applying what they had learned via multiple media channels, rather than unimedia (visual only) instruction.

While instructional content using multimedia learning was initially limited to logical and scientific processes that centered on cause-and-effect systems, over time it was found that the modality effect could be extended to other educational domains.

Information can and (should even) be encoded and transmitted using both visual and auditory (narration) channels. If verbal information is encoded auditorily it reduces the cognitive load of the learner. Consequently their working memory can process information more effectively. Mayer has calls this the the Modality Principle.

Adding audio to Adobe Captivate projects
Adobe Captivate, like a range of e-learning authoring environments enables you to leverage the Modality Principle by adding narration, music, wildtrack sound, and almost any other sound to learning content to enhance learning. For example, you can:

• Add a background track that plays for the duration of the project.
• Add sound to an individual slide.
• Add sound to a specific object, such as a caption, click box, highlight box, or button

Getting Started
For a refresher on creating markers in an audio editor click here. In sound editing, an audio file REGION specifies a segment of audio data which (in the context of e-learning) can be narration – a word, a phrase, a sentence, or some other meaningful unit of information. Regions are of variable length and usually align to the duration of the instructional event they are associated with. Audio editors like Sound Forge enable you to divide a sound file into different regions with specific start and end points (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Regions in Sound Forge

Unlike Presenter, Captivate cannot read markers, so to import audio into the application, you must first process the audio file so that it can be readily added to each component of your e-learning content by extracting smaller sound files from the master file (see Figure 2).

Figure 2 Extracted Regions

Once extracted, the files are ready to be imported into Captivate. At this point in the process, I expected to be able to add the folder containing my extracted files to Captivate 4. However, this happened:

… so the rest of this process was completed in Captivate 2.

Note: I attempted a range of activities to work around the error message – I won’t bore you with the details here – but I had no success in circumventing the issue. Not good. For Adobe Captivate.

Without the facility to import the files via the library feature in Captivate 4, I reverted to the process of manually importing each audio file as prescribed in Captivate 2 (see demo, below). While this is a tedious process, it is still much faster than recording and editing content directly into Captivate, for the simple reason that Captivate is a content authoring tool, not a dedicated audio editor.

I read somewhere recently that if you walk around with a hammer, pretty soon everything looks like a nail; when creating e-learning content it’s very much a case of using the right tool for the right job to save yourself time and effort.

You Try:

To create and extract regions in Sound Forge:

Open Sound Forge. From the File menu, select Open… -> [yourFile.wav]

Ensure the file’s audio markers are preserved as intended from last time.

Now, from the Special menu, choose Regions List -> Markers to Regions.

All existing markers will be converted to regions using the data between each consecutive marker as the region boundary. For example, if your file contains three markers, this command will create two regions; the first region will span the area between the first and second markers, and the second region will span the area between the second and third markers.

Next, from the Tools menu, choose Extract Regions to create new files from regions in the Regions List.

The regions will be extracted to a directory on your computer.

 

Next time: Back to mobile learning. Delivering e-learning via a range of instructional modalities using m-learning.

______________

References:

Baddeley, A.D.; G.J. Hitch (1974), "Working Memory", in Bower, G.A., The psychology of learning and motivation: advances in research and theory, 8, New York: Academic Press, pp. 47-89

Colvin Clark, R.  Mayer, R. E. (2002). e-Learning and the Science of Instruction: Proven Guidelines for Consumers and Designers of Multimedia Learning. Pfieffer.

Mayer, R. E. (2001). Multimedia learning. New York: Cambridge University Press

Paivio, A. (1971). Imagery and verbal processes. New York: Holt, Rinehart, and Winston.

–

As I progress through this series of articles on mobile learning, I will continue by looking at design and development approaches that are appropriate for m-learning. If I can find any research on the topic I will conclude this short series by investigating the benefits of m-learning on learners. I will also be learning Spanish, cataloging last year’s vacation snaps, doing the garden for Spring, and training for a 10K run in April. But that’s not important right now.

Now read on…

According to Gartner’s Nick Jones:

The opportunities of m-learning are driven by the ubiquity and familiarity of mobile devices, and because they allow just-in-time access to learning material whenever and wherever the user wants it. The low cost of entry-level mobile devices and basic services, such as SMS, is also attractive when delivering educational material to low-income learners.

(M-Learning Opportunities and Applications , p.5) 

We can say that m-learning can be used to provide a range of different types of learning including:

Media delivery: Converged Media Devices (CMDs) play audio and video. They are excellent platforms for delivering simple multimedia learning material. For example, podcasting is an easy technology to work with and can be consumed on a wide range of devices. Many CMDs can display information formats, such as web pages and interactive content which support immersive learning experiences. Many mobile devices can also access media resources such as YouTube.

Contextual and exploratory learning: Some of the most innovative m-learning applications are contextual or exploratory, involving information related to particular tasks or locations. Museums and galleries have deployed a number of educational systems of this sort. Recent examples include tagging exhibits in art galleries

Storage and delivery of reference documents: CMDs and e-books from vendors such as Amazon and Sony can display a variety of document formats. Most e-book readers support PDF. CMDs typically support PDF and a non-editable productivity document formats, such as Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel. Such devices can be used as a pocket archive of reference documents. For example, some organizations deliver parts of their disaster recovery plan onto employees’ mobile phones so that, in the event of an emergency, each employee has access to a quick and up-to-date reference of what individuals need to do. E-book readers are less pocketable, but can provide a convenient way to store and deliver large numbers of documents in a small volume. In the consumer domain, there are many instances of mobile devices used as a delivery channel for documents that previous generations would have consumed on paper. Popular examples include city guides and maps.

Time-sensitive learning. Industries such as financial services and healthcare have a business requirement to ensure that employees read specific documents, such as new regulations, immediately after they are published. Mobile devices are good delivery platforms for small but urgent documents. They provide a number of ways, such as mobile e-mail, for employees to receive documentation and confirm that they have read it.

Information feeds and fragments. Many learning activities deliver small amounts of information regularly — for example, health education. SMS works well on all mobile devices; a high-end Web-friendly mobile phone and MIDs can display feeds using formats such as Really Simple Syndication (RSS). A variation on this theme is using the mobile device to support learning by providing a quick way to look up information fragments — for example, on-device dictionaries for language translation.

Web and portal content. The Web is a delivery tool for many types of learning and reference material. Although most of this is in formats that are not well-adapted to small screens, MIDs and high-end smartphones, such as the iPhone, with larger screens and full HTML browsers can display Web content tolerably; and it’s possible to develop or adapt content for smaller screens (see Note 2). Some mobile devices and platforms have the capability to access material in corporate document management systems, such as SharePoint.

 More…

________________________

References:

Jones, N. (2008) M-Learning Opportunities and Applications. ID Number: G00163293 Gartner Research [Internet] Available from: http://www.gartner.com (Subscription or purchase required) Accessed 17 February 2009

Kineo and UFI/Learndirect (2009) Mobile Learning Reviewed. [Internet] Available from: http://www.kineo.com/documents/Mobile_learning_reviewed_final.pdf Accessed 17th February 2009

–

We have been looking at both Camtasia and Captivate for our online development. My question is if you have knowledge of ANY Apple compatible capturing software with the same capabilities of Camtasia and Captivate? Or if either Adobe or Techsmith ever plan on making this available to the Apple community?

Two great questions centered around the notion that there is no screencasting killer app for the Mac. Now, I have a Intel-chip MacBook (it also runs Windows using Boot Camp), but I use Windows PCs for learning content development and production – it’s a work / life balance thing. As a result, I have never really considered the options for e-learning authoring on the Mac before now. But since I was asked, here’s my two cents worth…

There are a number of choices. First, you could run the programs you’re evaluating (TechSmith Camtasia or Adobe Captivate) on a Mac with Windows / Boot Camp, but my view would be given the processing resources needed to generate content in a native Windows environment, running them via a virtual machine would be to enter a world of pain I’m not prepared to contemplate: there are too many links in the chain; it’s too risky. Murphy’s Law says that on a death march project with a deadline looming, the the authoring environment would not be up to the task, regardless of how well it behaved prior to to that.

With that option rejected let’s look at the other choices available for the MacOS. To answer my correspondent’s second question first, it seems that TechSmith are looking at a mid-2009 release for the Mac version of Camtasia. Click here to view a screencast about the latest developments in this product.

Camtasia for the Macintosh is soon to be a reality

Not so good, I’m sad to say for Adobe fans. According to The Apple Blog there are currently no plans to bring it to the Mac. When questioned, the Adobe development team responded:

Captivate is built from a program that ties deeply into the core Windows. To bring it to the Mac would require a total rewrite, something that we’re not sure we can justify at this point. If we had significant interest from Mac users, it’d be a different story.

If you want to register your interest in a Mac version of Captivate, click here to let Adobe know via their feature request form.

Next, the third of the “Big Three” rapid e-learning development authoring tools, Articulate similarly does not support MacOS natively. However, in a very comprehensive post here, guest blogger Jim Gritton (co-founder of GB Learning Consultancy) discusses

Parallels Desktop for Mac, followed by CrossOver Mac and now VMware Fusion. Both Parallels and Fusion are Windows emulators: they use virtualization technology to allow you to run Windows as a virtual machine alongside the Mac operating system, as you can see from the screenshot below:

While it may seem contradictory that I discuss an emulator here, Articulate is a little different, in that it can interact with Mac-native KeyNote-created presentations and even integrates with the Mac Dock (via Parallels).

Obviously more optimistic than me (see Death March above) Jim asserts that:

If you’re wondering about my set-up, I’m currently running Parallels Desktop with Windows XP on a 20-inch, all-in-one iMac, sporting a 2.16 GHz Intel Core Duo Processor, 1 GB memory and a 240 GB hard disk. This isn’t the fastest or most powerful Mac on the block, but it isn’t the slowest, either. I’m not going to pretend that running Windows applications using Parallels is as fast as running Mac applications natively on my iMac, but it’s no slouch. Nor has it let me down.

One approach that seems to me to have some potential is CrossOver Mac, which builds on the open-source implementation of the Windows API, Wine. This enables Unix-based operating systems (like Mac OS X and Linux) to run Windows applications “natively.” Hmmm… might look in to this myself, but it breaks my “Macs are for fun” work / life balance rule, in a thin-end-of-the-wedge kind of way…

What are we left with? Quite a lot, as it turns out.

In terms of native MacOS screencasting Mac, the evidence of my research suggests that Telestream’s ScreenFlow is the most popular application.

ScreenFlow Export wizard screenshot

According to their website ScreenFlow includes:

In the multiplatform world, Qarbon’s offering ViewletBuilder seems to have potential. This product seems to have some powerful e-learning features including LMS integration.

Qarbon’s ViewletBuilder

According to Qarbon, the product’s highlights are:

• Create and publish Flash tutorials and simulations in minutes
• Expand the reach of your online marketing with interactive slideshows and presentations
• Develop and deliver powerful, dynamic courseware without programming
• Capture detailed viewer responses with quizzes, tests, surveys and polls
• Seamlessly share Projects amongst Authors
• Integrate your content with your organization’s learning management system (LMS)
• Benefit from its multi-platform solutions Windows, Linux & Mac

From the open source world SWF Tools is also available for the Mac. SWF Tools is a collection of SWF manipulation and creation utilities written by Rainer Böhme and Matthias Kramm. It is released under the GPL.
Features included are:

• PDF2SWF A PDF to SWF Converter. Generates one frame per page. Enables you to have fully formatted text, including tables, formulas etc. inside your Flash Movie. It’s based on the xpdf PDF parser from Derek B. Noonburg.
• SWFCombine A tool for inserting SWFs into Wrapper SWFs. (Templates) E.g. for including the pdf2swf SWFs in some sort of Browsing-SWF.
• SWFStrings Scans SWFs for text data.
• SWFDump Prints out various informations about SWFs.
• JPEG2SWF Takes one or more JPEG pictures and generates a SWF slideshow.
• PNG2SWF Like JPEG2SWF, only for PNGs.
• GIF2SWF Converts GIFs to SWF. Also able to handle animated gifs.
• WAV2SWF Converts WAV audio files to SWFs, using the L.A.M.E. MP3 encoder library.
• AVI2SWF Converts AVI animation files to SWF. It supports Flash MX H.263 compression. Some examples can be found at examples.html.
  Font2SWF Converts font files (TTF, Type1) to SWF.
• SWFBBox Allows to readjust SWF bounding boxes.
• SWFC A tool for creating SWF files from simple script files.
• SWFExtract Allows to extract Movieclips, Sounds, Images etc. from SWF files.
• RFXSWF Library A fully featured library which can be used for standalone SWF generation. Includes support for Bitmaps, Buttons, Shapes, Text, Fonts, Sound etc. It also has support for ActionScript using the Ming ActionCompiler.

SWFTools has been reported to work on Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, HP-UX, MacOS X and Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/Vista.

If you want to experiment with a ‘lite’ authoring environment for the Macintosh, try free-to-use Jing (by TechSmith).

• Screenshot still image capture
• Record onscreen video
• Share instantly over the Web (FTP), IM, e-mail
• Audio Narration

Jing lacks many features that proprietary screencasting software has, including local saves, multiple output types, and delivery formats, but it’s free to use, so a restricted function set should be expected. Once content is captured and saved, a URL for the file is automatically created and can be shared with others to view or access.

So there you have it. A whistle-stop tour of content capture and rapid e-learning authoring tools for the Mac. I would be very interested to hear how Mac users fare with these applications, or can suggest any others that are used in this context on the MacOS platform. What really surprises me is that there aren’t more tools already, after all, the Mac is the doyen of the digital media development industry and I would have thought that the tools available for e-learning development would reflect this preference for the platform. But that’s another story.

NOTE WELL:

Given the number of positive comments I have made about TechSmith recently, I want to emphasize that I am in no way associated with them, and that the purpose of this blog is not to showcase or cheerlead any commercial interest. It just happens at the moment they seem to make the most effective tools in this market space. I would suggest to their competitors that they step up to the mark and compete with applications that really meet the needs of learning and development practitioners and I will certainly be pleased to discuss their solutions in positive terms. Equally, should anyone fall short of the mark (MPEG4 or FLV, anyone?) I will highlight it on the E-Learning Curve Blog with no prejudice.

–

We have been looking at both Camtasia and Captivate for our online development. My question is if you have knowledge of ANY Apple compatible capturing software with the same capabilities of Camtasia and Captivate? Or if either Adobe or Techsmith ever plan on making this available to the Apple community?

Two great questions centered around the notion that there is no screencasting killer app for the Mac. Now, I have a Intel-chip MacBook (it also runs Windows using Boot Camp), but I use Windows PCs for learning content development and production – it’s a work / life balance thing. As a result, I have never really considered the options for e-learning authoring on the Mac before now. But since I was asked, here’s my two cents worth…

There are a number of choices. First, you could run the programs you’re evaluating (TechSmith Camtasia or Adobe Captivate) on a Mac with Windows / Boot Camp, but my view would be given the processing resources needed to generate content in a native Windows environment, running them via a virtual machine would be to enter a world of pain I’m not prepared to contemplate: there are too many links in the chain; it’s too risky. Murphy’s Law says that on a death march project with a deadline looming, the the authoring environment would not be up to the task, regardless of how well it behaved prior to to that.

With that option rejected let’s look at the other choices available for the MacOS. To answer my correspondent’s second question first, it seems that TechSmith are looking at a mid-2009 release for the Mac version of Camtasia. Click here to view a screencast about the latest developments in this product.

Camtasia for the Macintosh is soon to be a reality

Not so good, I’m sad to say for Adobe fans. According to The Apple Blog there are currently no plans to bring it to the Mac. When questioned, the Adobe development team responded:

Captivate is built from a program that ties deeply into the core Windows. To bring it to the Mac would require a total rewrite, something that we’re not sure we can justify at this point. If we had significant interest from Mac users, it’d be a different story.

If you want to register your interest in a Mac version of Captivate, click here to let Adobe know via their feature request form.

Next, the third of the “Big Three” rapid e-learning development authoring tools, Articulate similarly does not support MacOS natively. However, in a very comprehensive post here, guest blogger Jim Gritton (co-founder of GB Learning Consultancy) discusses

Parallels Desktop for Mac, followed by CrossOver Mac and now VMware Fusion. Both Parallels and Fusion are Windows emulators: they use virtualization technology to allow you to run Windows as a virtual machine alongside the Mac operating system, as you can see from the screenshot below:

While it may seem contradictory that I discuss an emulator here, Articulate is a little different, in that it can interact with Mac-native KeyNote-created presentations and even integrates with the Mac Dock (via Parallels).

Obviously more optimistic than me (see Death March above) Jim asserts that:

If you’re wondering about my set-up, I’m currently running Parallels Desktop with Windows XP on a 20-inch, all-in-one iMac, sporting a 2.16 GHz Intel Core Duo Processor, 1 GB memory and a 240 GB hard disk. This isn’t the fastest or most powerful Mac on the block, but it isn’t the slowest, either. I’m not going to pretend that running Windows applications using Parallels is as fast as running Mac applications natively on my iMac, but it’s no slouch. Nor has it let me down.

One approach that seems to me to have some potential is CrossOver Mac, which builds on the open-source implementation of the Windows API, Wine. This enables Unix-based operating systems (like Mac OS X and Linux) to run Windows applications “natively.” Hmmm… might look in to this myself, but it breaks my “Macs are for fun” work / life balance rule, in a thin-end-of-the-wedge kind of way…

What are we left with? Quite a lot, as it turns out.

In terms of native MacOS screencasting Mac, the evidence of my research suggests that Telestream’s ScreenFlow is the most popular application.

ScreenFlow Export wizard screenshot

According to their website ScreenFlow includes:

In the multiplatform world, Qarbon’s offering ViewletBuilder seems to have potential. This product seems to have some powerful e-learning features including LMS integration.

Qarbon’s ViewletBuilder

According to Qarbon, the product’s highlights are:

• Create and publish Flash tutorials and simulations in minutes
• Expand the reach of your online marketing with interactive slideshows and presentations
• Develop and deliver powerful, dynamic courseware without programming
• Capture detailed viewer responses with quizzes, tests, surveys and polls
• Seamlessly share Projects amongst Authors
• Integrate your content with your organization’s learning management system (LMS)
• Benefit from its multi-platform solutions Windows, Linux & Mac

From the open source world SWF Tools is also available for the Mac. SWF Tools is a collection of SWF manipulation and creation utilities written by Rainer Böhme and Matthias Kramm. It is released under the GPL.
Features included are:

• PDF2SWF A PDF to SWF Converter. Generates one frame per page. Enables you to have fully formatted text, including tables, formulas etc. inside your Flash Movie. It’s based on the xpdf PDF parser from Derek B. Noonburg.
• SWFCombine A tool for inserting SWFs into Wrapper SWFs. (Templates) E.g. for including the pdf2swf SWFs in some sort of Browsing-SWF.
• SWFStrings Scans SWFs for text data.
• SWFDump Prints out various informations about SWFs.
• JPEG2SWF Takes one or more JPEG pictures and generates a SWF slideshow.
• PNG2SWF Like JPEG2SWF, only for PNGs.
• GIF2SWF Converts GIFs to SWF. Also able to handle animated gifs.
• WAV2SWF Converts WAV audio files to SWFs, using the L.A.M.E. MP3 encoder library.
• AVI2SWF Converts AVI animation files to SWF. It supports Flash MX H.263 compression. Some examples can be found at examples.html.
  Font2SWF Converts font files (TTF, Type1) to SWF.
• SWFBBox Allows to readjust SWF bounding boxes.
• SWFC A tool for creating SWF files from simple script files.
• SWFExtract Allows to extract Movieclips, Sounds, Images etc. from SWF files.
• RFXSWF Library A fully featured library which can be used for standalone SWF generation. Includes support for Bitmaps, Buttons, Shapes, Text, Fonts, Sound etc. It also has support for ActionScript using the Ming ActionCompiler.

SWFTools has been reported to work on Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, HP-UX, MacOS X and Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/Vista.

If you want to experiment with a ‘lite’ authoring environment for the Macintosh, try free-to-use Jing (by TechSmith).

• Screenshot still image capture
• Record onscreen video
• Share instantly over the Web (FTP), IM, e-mail
• Audio Narration

Jing lacks many features that proprietary screencasting software has, including local saves, multiple output types, and delivery formats, but it’s free to use, so a restricted function set should be expected. Once content is captured and saved, a URL for the file is automatically created and can be shared with others to view or access.

So there you have it. A whistle-stop tour of content capture and rapid e-learning authoring tools for the Mac. I would be very interested to hear how Mac users fare with these applications, or can suggest any others that are used in this context on the MacOS platform. What really surprises me is that there aren’t more tools already, after all, the Mac is the doyen of the digital media development industry and I would have thought that the tools available for e-learning development would reflect this preference for the platform. But that’s another story.

NOTE WELL:

Given the number of positive comments I have made about TechSmith recently, I want to emphasize that I am in no way associated with them, and that the purpose of this blog is not to showcase or cheerlead any commercial interest. It just happens at the moment they seem to make the most effective tools in this market space. I would suggest to their competitors that they step up to the mark and compete with applications that really meet the needs of learning and development practitioners and I will certainly be pleased to discuss their solutions in positive terms. Equally, should anyone fall short of the mark (MPEG4 or FLV, anyone?) I will highlight it on the E-Learning Curve Blog with no prejudice.

–

We have been looking at both Camtasia and Captivate for our online development. My question is if you have  knowledge of ANY Apple compatible capturing software with the same capabilities of Camtasia and Captivate? Or if either Adobe or Techsmith ever plan on making this available to the Apple community?

Two great questions centered around the notion that there is no screencasting killer app for the Mac. Now, I have a Intel-chip MacBook (it also runs Windows using Boot Camp), but I use Windows PCs for learning content development and production – it’s a work / life balance thing. As a result, I have never really considered the options for e-learning authoring on the Mac before now. But since I was asked, here’s my two cents worth… 

There are a number of choices. First, you could run the programs you’re evaluating (TechSmith Camtasia or Adobe Captivate) on a Mac with Windows / Boot Camp, but my view would be given the processing resources needed to generate content in a native Windows environment, running them via a virtual machine would be to enter a world of pain I’m not prepared to contemplate: there are too many links in the chain; it’s too risky. Murphy’s Law says that on a death march project with a deadline looming, the the authoring environment would not be up to the task, regardless of how well it behaved prior to to that.

With that option rejected let’s look at the other choices available for the MacOS. To answer my correspondent’s  second question first, it seems that TechSmith are looking at a mid-2009 release for the Mac version of Camtasia. Click here to view a screencast about the latest developments in this product.

 Camtasia for the Macintosh is soon to be a reality 

Not so good, I’m sad to say for Adobe fans. According to The Apple Blog there are currently no plans to bring it to the Mac. When questioned, the Adobe development team responded:

Captivate is built from a program that ties deeply into the core Windows. To bring it to the Mac would require a total rewrite, something that we’re not sure we can justify at this point. If we had significant interest from Mac users, it’d be a different story.

If you want to register your interest in a Mac version of Captivate, click here to let Adobe know via their feature request form.

Next to the the third of the “Big Three” rapid e-learning development authoring tools, Articulate similarly does not support MacOS natively. However, in a very comprehensive post here, guest blogger Jim Gritton (co-founder of GB Learning Consultancy) discusses

Parallels Desktop for Mac, followed by CrossOver Mac and now VMware Fusion. Both Parallels and Fusion are Windows emulators: they use virtualization technology to allow you to run Windows as a virtual machine alongside the Mac operating system, as you can see from the screenshot below:

While it may seem contradictory that I discuss an emulator here, Articulate is a little different, in that it can interact with Mac-native KeyNote-created presentations and even integrates with the Mac Dock (via Parallels).

Obviously more optimistic than me (see Death March above) Jim asserts that:

If you’re wondering about my set-up, I’m currently running Parallels Desktop with Windows XP on a 20-inch, all-in-one iMac, sporting a 2.16 GHz Intel Core Duo Processor, 1 GB memory and a 240 GB hard disk. This isn’t the fastest or most powerful Mac on the block, but it isn’t the slowest, either. I’m not going to pretend that running Windows applications using Parallels is as fast as running Mac applications natively on my iMac, but it’s no slouch. Nor has it let me down.

One approach that seems to me to have some potential is CrossOver Mac, which builds on the open-source implementation of the Windows API, Wine. This enables Unix-based operating systems (like Mac OS X and Linux) to run Windows applications “natively.” Hmmm… might look in to this myself, but it breaks my “Macs are for fun” work / life balance rule, in a thin-end-of-the-wedge kind of way…

What are we left with? Quite a lot, as it turns out.

In terms of native MacOS screencasting Mac, the evidence of my research suggests that Telestream’s ScreenFlow is the most popular application.

ScreenFlow Export wizard screenshot

According to their website ScreenFlow includes:

In the multiplatform world, Qarbon’s offering ViewletBuilder seems to have potential. This product seems to have some powerful e-learning features including LMS integration.

Qarbon’s ViewletBuilder

According to Qarbon, the product’s highlights are:

• Create and publish Flash tutorials and simulations in minutes
• Expand the reach of your online marketing with interactive slideshows and presentations
• Develop and deliver powerful, dynamic courseware without programming
• Capture detailed viewer responses with quizzes, tests, surveys and polls
• Seamlessly share Projects amongst Authors
• Integrate your content with your organization’s learning management system (LMS)
• Benefit from its multi-platform solutions Windows, Linux & Mac

From the open source world SWF Tools is also available for the Mac. SWF Tools is a collection of SWF manipulation and creation utilities written by Rainer Böhme and Matthias Kramm. It is released under the GPL.
Features included are:

• PDF2SWF A PDF to SWF Converter. Generates one frame per page. Enables you to have fully formatted text, including tables, formulas etc. inside your Flash Movie. It’s based on the xpdf PDF parser from Derek B. Noonburg.
• SWFCombine A tool for inserting SWFs into Wrapper SWFs. (Templates) E.g. for including the pdf2swf SWFs in some sort of Browsing-SWF.
• SWFStrings Scans SWFs for text data.
• SWFDump Prints out various informations about SWFs.
• JPEG2SWF Takes one or more JPEG pictures and generates a SWF slideshow.
• PNG2SWF Like JPEG2SWF, only for PNGs.
• GIF2SWF Converts GIFs to SWF. Also able to handle animated gifs.
• WAV2SWF Converts WAV audio files to SWFs, using the L.A.M.E. MP3 encoder library.
• AVI2SWF Converts AVI animation files to SWF. It supports Flash MX H.263 compression. Some examples can be found at examples.html.
  Font2SWF Converts font files (TTF, Type1) to SWF.
• SWFBBox Allows to readjust SWF bounding boxes.
• SWFC A tool for creating SWF files from simple script files.
• SWFExtract Allows to extract Movieclips, Sounds, Images etc. from SWF files.
• RFXSWF Library A fully featured library which can be used for standalone SWF generation. Includes support for Bitmaps, Buttons, Shapes, Text, Fonts, Sound etc. It also has support for ActionScript using the Ming ActionCompiler.

SWFTools has been reported to work on Solaris, Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, HP-UX, MacOS X and Windows 98/ME/2000/XP/Vista.

If you want to experiment with a ‘lite’ authoring environment for the Macintosh, try free-to-use Jing (by TechSmith).

• Screenshot still image capture
• Record onscreen video
• Share instantly over the Web (FTP), IM, e-mail
• Audio Narration

Jing lacks many features that proprietary screencasting software has, including local saves, multiple output types, and delivery formats, but it’s free to use, so a restricted function set should be expected. Once content is captured and saved, a URL for the file is automatically created and can be shared with others to view or access.

So there you have it. A whistle-stop tour of content capture and rapid e-learning authoring tools for the Mac. I would be very interested to hear how Mac users fare with these applications, or can suggest any others that are used in this context on the MacOS platform. What really surprises me is that there aren’t more tools already, after all, the Mac is the doyen of the digital media development industry and I would have thought that the tools available for e-learning development would reflect this preference for the platform. But that’s another story.

NOTE WELL:

Given the number of positive comments I have made about TechSmith recently, I want to emphasize that I am in no way associated with them, and that the purpose of this blog is not to showcase or cheerlead any commercial interest. It just happens at the moment they seem to make the most effective tools in this market space. I would suggest to their competitors that they step up to the mark and compete with applications that really meet the needs of learning and development practitioners and I will certainly be pleased to discuss their solutions in positive terms. Equally, should anyone fall short of the mark (MPEG4  or FLV, anyone?) I will highlight it on the E-Learning Curve Blog with no prejudice.

–

What is the impact of the economy on you and your organization? What are you doing as a result?

In response, I returned to a post I wrote about a year ago. While reflecting on the LCBBQ I formed the view that the argument I outlined then bears repeating now. Where appropriate I have updated the article to reflect recent developments as the Recession turned into Depression.

The dialectic I am presenting here can be summarized in the following manner: will the positive economic, organizational, and social value of e-learning outweigh traditional human responses an economic crisis? What strategies can we use to ensure the survival of and even the growth of e-learning as an industry in these changing times?

So what’s changed in the e-learning industry since the last recession in 2001? I’ve outlined some discussion points below:

1. First of all: Traditional business practice
2. Developments in Infrastructure & Hardware
3. The E-learning Hype curve
4. Refinements in Content Development Methodologies
5. The Rise if the Read/Write Web
6. The PlayStation Generation – Digital Natives in the workplace

Scroll down to find out more about each of these points.
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Traditional business practice
Historically, when a slowdown or company rationalization occurs, the first against the wall are the folks in the PR, marketing, and training departments. Typically, individuals and organizations revert to previously-learned behaviors in tough times; this usually means going through the process of carrying out tried-and-tested, though not necessarily logical responses to the problems put in front of them. The rationale is as follows:

• Profits are down
• Revenue projections aren’t great for the next 12/18 months
• We need to cut our costs
• We need to keep the guys that make the widgets (we need to have product to sell)
• We need to keep the managers of these people (or productivity will go down)
• We need to keep Human Resources in place to manage everyone obviously (it’s just a coincidence that I – that is the decision-maker – work in HR!)

• What about those training people? High travel costs for the ILT guys, they pull people out of work for 3 days to go on courses. Large budgets spent on implementing and maintaining an LMS/LCMS, third-party e-learning libraries, custom courseware etc, but they do seem to add value to the organization. And let’s face it, they don’t really improve the quality of our product, because they never convince us with their ROI metrics…
• Outcome: tea and sympathetic chat, and the Training team get their pink slips / P45s.

Sadly, I reckon that this will be strategy undertaken by a significant number of organizations over the next year or so. However….

…and it’s a big however.

Let’s look at the evidence for factors that have changed in the e-learning industry since 2001 and the recession following the Dot-Com Crash.

Infrastructure & Hardware
More-or-less general availability of high-speed internet access just wasn’t there in 2001. To take the example of the company I worked for at the time, our high-quality courseware was developed in Authorware and Director and delivered to customers on CD-ROM for distribution via their intranet or accessed directly from the disk. Our on-line courseware was a ‘lite’ version of the CD material – not out of choice, but because of the limited functionality that could be provided to a user via a 56k connection.

Over-compressed images, poor animation, and very poor audio – hardly the immersive learning solution that e-learning flattered to promise at the time. Assuming the learner could access the content successfully, the chances were that the PC (for it was always a PC) that they were using to view their content was processing and displaying the date at a rate that we wouldn’t find acceptable on a PDA now (screen-size excluded). Pentium or pre-Pentium processors, 8-bit sound cards, 16 colors, 800×600 pixel displays. And so on.

In short, we could see the potential, but our imaginations exceeded the available technology.

The e-learning hype curve
This brings me neatly to the e-learning hype curve (see Figure 1). Kevin Kruse described 2001 as the year that

…brought the harsh, steep slope of unfulfilled promises. Several high-profile providers shut their doors while many more announced large-scale layoffs in the face of missed revenue targets and crashing stock prices. E-learning advocates retreated to the more defensible ground of “blended learning. This year [went] down as the Trough of Despair.

Figure 1. The E-learning Hype Cycle

I would suggest through familiarization and use, learners expectations are more reasonable about what can be achieved (and perhaps more importantly how it can be achieved through digitally mediated delivery). Given this environment, organizations are now more willing to invest in e-learning as part of their overall training strategy. But is it perceived as a necessity or a luxury?

A year ago I wrote that:

I can’t answer that question right now. I suspect that I will be able to answer it 12 months from now, because there will be evidence as to whether decision makers consider e-learning to be a core requirement that effectively meets organizations’ training needs.

In light of recent research by Bersin & Associates among others, it seems that The Powers That Be in organizations have judged online training to be found wanting, and are responding by cutting budgets and reassessing learning & development strategies, apparently by beginning to disintermediate training by using non-formal and informal knowledge transfer methods in place of ‘e-training,’ LMSs, and VLEs.

Content development methodologies
I would assert that there is a real opportunity for e-learning here (if L&D professionals are in a to position stand their ground). Without going into the history of this too much, the development of (relatively) easy-to-use authoring tools like Captivate, Articulate (and a whole raft of others), Rapid E-Learning development methodology and the disintermediation principle means that e-learning has fewer up-front costs associated with it than at the turn of the century.

Similarly, if it’s done correctly it can be argued that ongoing maintenance and support costs are lower than they ever have been. By developing content with smaller, more flexible teams, the value proposition of e-learning has been enhanced, and the total cost of ownership has been significantly reduced. Outside of e-learning, the take-up of podcasting and streamed media on sites like Blogger and YouTube demonstrates that this ease-of-use of tools and technologies has extended into the community at large.

The Read/Write Web
Who would have thought in 2000 that blogging, social networking, wikis and podcasts would be as big a part of life as they are now? At the start of the century, the Web (and e-learning) could at best be described as a half-duplex medium; it was pretty much all one-way traffic. The development of information platforms has facilitated knowledge-sharing, folksonomies, social interaction, and, key to all this, reciprocity.

We now live in a multiplex world of many voices and ideas, mediated by the internet. At the forefront in using these web technologies is the e-learning industry. By using these tools to develop content I feel we can demonstrate quite effectively that e-learning has a value now that it did not have a decade ago. I would assert that this is particularly true if you take a social-constructivist approach to learning. By the way, I’m happy to entertain debates about the role of formal as opposed to non-formal and informal learning in this environment.

The PlayStation Generation
Concomitant with the read/write web is the PlayStation generation that have grown up over the last number of years. In his seminal essay Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants (2001), Marc Prensky declares:

…students have changed radically. Today’s students are no longer the people our educational system was designed to teach.
Today’s students have not just changed incrementally from those of the past, nor simply changed their slang, clothes, body adornments, or styles, as has happened between generations previously. A really big discontinuity has taken place. One might even call it a “singularity” – an event which changes things so fundamentally that there is absolutely no going back. This so-called “singularity” is the arrival and rapid dissemination of digital technology in the last decades of the 20th century.

Today’s students – K through college – represent the first generations to grow up with this new technology. They have spent their entire lives surrounded by and using computers, videogames, digital music players, video cams, cell phones, and all the other toys and tools of the digital age. Today’s average college graduates have spent less than 5,000 hours of their lives reading, but over 10,000 hours playing video games (not to mention 20,000 hours watching TV). Computer games, email, the Internet, cell phones and instant messaging are integral parts of their lives.

Extending from this, there is a generation of workers who are comfortable with and practiced in the concepts and use of e-learning – take a look at the resources available on www.skoool.ie, an initiative for second-level students in Ireland. I was involved in the development of the first iteration of this site, and it’s changed a lot (for the better) since we took those first steps creating it 8 years ago. Similarly in third-level education, there have been significant developments in on-line learning, and I think that it’s fair to say that it has become quite embedded in the pedagogy employed by universities: tools like Moodle enable students to upload coursework, take tests, build their own knowledgebases and wikis, and have on-line discussions through a single point of access.

This generation is in the workplace right now. It will expect to learn new skills as their careers develop using the tools that they have always learned on in the past: that is, by using e-learning.

Conclusion
This is a blog entry, not an essay. But consider other factors including transport costs and training in the era of $100 a barrel oil and the value of virtual classrooms; the ROI of e-learning as opposed to traditional methods; even the impact of traditional ways of teaching on the environment (”e-learning” becomes “eco-learning” anyone or even ‘economical-learning’?). I think that if they are in a position to do so, learning professionals are repositioning themselves to re-use the skills they’ve acquired in different contexts – perhaps undertaking their activities from a different platform, or through working in a different domain of expertise.

Ultimately, I would say that all anyone can do at the moment is keep their powder dry and hope for the best in the short term, while preparing for what may be a completely different business environment when the green shoots of recovery finally emerge.

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Figure 1. Presenter 7 Publish dialog box

Sure enough, Adobe Presenter 7 does have a ‘Publish to PDF’ output option (see Figure 1), accompanying the ‘Publish to My Computer’ and ‘Publish to Connect Pro’ rendering options available with the previous versions of Presenter (see Figure 2).

Figure 2. Presenter 6 Publish dialog box

Having only just installed Presenter 7, and while I have published some test presentations locally, I have yet to upload any PDF-formatted content to an LMS. So, I have no idea how well this output type functions in comparison to the more traditional XML, SWF, and HTML-formatted e-learning content package when it’s deployed from an online or networked platform.

I will carry out one of my famous comparisons between the two formats at some point in the future. My preliminary view is that the ability to distribute content as a PDF certainly opens up some interesting possibilities and opportunities.

____________________

References:

Adobe Presenter 7 Homepage: http://www.adobe.com/products/presenter/

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