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A
Anonymous
March 13, 2007
Answered

Link to files via relative path?

  • March 13, 2007
  • 5 replies
  • 5285 views
It seems that Captivate is only capable of linking to external files via absolute links. In other words, when I create a click box that opens a file and select a file located on my development machine, the project will still look for that file on my local hard drive, even after it is posted on the Web. This is extremely frustrating, and I have not found a workaround.

Please help me identify a way to link using a relative path. In other words, the project will resolve it's current location and look for content in the directory it is located in or in specified directories under that location. That is is the only way you can create a project that will run correctly when posted. Captivate already does this when you create a click box that opens another project, so there MUST be a way to do this when opening non-project files!

Please Help!

Thanks,
Dan Roberts
    This topic has been closed for replies.
    Correct answer
    You, sir, are a scholar and a gentleman!

    Using the conventions you described, I was able to create workable relative links. This should be widely published, as I'm sure many other authors are hitting the same problem.

    Take note Adobe: The abiity to create relative links shold be an option withing the product, as it is in most other products I have used.

    5 replies

    5
    5Rachel5
    Known Participant
    March 29, 2007
    Brilliant! Thanks very much for your help!

    Kind regards,

    Rachel
    5
    5Rachel5
    Known Participant
    March 29, 2007
    A-ha! This seems to have worked. One last question (well... on this subject) ideally we would like our customers to be able to download the captivate movie from our website. Will these word and PDF files still work on other computers as obviously they wont have the original file on their hard drives. Or should it now be stored within the captivate movie? Do you know what I mean?

    Sorry for bein such a pain!

    Thanks again!

    Rach
    A
    Anonymous
    March 29, 2007
    Hi Rachel,

    Well you cannot embed PDF nor Word documents into a Captivate project. What you can do however is embed FlashPaper documents, by inserting them as animations. You can read more about from this blog post. Working with Multiple Page Documents

    Anything else (even if you publish your files as standalone exe files) need to have all files you reference in your Captivate project in the same folder as your Flash (SWF).

    Regards,
    Mark

    5
    5Rachel5
    Known Participant
    March 29, 2007
    Blimey- that was quick!

    Ive tried doing this but when I preview it in my Web Browser (using F12) it says "cannot find file...make sure the path or internet address is correct). And when I preview the movie (F4) it opens a webpage and searches the file name- using my default search engine (msn) and shows a list of websites that relate to the file name. Am I missing something really obvious?

    Rachel
    A
    Anonymous
    March 29, 2007
    Hi Rachel,

    Hmm, that is strange. Try publishing the Flash (SWF) and put the document you want to open when the learner clicks on the link in the same folder as the published SWF file.

    Let me know how you get on.

    Regards,
    Mark
    5
    5Rachel5
    Known Participant
    March 29, 2007
    Hi! Im quite new to Captivate and Im slightly confused with all the abbreviations and file types, so Im going to ask this very simply. Am I able to link to a word document or PDF file from the Captivate movie? I am creating an e-learning training programme and would like to add a link that opens up a word document with a template on for the user to fill in as part of the training. Is this possible?

    Thanks,

    Rach
    A
    Anonymous
    March 29, 2007
    Hello Rach,

    Yes, you should be able to do this by carrying out the following steps -

    1. Choose Insert and select the interactive object (click box / button etc) that you want to use to acts as the link to your external document.
    2. In the Click box / button dialog box) choose Open URL or file from the On Success menu of the dialog box.
    3. Click the "..." button and select the file you want to open.
    4. From the Target menu (to the left of the "..." button choose "New"
    5. Click OK.

    To preview this locally you will need to test by previewing the project in your Web Browser (Press F12) Note: When tested this using Firefox, I did find that there was a slight delay before the "Open in" dialog box appeared.

    HTH
    Regards,
    Mark
    A
    Anonymous
    March 13, 2007
    Hi Dan,

    Are you publishing the file as a standalone executable? If so, others have experienced problems and have reported this as a bug... a link to a recent post.

    http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=464&threadid=1247575

    I have had no problems using standard conventions for relative links in published swfs. For instance - assume I have a course with lessons separated in 8 different folders. I have resources in a common folder that is in the same folder as all of the lessons. To get one of my swfs to link to a resource in the common folder, I would set the URL to something like "../common/managing_workflows_job_aid.pdf" - this causes the browser to look up one folder level, then to common, then to the specified file.

    Does that answer your question?
    A
    Anonymous
    Correct answer
    March 13, 2007
    You, sir, are a scholar and a gentleman!

    Using the conventions you described, I was able to create workable relative links. This should be widely published, as I'm sure many other authors are hitting the same problem.

    Take note Adobe: The abiity to create relative links shold be an option withing the product, as it is in most other products I have used.
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