embedded mp4 videos won't play through LMS

Report · May 23, 2017

I have a Captivate project with embedded videos. When I publish the files the videos play through either the .html or the .swf files. Then, when client put the files in his LMS, the videos don't play. he has received a error MSG that

Error:resource file does not exist
file: imsmanifest.xml
Path: 1.mp4 (1=Video name.mp4)
severity: warning

May you resolve this?

Report · May 23, 2017

Are video MP4 files enabled to play from that LMS server? Check with the LMS Admin. And if you happen to be publishing HTML5 courses from Captivate 9 to the same LMS, check that the LMS Admin has enabled JSON files too. That won't be the cause of your current issue, but it might save you another one in the near future.

Report · Jun 14, 2017

I have the same thing happening for a project which includes video assets. I think when Captivate exports the SCORM, the video files are being housed in a different folder than what is referenced in the imsmanifest. If I unzip the SCORM, I find my mp4 files in a 'vr' folder. But in the imsmanifest the mp4 is referenced as being located in the root folder. I have not tried changing the manifest (to include 'vr/' before the mp4 file name) or moving the file to the root folder within the SCORM, but those are my next steps. Either way, it seems like a Captivate 2017 SCORM export problem specific to video files.

Report · Jun 15, 2017

Hi,

Could you please drop a mail to CaptivateHelp@adobe.com by mentioning this thread in the subject line and also let us know the LMS you are using to host your content.

Also please share with us, your project and its published HTML5 output you are hosting using drop box or google drive.

We would like to suggest you to try hosting the published html5 output of your project on Scorm cloud and confirm if the issue exists there as well. If issue is specific to your LMS, we might need a test account to debug this further.

Regards,

Zeeshan

Report · Dec 11, 2017

Seeing the same behavior in Captivate 9.0.2.437. Responding here for any updates. Already bug reported.

Report · Dec 12, 2017

The imsmanifest.xml should have two references to any MP4 video files that are used in dual publishing output. These references will be in the xml resources list, and the MP4 used by the SWF output is usually near the top of the list in the following format:

The other MP4 used by the HTML5 output will be near the bottom of the resources list sort order because it's in the vr folder and will look like this:

If an LMS is not playing MP4 videos the most common reason is that the LMS web server is not set up to allow MP4 file mimetype. So you need to check with your server administrator to make sure that cannot be an issue. Sometimes, in the case of quite large video files, it may SEEM like they are not working because they are taking a very long time to download.

Report · Dec 12, 2017

I just did a little test project and this is what I found.

I tested a simple three slide project with a 5 second video file and a quiz question in Captivate 2017 set up to report to SCORM 1.2 and uploaded the zip file to SCORM Cloud, I found that the HTM/SWF content correctly showed the video file even though the original content did NOT have two MP4 videos. There was only ONE video file and that was in the vr folder of the HTML5 content.

So it seems to me that Captivate IS using the same MP4 video file in the vr folder for both HTM/SWF and HTML5 outputs. The imsmanifest,xml file is listing a second MP4 at the root level incorrectly. There isn't one there.

What's more, SCORM Cloud confirmed that an LMS set up to play MP4s CAN play videos in Captivate's dual published output.

So perhaps the issue some users are facing is that their particular LMS is either not set up correctly, or else is not playing the content because it's seeing a reference in the imsmanifest.xml pointing to a file (the MP4 at the root level) which isn't present. A way to test this theory would be to go in and delete the reference to the top-level MP4 from the manifest, leaving only the reference to the one in the vr folder and then see if the LMS will play the project.