Sequence Drag & Drop activity. Is it possible to not "drop" until the end?

Report · Sep 09, 2015

This is a far reach. I don't think it's possible, but I wanted to ask the community before giving up.

I have a sequence drag and drop activity for practicing how to write foreign alphabet letters (Russian, Japanese, what have you) that require the learner to drag a Pen to the correct points on the character in the correct order (an attempt to simulate how to write it correctly). Right now, the student drags the pen to first point, lets go of the mouse to get it "right," then drags it again to the second point, let's go, and so on. I'm looking for a way to have the program recognize that the pen has hovered over the point, mark it as "correct" as in the sequence, but not have the student actually let go of their mouse until the very end of the letter - simulating how to write the letter much more realistically.

This is for a school project, so it's not the end of the world if it's not possible. But perhaps there's some sort of script I could use to get it working right? And as for the version of Captivate, I'm using 8, but if its available in 9 let me know how that works too for when I decide to upgrade.

Thanks for the help!

Report · Sep 09, 2015

There is still no other rollover event in CP9 then the one you have as well: for a rollover slidelet.

Report · Sep 09, 2015

If you are NOT publishing to HTML5, but only HTM/SWF output then you could use the Infosemantics Event Handler widget.

About Infosemantics Event Handler Widget | Infosemantics Pty Ltd

This allows you to make almost any Captivate object interactive so that it can trigger Actions from a number of mouse events, including Mouse Rollover and Rollout.

You can download trial versions here to give it a go.

http://www.infosemantics.com.au/adobe-captivate-widgets/download-free-trial-widgets

Unfortunately since the widget is SWF, it is not compatible with HTML5.

Report · Sep 10, 2015

That looks awesome! And I feel like I could really play around with it to get what I want. At the moment, though, because this is just for a school project, I don't really have it in a budget to buy anything. I've bookmarked the page just in case, though! Wonderful resources.

Report · Sep 09, 2015

Hi LilMissLori,

Sounds like a fun way to teach stroke order. Unfortunately, I don't have any answers to your technical question about Captivate recognizing mouse actions.

This is well outside the specifications you've laid out, but … Is it not desirable to have the students use a pen tool and actually trace over the letters? (Perhaps you could use a custom trace font, like this kind of thing for Hiragana, or add arrows and numbers yourself.)

If you're displaying the HTML/SWF content in a browser, you could install a browser plugin like Web Paint to allow students to annotate.

Just an idea, and not one that answers the question. Apologies if it's of no use!

Report · Sep 10, 2015

You got it! It's actually a stroke order for Hiragana tutorial. Not necessarily memorizing the characters, but actually how to use them, with drag-and-drop "Points of Interest" that show where the stroke begins, ends, curves, has a "tail," etc. I don't necessarily need the stroke order font you linked - I've animated the numbers to show up in a sequence within Captivate - but that's actually really cool to see.

As for the browser plugin, that's certainly an option, but perhaps not for the project I have in mind. It's more of a portfolio piece rather than having a class required to go in and install a plugin. There's this website (not mine): Kakimashou - Let's Practice Writing Japanese! It actually allows you to write within the browser without a plugin, and gives you immediate positive or negative feedback. It just doesn't necessarily teach HOW to write them (using these Points of Interest I mentioned) and opts for trial and error. Regardless, if I could put the functions of that application into a Captivate slide, I'd be crazy happy.