Swf Compilation Failed Error in Captivate 9

[trillium68]

I have just recorded 141 slides for a new project, which at this point contains no audio, video, quiz, action script, user variables. The only thing I added were some images (pngs) that I superimposed on some slides. I deleted all those images and still keep receiving the error message below when I try to play the project or view in the browser.   

Swf compilation failed. Note: Please verify if any of the actionscript keywords is used as user variable name.

Any assistance would be very much appreciated, because like most of us developers, I have a project deadline hanging over my head!

[RodWard]

You can usually find where things are fouling up by hiding groups of slides and attempting to publish again.  Hide one half then the other half of the project.  If one of these allows you to publish, work on hiding sections of the half that DIDN'T publish to narrow it down.

Eventually you should find the slide or slides where the issue is located.  Once you are down to a slide, start dragging objects on that slide out into the scrap area and republish again.  It may turn out that there is an object that you have named with a keyword, or it could be that text in a given text caption contains some punctuation characters that Captivate is tripping over. 

The issue might also be in Closed Captioning text (but you say there is no audio so that shouldn't be the case). 

Also make sure that your filename or publish name contains no punctuation.

[trillium68]

Rod, I followed your advice and narrowed the problem down to five slides. When I removed the images I had superimposed on these slides, I was able to view the project in the browser with no swf compilation errors. Can you advise what could be the problem with the images? One thing you mentioned was naming objects with keyword...is there a list somewhere of the keywords? I need to superimpose the images on these slides to represent the workflow. Thanks so much for your time and expertise!

[Ashish.K]

Hi Linda,

Please try the steps given here: https://helpx.adobe.com/captivate/kb/swf-compilation-error.html

Regards

Ashish

[BDuckWorks]

Does this imply that work is underway to update the Captivate Help into a new knowledge-base, or is this a new interface to the same help files that have been around before Cp8?

[Lilybiri]

KB documents have been around since many years, they are just more difficult to find but a google search can help.

[marya31391609]

I'm having this issue when trying to publish a course as a video and cannot seem to resolve it with any of the steps. I've tried to implement the .ini file fix, but I get a "not authorized" error and cannot save changes to that file. I've tried running Captivate as administrator, I've tried hiding slides to see what slide/element might be causing the issue, and even with all hidden but a single blank slide at the beginning, it won't publish as video.

This is a course I need 2 versions of--one to run on AdobeConnect that has super-light interactivity (a couple of pauses), and one that needs to just run as a video on a public website. It publishes fine as an html5 course, but fails to publish every time as a video.

HELP! Is the only fix the Captivate 6 one? I'm running Captivate 2017 on Windows 7 Pro.

[Lilybiri]

Are you on 10.0.1.285?

[marya31391609]

Yes.

[Lilybiri]

Do you Run Captivate as Adminisrator. From what you tell, you seem not to have any admininstrator rights.

[marya31391609]

I read this in one of your previous discussion answers, and yes, I'm running the application as administrator now. It hasn't resolved the issue. Opening that .ini file doesn't seem to be something I can choose "run as administrator" for.

[Lilybiri]

Why do you want to edit that ini file?  A problem with publishing to mp4 has never been linked with a chenge to an ini file. Why do you talk about CP6, while the OP had CP9 and you are on CP2017?

[marya31391609]

I've read several discussion threads, and this link is what Adobe seems to provide as the remedy, even when users have specified that they're on later versions of CP: SWF compilation failed error when publishing an Adobe Captivate project

I'm just telling you EVERYTHING that I've tried from posts I've read on the forum. What else do you recommend????

[Lilybiri]

Sorry, but you are publishing to a video, to mp4. Why do you talk about a fix for SWF compilation? I don't understand. Using werid characters in the filename can cause problems for all outputs but you told you have done that. That document is for a much older version. Avoiding some characters in file names is a general rule. Changing that ini file was for an old version. I never had to do that for later versions. What is the filename that you use?

[marya31391609]

Ok, let me back up. I arrived at this post because I'm getting the same error message as the original poster. There doesn't seem to be a post addressing this common error specifically with a user trying to output mp4, and I don't understand the issue either!

Yes, I understand that the solution document I posted the link to was for an older version, but an Adobe staffer posted it as a solution in the thread we're conversing in right now, which references CP9 as the version in the OP. In this thread: SWF Compilation Failed CP 2017 , an Adobe staffer also posted the same link as the solution, even though the poster clearly stated that they were using CP 2017 and Windows 10. I've seen the link as an Adobe-recommended solution in one other post today, but I closed that window and don't still have the link. I think it was reasonable, given that this is Adobe's recommendation in at least three threads for the same error message, that I tried the steps they instruct users to take.

Here's what I'm looking at when I try to publish this as a video:

[RodWard]

Did you try the suggestions I gave earlier in this same thread about hiding slides to see if you can isolate any specific slides that are triggering the failure?  You can often use a process of elimination to find the culprit slide/s.

[marya31391609]

Yes, I tried that. I didn't find a specific slide causing the issue. In fact, when I had hidden all but the first slide and was still having the same issue, I dropped in a blank slide and hid everything else, and the error persists. In fact, that screen shot above is the result of trying to publish with just the one blank slide showing. It will publish html5 but throws this error at me when I try to publish as a video.

[marya31391609]

In fact, I just created a new blank project with three slides that each have just a line of text. I try publishing as video, and I get the same error.

[RodWard]

How long since you cleaned out your Cache folder?

[marya31391609]

That was one of the first things I tried when the issue came up yesterday, and I dumped it before opening the project this morning. I also went to the utils folder and ran CleanPreferencesWin.

[RodWard]

Your current project may have become corrupted.

Have you tried copying all slides into a new project shell?

[marya31391609]

No, I haven't tried that yet (and of course, I'd rather not have to go there!); but what about the clean project I started that does the same thing? That simply consists of three 3-second slides with a line of text on each one, and it behaved the same way. Am I just doing something wrong in the publish settings for Video? (I've unchecked "Enable reporting for this project" before publishing.) I'm no expert on these settings; I could certainly be doing something wrong there, but it is just not jumping out at me!

[RodWard]

There may be some conflict on your system with some of the drivers required to perform the video publishing.

Another option is that it could be something in your user profile.  Are you able to log in as a different user (preferably one with full admin privileges) and test from that profile?