Unable to Acquire LMS API

[Nathan_Jeffery]

I have developed a SCORM 1.2 compliant Captivate 6 show which is also consistent with my client's LMS requirements as set out in a developer's guide provided to me. When the show is tested with the ADL SCORM Test Suite it shows no errors. It also loads and reports as planned when using SCORM cloud. However, when I try to load it on my client's Oracle-based LMS I receive this error upon loading "Error - unable to acquire LMS API" (and reporting does not work).

Is this likely to be a problem with my client's LMS or my publishing settings?

[RodWard]

Always trust SCORM Cloud. Rustici software know their stuff and they're the ones behind the new SCORM drivers in Cp6.

Don't trust your LMS.  If if works in SCORM Cloud and your LMS claims to be SCORM compliant then it should work there too.

[Nathan_Jeffery]

Thanks RodWard. That's what I thought. I just wanted to make sure before I went back to the client to tell them to review their LMS sandpit for me.

[zanoahb55843596]

This post is kind of old so I'm not sure if I'll get a response.

I'm having issues with API Error using the 2017 Captivate release. 10.0.1.285. I have loaded the content to SCORM Cloud and it worked perfectly fine there. He is the issue, when I publish anything scorm from my machine I get API errors. My cohorts using the same software get completions mark using the same LMS. Does this mean my program is corrupt? Or is it my computer?

[abirocan]

I am trying to report a quiz in Adobe Captivate 2017 but I don't have an LMS in the server. The following error occurs: unable to acquire LMS API after publishing the captivate file. I selected the other LMS option from the drop down menu and chose SCORM 1.2. I realized that only during AICC configuration the quiz is reporting does not generate any error message despite not having an internal server or an cloud based server. My question is: Is there any way of reporting a quiz other than choosing an LMS or cloud based LMS? We have some internal restrictions due to which we can't have an LMS in our server. What sort of reporting and tracking could be done on the sever side without having an LMS. How is it done. Anybody can answer, thank you.

[RodWard]

You're always going to see this error message if you have LMS reporting turned on.  It's just telling you that it cannot find the LMS (because you haven't launched the SCORM module from within an LMS).

Captivate does offer the option of using what is called Internal Server Reporting.  But this requires that you have a web server that is running either PHP or ASP pages.  I'm assuming from your original question that neither of these would be the case.

[abirocan]

Hi RodWard,

Thank you for your answer, I realized why so many people were having similar problems as mine. However there is one confusion I have about Adobe Captivate 2017: It is about enabling reporting to quiz options. Among the five ways quiz could be reported through; one of them is any standard LMS and the other is Internal sever. My confusion is about the location of this LMS. When you choose the former does the quiz know where the LMS is? In the computer or in the server? And when you choose the internal server option how does it find the LMS? For instance if my LMS is SABA do I report the quiz through internal server or choose any other LMS? I don't have a clear sense of how this particular quiz reporting option needs to be set up properly so the LMS API error does not complicate proper loading of the project.

Another related question is about disabling the quiz reporting options. If I take that route then can I still receive some type of user interaction with the quiz e.g. who took it, how many clicks were generated and in which pages without connecting the quiz with any LMS. In your last reply to my question you did mention about Internal Server Reporting option. If I intend to create reports of quiz in the server without an LMS how do I generate those reports? Thanks for taking time to answer.    

[RodWard]

The option for Any Standard LMS is really meant to be used when your LMS of choice is known to be SCORM-compliant and will accept either SCORM 1.2 or SCORM 2004 packages.  Captivate can publish to both of these standards.  If your SABA LMS is SCORM-compliant, then you set your Quiz > Reporting to use the LMS option and configure the SCORM settings according to how your LMS needs them to work.  (Each LMS is slightly different in how they interpret the SCORM standard.)

When you publish a SCORM module and upload that module to your SCORM-compliant web server and then deliver that module to end users FROM the LMS, then the module and the LMS are able to communicate over the internet (or your corporate intranet) using what is known as an Application Programming Interface (or API for short).  If the course module is launched but cannot detect the presence of an LMS at all, then it will display this Cannot find API error message.  So, if you set up your module to report to SCORM but then launch it from your desktop or from a web server that is NOT an LMS, then you will see this error.

If you disable quiz reporting then you don't really have the option to get any information about who took the course or what scores they achieved.

The option for Internal Server is for when you are NOT using a proper SCORM-compliant LMS but might still have the option of running your own web server and have access to technical expertise necessary to set up PHP or ASP pages that can accept the output that Captivate modules will supply when you select this option.  I would stress that the Internal Server option is NOT for anyone that has very little IT expertise.  You DO need to be technically capable to implement this solution because there is very little information about it available and Adobe is usually not that helpful when things go pear-shaped (which they usually do). 

[antonellal28311794]

Hi Rod,
I realise this is an old thread, but was hoping to find my answer here and have understood majority of it. I am experiencing the same issue currently. The LMS I use is Oracle. I have to upload my scorm package as a zip file am I better off selecting import  button on the LMS to import the file located on my desktop into the LMS rather than selecting the browse option and locating the file? I would think it is the same thing. We tend to see this error more often in our Oracle test environment rather than the Oracle production server. But I have also come across it in production previously.

[RodWard]

If you published your project correctly with Quiz > Reporting settings set for the SCORM version your LMS accepts then it shouldn't matter which way you upload the ZIP file to the LMS.  If the LMS is rejecting the ZIP as not being a valid SCORM the usual reasons are that you did not publish correctly to a valid SCORM format, or that your ZIP file was not created via Captivate but someone else just zipped up the folder containing all the course files.  This places the imsmanifest.xml file one level too far down inside the zip archive, which means the LMS cannot find the manifest.

So, which version of SCORM did you publish to?

And how did you create the final ZIP archive?

[antonellal28311794]

Hi Rod

I used SCORM 1.2 and the final Zip was created via Captivate and is sitting in my adobe captivate projects folder. I uploaded this to the LMS. Although it has only done it with one course and not the rest.

[RodWard]

Try uploading the same module to SCORM Cloud to see if it fails there as well.  If it doesn't, the issue is something related to your current LMS.  Make sure the naming of the package contains no special characters.  Sometimes that throws a spanner in the works.