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Using Advanced Actions to Make a button appear only after three other click boxes have been clicked.

New Here ,
Apr 01, 2013 Apr 01, 2013

I'm working on an interactive brief, and I'm making slides where the user has to click the correct items and then a "Contine" or "Next" button appears so they can move to the next slide.  Any help out there?  I have been using Captivete but I do not have a lot of experience withthe Advanced Actions.  I'm sure this is a pretty simple solution for all you captivate Wizards out there.

I'm using Captivate 5.5.

Thanks for any help!

heymattmann

TOPICS
Advanced , Advanced actions , Getting started
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LEGEND ,
Apr 01, 2013 Apr 01, 2013

Hi there

What you will need to do is create variables to track whether the items have been clicked. Then create Advanced actions that set the variables as each item is clicked and perform a check of the variables and if the criteria has been met, reveal your button. Then assign the Advanced actions to the items the user will click.

Cheers... Rick

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New Here ,
Apr 01, 2013 Apr 01, 2013

Rick, thanks.  Much appreciated.


Is there a glossary on line for the variables?  Or at least some good tutorials?  I've been having some trouble finding some.  I figured I needed to set variables for the click boxes to be TRUE if clicked and that the button would need the action of the button to be that all click box values are TRUE and then it shows up.  I'm just having troble getting started.  Any known reference material would be helpful.

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New Here ,
Apr 01, 2013 Apr 01, 2013

I got it.  It was easier than I thought.  I was also associating the Advanced Action to an object and not the slide.

Thanks!

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Community Expert ,
Apr 01, 2013 Apr 01, 2013

Have several examples of the work flow you needed, but was not online for several hours. Perhaps some of my articles could help you:

http://blog.lilybiri.com/curious-about-variables-in-captivate-4-5   introduction to variables in Captivate

http://kb2.adobe.com/community/publishing/862/cpsid_86299.html   in depth article about variables

http://blog.lilybiri.com/unleash-the-power-of-variables-in-captivate-5    using variables in advanced actions

http://kb2.adobe.com/community/publishing/871/cpsid_87182.html    in depth article about variables in advanced actions

http://blog.lilybiri.com/blog-after-posterous-clickclick   an example of the condition you needed (only to show Next button after...)

http://blog.lilybiri.com/events-and-advanced-actions   list with all possible events to trigger an advanced action

Have more lists on my blog: statements in advanced actions, system variables, Effects, widgets...

Lilybiri

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New Here ,
Apr 03, 2013 Apr 03, 2013

Lilybiri and Rick,

Thanks for taking the time to help me out.  I said in a reply previously that "I got it" and "it was easier than I thought."  Well, WRONG!!  I actually did not get it right at all and I have spent hours trying to figure it all out.  But nope.  Zip.  Nada.  Bupkis.  Etc.

Lilybiri, thanks for all of the blog links.  I'm just not understanding what I'm supposed to do.  Are there publications to find or courses to take to fully understand Variables and Advanced Actions?  Is there some baseline level or some other scripting language I'm supposed to know already so that what is in Captivate is second nature?  I'm starting to get frustrated with myself because I can not get the results I'm looking for and I'm worried it is staring me in the face and I just don't know the ins and outs of theVariables and Advanced Actions well enough to find the solution. 

I'm still trying to come up with a solution for the problem I started with:  User needs to find all the problems in a scenario before being allowed to continue, either by just advancing to the next slide or by seeing a button that they click to advance.  They do NOT need to find the problems in a specific order.  It CAN'T be this tough.  If you know of an print materials - books or manuals - that you could recommend purchasing, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for all of your help!

-Matt

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Engaged ,
Apr 03, 2013 Apr 03, 2013

Hi Matt,

Can you post some pictures of the Advanced Actions you're trying to use that aren't working? It might give people some ideas of specific ways to help you. It can be a bit frustrating to start out, since there's not a lot out there in Adobe's official stuff for Adobe Actions, but Lilybiri's blog really is a great resource.

Others might do this differently, but for your scenario, I would create 3 similar Advanced Actions, each one assigned to execute On Success for a clickbox, and three Variables to keep track of whether or not the user has clicked a particular box. There's also your next button, which starts out hidden. Make sure to name it something like NextButton so you can find it easily in the dropdown box when making your Advanced Actions.

So I might name the actions and variables: actionClickBox1, actionClickBox2, actionClickBox3, and varClickBox1, varClickBox2, varClickBox3 (when you create the variables, set their default values to 0). You can call them whatever you want, just don't reuse names anywhere else-- you will run into problems.

The idea behind the actions is that each time the user clicks a box, you change the variable for that box to keep track of the fact that it has been clicked. That part you were on the right track for. The next part of the action then checks to see if all the clickboxes have been clicked (aka, if all the variables have been changed from their original values to the new one). If they are, it shows a next button. If not, it does nothing.

From what you said, I think you were trying to add an Advanced Action to show the next button to the next button itself. This would only execute when the user clicks that button, which makes it impossible-- you'd have to click the next button in order to show the button so that you can click it... oh dear. The decision of whether or not to show the next button needs to be part of the clickbox actions, so that upon clicking the third and final box, the next button will pop up. Because it makes this decision (to show or not to show) on each clickbox, the order you click them in doesn't matter. It will only show the next button once all the variables have been changed.

You will see that the actions are all very similar, except for the variable that they change:

actionClickBox1

first tab in the conditional action:

     if varClickBox1 is equal to 0 <-- default value of variables must be 0

     then assign varClickBox1 with 1 

second tab in the conditional action:

     if varClickBox1 is equal to 1 AND

     if varClickBox2 is equal to 1 AND

     if varClickBox3 is equal to 1

     then show NextButton

actionClickBox2

first tab in the conditional action:

     if varClickBox2 is equal to 0

     then assign varClickBox2 with 1

second tab in the conditional action:

     if varClickBox1 is equal to 1 AND

     if varClickBox2 is equal to 1 AND

     if varClickBox3 is equal to 1

     then show NextButton

actionClickBox3

first tab in the conditional action:

     if varClickBox3 is equal to 0

     then assign varClickBox3 with 1

second tab in the conditional action:

     if varClickBox1 is equal to 1 AND

     if varClickBox2 is equal to 1 AND

     if varClickBox3 is equal to 1

     then show NextButton

Hint: If you set up one of these actions and save it, you can click a button in the top right hand corner to duplicate it and then just change the few things that are different to make the next action. It saves you from having to create it three times from scratch!

Wow, this is long... I hope it isn't overwhelming in its length, and that it helps! Advanced Actions really are a cool feature once you get past their quirks...

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New Here ,
Apr 04, 2013 Apr 04, 2013

ElaKat,

Thanks for taking the time to look at this.  I am a newbie at these things and can use all of the help and advice I can get.  I found a solution. I found it on a blog site called "Crazy About Captivate."  It seems to have some good info and examples to reference for someone like me just starting out.

Anyway, Here's a screen shot of one of the Advanced Actions:

AdvancedActionsMatt.gif

One of the main things I never knew about, or missed, was the "1 is equal to 1" condition.  It works for me here, so I'm psyched.  I duplicated the Action and changed the Show and hide actions for the different items.  Also, I created distinct Image Buttons for the things I wanted users to identify instead of clickboxes placed over areas of a large image and tring to assign variables to them.  I created an "All Clicked" part of the Action that just said if everything equaled "1" SHOW the "NEXT" button.

I would NEVER have figured this out without help from people here on these forums or from standing on the shoulders of others who know these things inside and out.

I really appreciate it.

-Matt

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Community Expert ,
Apr 03, 2013 Apr 03, 2013

The in-depth articles about variables were meant as an introduction, but apparently they were not clear enough. Those were all articles I wrote to try to explain how to create variables and advanced actions. There are a lot of books for Captivate around, but not one focusing in Advanced actions and variables. Perhaps you'll need a tutor? If I could find a sponsor, perhaps I'd write a book, but apparently most users are only interested in basic stuff. And I'm just spending many hours a day trying to help users out with advanced actions. I'll leave you to Vish from now on, he is from Adobe.

You can ask me for the template described in this article, it has an example of the advanced action you need, but template for CP6 is not available yet, 5.5 would work as well. Send me a PM with your email address:

http://blog.lilybiri.com/template-for-reusing-script

It is the workflow that Vish described, with another labeling system.

Lilybiri

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New Here ,
Jul 11, 2013 Jul 11, 2013
LATEST

Create variables and advanced actions to hide buttons until another button has been selected (only works when destination is another slide)

  1. Name your click boxes
  2. Project
  3. Variables
  4. Add new
  5. Name variable
  6. Create a value of 0
  7. Save
  8. Navigate to the slide that the click box links off to
  9. Under action, on enter select assign
  10. Select the name of your variable
  11. And add one on the with box
  12. Project
  13. Advanced action
  14. Conditional actions
  15. Name action
  16. In first section under ‘perform action if all conditions are true’, double click
  17. Select variable
  18. Select your variable
  19. Select Is equal to
  20. Select literal
  21. Add one
  22. Under actions
  23. Select show
  24. Select your named button
  25. Now create the action you want the button to do when selected
  26. Selection the action – for example go to next slide
  27. Save

Hope this helps

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