[Xerte] Re: Narration oddness (Wizards)

Wed Apr 27 17:16:33 BST 2011

Well that gave me a chuckle :-)

I downloaded and ran your project and for some reason that I don't know the
answer too, when I previewed your xerte project, your audio files narrated
at super speed, so I was treated to some chipmunk dialogue. Funny thing is
when I opened the files separately in vlc portable they played at the
correct speed. What baud rate were they saved at?

When I first created the page wizards I based them on the xml, xwd and .rml
data from the PageTemplates project wide template. If I remember correctly
there were some pages that had narration in the xwd file i.e. the wizard
form would offer an optional parameter of narration, but the .rlm file had
no code to handle narration. At the time I was just seeking to achieve a set
of Page Wizards that were comparable to the page templates in PageTemplates.
This will mean that both in Page Wizards and PageTemplates there are some
page designs that do not out of the box support narration.

For narration to work, as a minimum there must be
1. The narration optional property in the xwd file

  <narration type="media" label="Narration" optional="true"/>

2. Code in the getPageID file to support narration (the blue bit is my
addition to implement auto play and is not standard to most Page Wizards at
this time, nor is it found in PageTemplates pages.).

if (pageIcon.templateData.learningObject[0].gapFill[0].narration !=
undefined){
narration = pageIcon.templateData.learningObject[0].gapFill[0].narration;
rootIcon.broadcast('showAudio');
if (pageIcon.templateData.learningObject[0].gapFill[0].narPlayback !=
undefined && pageIcon.templateData.learningObject[0].gapFill[0].narPlayback
== "pageLoad"){
nar.play();
}
}

3. PageTemplates includes code in the main project file to action the
narration. Page Wizard based projects need the narrationHandler model to be
added to an Entry Frame of the project.

There seem to be two main problems that you have raised.
A. Consistent support in the PageTemplates and Page Wizards for narration
i.e. points 1 and 2 above.

With respect to the Page Wizards I will be revisiting narration for all the
Pages on the next upgrade to add autoPlay optional properties to the xwd
files and to modify the narration code to support autoplay. This will result
in those pages that have no narration code being provided with narration
code in their getPageID scripts. That is unless for some reason the
inclusion of narration compromises the page running.

The Xerte team manage the PageTemplates and On-line tookits files and I am
sure will be interested in the above observations.

B) Inconsistencies in performance within different browsers. The
PageTemplates do not support autoPlay of narration at this point in time.
The addition of nar.play(); to the narration code block, in order to force
the narration to play on page opening, may need reviewing. This feature is
only currently included in the latest version of the gapFill page wizard,
for anyone who would like to test it out. I would welcome Julian's input
here. I wonder if for example there might be an issue of timing and a need
to ensure that the file or page has loaded before playing starts. I would
like to include the ability to have narration auto play if so selected in
the wizard. So if my solution for achieving this is part of the problem then
I welcome any input that can improve the implementation.

I cannot comment further on this. I am not a flash player expert and I am
guessing that it may be differences between the versions of flash player
that are resulting in the differences in performance. There did not appear
to be any problem with narration playing in any of the browsers, only in it
auto playing at the opening of the page. The narration play bar appeared
present for all pages that had narration coded for in the .rlm file and a
narration file specified in the xwd wizard.

If there are any changes to the narration code in the next version of Xerte
then I will seek to include the changes in the narrationHandler model.rlm
file used by the Page Wizards.

footnote for Deborah.
To provide your wizard with the auto playback option you need to add a line
to the xwd file.

<narPlayback type="ComboBox" label="Narration Playback" options="On user
request,On page load" data="userRequest,pageLoad" width="150"
optional="true"/>

This will add the optional property to the form. When you add the optional
property using the form, this will add the property and your selected value
for the property to the xml file. Adding the value directly to the xml makes
the value available to your project but does not include it in the form so
that you can modify it.

Kind regards

Johnathan

On 27 April 2011 15:31, Deborah Delin <admin at strivney.com> wrote:

> Hi Johnathan,
>
> Well I've done quite a lot of testing of this narration issue and there
> definitely are some problems.  You might like to skip over my testing notes
> below to the final summary of problems at the bottom.  I am going to send
> you a zip file of my test as it does behave differently to yours and I don't
> know why that is.  You recently made changes to narration on the gap fill
> and I am wondering if the  file you posted to the Wiki might be different to
> the one you are working with?
>
>
> *Testing Notes*
> Yes there is an optional property in my Wizard that offers narration but
> not the added option of Narration Playback>On Page Load as in your wizard.
>  I added narPlayback="pageLoad" to the xml file of my gapfill, as you have
> in yours, but the added option still does not show up.
>
> When I added just the block of code about narration to the getPageID script
> of the gap fill page, narration still failed to show up but when I deleted
> all the code on that page and replaced it with all the code on your gap fill
> page the narration showed up.
>
> When I create a new gapfill page the narration script is not there but in
> the drag and drop labeling and categories pages, the only other types of
> pages I tested, the narration script is included in the getPageId script.
>
> When I add narPlayback="pageLoad" to the gapfill page, the audio file
> plays on load.  When I add it to drag and drop and categories pages the
> narration does not play on load, but narration control does show up.
>
> I tested both your and my narration test in 3 different browsers with
> varying results.  (Sorry there were access problems in the last link I sent
> but the following will definitely take you directly to the exercises):
>
> JK Test:    http://www.strivney.com/file.php/58/JK_Test/index.htm
> Deborah Test:  http://www.strivney.com/mod/resource/view.php?id=2043
>
> *Google Chrome:*
> *
> *
> *Johnathan Test:  Narration shows up but on page 4 gapfill doesn't auto
> load on first load but when returning to it it plays then cuts off after a
> couple of seconds.*
> *Deborah Test*: Narration shows up but doesn't auto-load (in Google Chrome
> on desktop narration on gapfill auto-loads but cuts off after couple of
> seconds)
> *
> *
> *IE8:*
> *
> *
> *Johnathan Test:  *As in Google Chrome but sound doesn't cut off when
> returning to page 4.
>
> *Deborah Test: *Narration doesn't show up.
>
> *Firefox:*
> *
> *
> *Johnathan Test:  *Narration shows up but no auto load on P4.
>
> *Deborah Test*:  Narration shows up, doesn't auto load and is speeded up
> and squeaky.
> *
> *
> To summarise the issues I found:
>
> -  No narration script in getPageID on my gap fill exercise, but narration
> script on getPageID of other interactive page scripts.
>
> -   Unable to get narration to auto load on pages other than gap fill, even
> after adding narPlayback="pageLoad" to XML file
>
> - Unable to get added option of Narration Playback>On Page Load in Wizard.
>
> Narration issues in various browsers, both with JK and Deborah's tests.
>
> Phew!  I do hope this is all clear...........?  Thanks very much in advance
> for your patience.
>
> Deborah
>
>
>
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