[Xerte-dev] Re: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT

Mon Oct 29 14:22:40 GMT 2012

The toolkits wizard? Yes it is, but that's not really a problem. IUt would be good to have a crack at migrating it to HTML, but it's not a priority just now,

-----Original Message-----
From: xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk [mailto:xerte-dev-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Pat Lockley
Sent: 29 October 2012 14:21
To: For Xerte technical developers
Subject: [Xerte-dev] Re: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT

The editor is still flash though?

On Mon, Oct 29, 2012 at 2:18 PM, Julian Tenney <Julian.Tenney at nottingham.ac.uk> wrote:
> [moved from the xerte list]
>
> So here is the problem for us. We (Nottingham) don't have any interest
> in supporting, or developing standalone Xerte anymore. From our point
> of view, very few people use it, and it's flash, and is dead or dying.
>
>
>
> I cannot justify putting our time and effort myself into supporting
> the old stuff, and I think that if we try and keep the two things
> running we are just going to make a big mess. At the very least, it
> makes problems much more complicated. At some point, we need to let
> the standalone Xerte die, and I'm at that point. The future for me is
> with toolkits, we saw that at the event a couple of weeks ago when you
> asked 'how many people use standalone xerte?'. It was hardly any, and
> they are almost all using templates anyway, and could do that on an xampp install of toolkits.
>
>
>
> Debate it or not, Nottingham's position is not to put any time into
> the standalone / flash stuff anymore.
>
>
>
> From: xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> [mailto:xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Kemp
> Johnathan
> Sent: 29 October 2012 12:01
> To: Xerte discussion list
> Subject: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT
>
>
>
> The source of the list of pages in a project is different for Xerte
> projects and for XOT or Page Templates projects.
>
> XOT contains the data for all the pages in the project in a single
> .xml file so the connector pages access the page ID by
>
> extXML.firstChild.childNodes[i].attributes.pageID
>
> In desktop Xerte pages projects each page has its own separate xml file.
> Xerte builds an array rootIcon.pages from which the page data can be
> accessed e.g.
>
> rootIcon.pages[i].extXML.firstChild.childNodes[0].attributes.pageID
>
> The building of the array takes place at run time and has not
> completed by the time the rootIcon.onInit event is broadcast. So the
> data is not available to the xwd file to be able to offer a list of pages.
>
>
>
> However in desktop Xerte Julian modified the engine so that on
> changing the page title i.e. name attribute in the page's xwd form
> this value was transferred to the associated page icon's name
> attribute written  in the .rlo file. So in desktop Xerte the source of
> the page names would have to be the rlo file.
>
>
>
> Is it doable that the engine could be coded so that one solution can
> work in the xwd forms for the pages and for the page models,
> irrespective of them residing in Xerte or XOT?
>
>
>
> Kind regards
>
>
>
> Johnathan
>
>
>
>
>
> Kind regards
>
>
>
> Johnathan
>
>
>
> On 29 October 2012 11:33, Julian Tenney
> <Julian.Tenney at nottingham.ac.uk>
> wrote:
>
> I can code it, the engine needs to do it, based on that type in .xwd
>
>
>
> <attName type="pageList" label="targetPage" ...etc...>
>
>
>
> Then the wizard needs to build the list based on the data on the tree,
> and show the user page titles to choose from. When one is selected it
> needs to generate an ID if one doesn't exist on the target page, and
> then link to that. I think that would work? I think also the user
> could screw it up by changing the ID later and breaking the link: the
> generated ID would be
> targ12398637562 or something like that, it would be better to prompt
> the user to create a friendly one if one didn't exist.
>
>
>
>
>
> From: xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> [mailto:xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Pat Lockley
> Sent: 29 October 2012 10:52
>
>
> To: Xerte discussion list
> Subject: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT
>
>
>
> Strikes me it better to offer a choice of valid options than to try to
> validate later on?
>
>
>
> No idea how to code it though
>
>
>
> Of course you could go crazy and connect to pages in other projects....
>
> On 29 Oct 2012, at 10:43, Julian Tenney
> <Julian.Tenney at nottingham.ac.uk>
> wrote:
>
> Good idea. That would require some work in the engine, and a type in
> the xwd file of 'pageList'. For attributes labelled as such, the
> engine would then present the drop down, and could generate IDs
> automagically if they didn't exist...
>
>
>
> From: xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> [mailto:xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Pat Lockley
> Sent: 29 October 2012 10:34
> To: Xerte discussion list
> Subject: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT
>
>
>
> Why not provide a drop down list of pages?
>
> On 29 Oct 2012, at 10:30, Kemp Johnathan <johnathan.kemp at ntlworld.com>
> wrote:
>
> One problem may be that people are failing to locate the documentation
> that supports the Connector pages. Which does not surprise me as at
> the moment the only place I know they are accessible from is either
> the help folder of a desktop Xerte install, or from the SVN.
>
>
>
> It should be possible to check for page ID and then for page "title".
>
> When you say "page title" are you referring to the xml attribute "name" ?
>
> In desktop Xerte there is both a "name" and a "title" attribute but in
> XOT the label "Page Title" is used to refer to the attribute "name".
> So for Xerte use which would you want it to be?
>
>
>
> I am concerned that this approach may instead complicate things. By
> using only Page IDs for connections projects retain a consistency of
> approach and the connections are safe from side effects resulting from
> the renaming
> (retitling) of a page. Page IDs are free from having to do duty as a
> page title and so can reflect the logical structure of the connections.
>
>
>
> Perhaps an alternative solution is to include an info statement to
> remind people to set a page ID for their destination page.
>
>
>
> Kind regards
>
>
>
> Johnathan
>
>
>
> On 29 October 2012 09:35, Julian Tenney
> <Julian.Tenney at nottingham.ac.uk>
> wrote:
>
> People are missing the need to create a page ID? Is that the root
> cause of the problem here?
>
>
>
> I've wondered if the navigation stuff should use either the page title
> or the page ID? I've had feedback from people that the ID makes things
> too complicated / is easy to miss etc. If the code looked first for an
> ID, and if found, navigated to that, but if not found, it then checked
> the page titles, and if found, navigated to that, it would catch both situations?
>
>
>
> We have got to keep the 'keep it simple' mantra in mind here. Andy is
> an experienced user, and this should be a simple task. This tells me
> something could be improved.
>
>
>
> From: xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> [mailto:xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Kemp
> Johnathan
> Sent: 27 October 2012 10:38
>
>
> To: Xerte discussion list
> Subject: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT
>
>
>
> In principle it is possible to add this functionality to any page that
> has a text block.
>
>
>
> However this raises the question of when is a connector page not a
> connector page. For you could end up potentially with a list of
> connector pages that duplicated most of the existing pages. I would be
> personally inclined to treat the ability to link from text as in the
> Plain Text Connector Page as something that is not really a "Connector
> Page" if we ever went down the route of making this facility available
> to all text blocks. Almost all the other Connector pages offer
> facilities to control the navigation options of the destination page,
> a feature not offered when making a text based connection.
>
>
>
> I think the concept of connector pages is still in its infancy. There
> is a bit of tidying up that I am working with Julian on, to improve
> the options regarding navigation and setting navigation for
> destination pages. Then I think it will be worth waiting a while and
> seeing what the take up of the Connector pages is and getting a feel for how people use them.
>
>
>
> There is also the major issue of HTML5. Until I am clearer about the
> implications of converting existing Connector pages to HTML5 I am
> rather loathe to expand the range of Connector pages available.
>
>
>
> Kind regards
>
>
>
> Johnathan
>
>
>
> On 26 October 2012 16:32, Davidson, Andrew
> <Andrew.Davidson at warwick.ac.uk>
> wrote:
>
> Thanks Johnathan - very helpful. Yes, it was a very simple solution -
> Dave showed me that I wasn't inserting a page id where it was needed.
> Makes sense now but in the instruction I only could see about copying
> and pasting text with the page id - anyway, it's a great addition for
> Xerte Online Toolkits and I wonder if it will be possible to add this
> function to other page types in XOT such as a page with graphics and text or a page with video and text.
>
>
>
> Best
>
>
>
> Andy
>
>
>
> From: xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> [mailto:xerte-bounces at lists.nottingham.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Kemp
> Johnathan
> Sent: 26 October 2012 16:27
> To: Xerte discussion list
>
>
> Subject: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT
>
>
>
> You have two ways to use the Page Models in Xerte 2.18 desktop. I hope
> that soon we will be able to improve the File / New menu so that all
> the options for creating a the different project types are listed
> there. However currently...
>
>
>
> If you want a page templates type project i.e. a toolkits style
> project then do
>
>   Pages / Create Template Project from Pages.
>
>
>
> Add pages in the same way as normal for Page Templates or XOT projects.
>
>
>
> If you want to use the new Pages type project that gives full access
> to the page models and also the editing environment then do
>
>
>
> Pages / Create New Page Project
>
>
>
> Add pages by selecting the "Interface" element in the project tree and
> then select the page type that you want to add from the range of page
> type folders that you will find off the Pages Menu.
>
>
>
> As to how to duplicate the problem that Andrew is experiencing, I am
> not sure since I am not sure what the cause of the problem is. It may
> be as simple as not having specified a page ID for the destination page.
>
>
>
> Kind regards
>
>
>
> Johnathan
>
>
>
>
>
> On 25 October 2012 17:19, Dave Burnett <d_b_burnett at hotmail.com> wrote:
>
> Johnathan, how would one go about recreating Andy's situation in 2.18
> desktop?
>
>
>
> Thnx,
>
> Dave
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2012 17:13:52 +0100
>
> From: johnathan.kemp at ntlworld.com
>
> To: xerte at lists.nottingham.ac.uk
> Subject: [Xerte] Re: plain text connector page problem in XOT
>
>
>
> The link to your project is not much help as I can't access the values
> you have entered into the form for the page.
>
>
>
> If you take a look at the learning object you should find it has an
> optional property of "Add Author Support". Add this attribute to your
> learning object and ensure the check box is ticked. Then play your
> project once more and try your hyperlink. You should see a message
> displayed "Page ID: somePageID could not be found in this project"
>
>
>
> Where "somePageID" will be the pageID you have specified in your link.
>
>
>
> Then check the destination page to ensure that you have given it an
> optional attribute of "Page ID" and that you have set the Page ID
> attribute to the value you have used in your link.
>
>
>
> That should sort it.
>
>
>
> Kind regards
>
>
>
> Johnathan
>
>
>
> On 25 October 2012 15:34, Davidson, Andrew
> <Andrew.Davidson at warwick.ac.uk>
> wrote:
>
> Hi
>
> I am trying to use the plain text connector page in XOT but for some
> reason I can't get the link to work -
> http://xerte.warwick.ac.uk/play_116
>
> it highlights as a link on page 3 but does not link back to page 2.
> Here is the code I entered as a hyperlink
>
> asfunction:_level0.engine.fnTextCon,page2
>
> any ideas?
>
> Thanks.
>
>
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