Caption formatting problems when inserting variables

[ElaKat]

Hi,

I've come across a bug similar to what is talked about in this thread: http://forums.adobe.com/message/3893978

When I insert a variable into a caption (with font: Tahoma, size: 12, style: bold), it changes the formatting. The text is larger, in a different location, and is a different font.

Does anyone know if there have been developments since that thread? I'm trying to match the font style of a website, so unfortunately the solution suggested there (putting an empty variable in every caption so they are consistent) will not work for me.

Thanks!

___

More info on exactly what I'm doing:

The project is a simulation that involves the user logging on to a website. I have a text entry box with a variable associated with it (username). On subsequent slides, there is a header on the webpage that says:

Logged on as: student1

I want to replace the username that was recorded (student1) by simply editing the background in photoshop to erase it and adding a text caption that has the username variable. At the moment though, the formatting is so off that the variable looks strange; I can't match it to the original text on the website.

[Lilybiri]

Try using the faux style Bold (click the bold letter T) instead of choosing the real Bold from the dropdown menu,

Lilybiri

[ElaKat]

Lilybiri,

I've tried both ways of bolding the text, and the results look the same when I compare them.

On a whim I made the text Arial instead of Tahoma, and it seems to be closer to what I need. The variable still changes the formatting compared to a caption sans variable, but it's not as noticeably different and I can work with it.

I'm guessing I should submit a bug? Assuming this is still an issue for other people (I'm using Captivate 5 not 5.5), another report won't hurt.

[Lilybiri · Accepted solution]

It was worse in CP5 than in CP5.5 and it depends on the font you use. But it is 'by design', the text is rendered in a different way when variables are inserted. This is very annoying, you could enter a report, do not know if it will help however. Have been complaining a lot about it, also about the fact that one cannot use the real styles (sometimes they are changed to a totally different font, even from sans serif to serif).

Lilybiri

[ElaKat]

How strange, fonts changing from sans serif to serif!

If there's a technical reason for variables rendering differently I can see why it isn't something that has been fixed yet; it makes me curious what makes it like that, but I doubt I know enough to understand an explanation.

I will submit a report when I have time, but I won't hold out a lot of hope for it changing since that's the case. It's frustrating, but I suppose working around it is the best we can do.

(On an unrelated note: I've been reading your blogs on things like advanced actions for some time now, Lilybiri, and they're awesome! They were just what I needed to see how advanced actions could be used to make much more interesting interactions and questions. ^_^)

[Lilybiri]

Thanks for that nice comment, happy that my blog could help. I started it out of frustration with the lack of documentation about advanced actions (and some other things as well).

Lilybiri

[RodWard]

Captivate content is really Flash content. There are three types of text in Flash: Static, Dynamic, and Input text.

http://www.smartwebby.com/Flash/text_basics.asp

Text in ordinary captions is Static text.

The text that can change at runtime because of using variable values in text captions is Dynamic text. 

Even in Flash there are slight visible differences between these types of text.  I agree that Captivate could handle this area better and hopefully in future versions the differences will be far less discernible.

[ct_itstraining]

Hi,

I have a similar problem - I want to rotate a text caption with a variable inside via transformation.

It looks fine in Captivate, but in preview the text caption is shown without rotation. I also tried working with effects and advanced action, but same result.

It seems to be no problem with font style (Arial), as I tried rotation also with an inital text caption and it doesn?t work. So I assume, its a problem with dynamic text.

Adobe said the following about rotation:

"You can rotate all objects in Adobe Captivate, except the following:

• Slidelet
• Mouse
• Answers for question slide objects
• Zoom destination and Zoom source"

So in my opinion it shoud work? Does anybody have experience with this problem as well? I appreciate any help.

Thanks,

ct_itstraining

[RodWard]

You are correct.  Rotating dynamic text is a known Flash issue.

Google this: Adobe Flash rotate dynamic text

The only way to pull it off is to embed the font.  And you don't have control over that in Captivate.

http://forums.adobe.com/message/3019213

[ElaKat]

RodWard wrote:

Captivate content is really Flash content. There are three types of text in Flash: Static, Dynamic, and Input text.

http://www.smartwebby.com/Flash/text_basics.asp

Text in ordinary captions is Static text.

The text that can change at runtime because of using variable values in text captions is Dynamic text. 

Even in Flash there are slight visible differences between these types of text.  I agree that Captivate could handle this area better and hopefully in future versions the differences will be far less discernible.

Thanks, Rod! That makes sense; I'd figured it was something like that (guess the simple explanation isn't quite beyond my understanding~). Hopefully it does work a bit better in future versions!