Adobe Captivate Widget: Dynamic PDF Export

Create certificates, transcripts, guides and job aids with the Learner’s custom information.  Add a company logo, watermark, or a high-resolution certificate image to make your custom certificates.  Dynamically export Quiz, System, and User variables tailoring the content to your exact needs.  When the button is pressed, the Learner is prompted to save the PDF to their computer.  This widget was made with the awesome CpGears Framework and the AlivePDFlibrary.

Screencast Demonstrating How to Create a Transcript

Screencast on How To Create Certificates

How Does It Work?

You, the Captivate Developer, design the layout of the PDF in the Editor.  Add formatted text and insert Quiz, System, or User variables that will be output at runtime.  Quickly and easily insert your variables using the “Insert Captivate Variable” dropdown provided.  Add quiz results with all the associated variables just by clicking the “Insert Quiz Results” button.  To add hyperlinks, just type out the URL and they will be active links inside the PDF.  You have full control to tailor the PDF for the Learner.

Configure Document properties such as the PDF’s size, orientation, margins, pagination and font.  Add an image as a logo, watermark, or a high-resolution certificate image to create your own certificates using the “Certificate Mode” option.  Customize the PDF file name that gets saved at runtime.  Use the provided PDF button icon or craft your own button utilizing the transparent button feature. At runtime, the Learner clicks the PDF button and is prompted to save the PDF to their computer.  If they need to print, they can open the file and print the document.

Requirements

1. Adobe Captivate 5.x
2. Publish for Flash Player 10 or above
3. Watch the Screencast above

Limitations

1. Supports only one image, but that image can be added to every page such as a header logo or a watermark.  PNG, GIF and JPG files are supported.  Image transparency is not supported, however, the image is inserted as a background so all text will by overlaid on top of the image.
2. Supports one Font for the whole document and there are 3 types to choose from: Helvetica/Arial, Courier, and Times Roman.
3. Made to work with .swf/.htm web projects.  It will work inside of a windows .exe file but adding an image file is not supported.  Have not tested with MAC .app projectors.
4. URL hyperlinks that wrap lines will not function.  If you have a URL that long, use a URL shortening service to get your hyperlink to fit on one line.

Try Before You Buy

The trial can only be run using an F4 Preview, or an F12 Web Preview, or from your local web server http://localhost or http://127.0.0.1.   It will also display the CaptivateDev.com logo and a red “Trial Version” in your project.  Otherwise, it is a fully functioning trial.

For Adobe Connect Users:

There are some extra steps to make it work for Adobe Connect.  Behind the scenes, Adobe Connect puts your Cp content in a folder called “default” which requires the below changes.  Connect also requires that you update the breeze-mainifest.xml file with the certificate image asset:

1.  Publish your Cp project to a folder (no zip).

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8" ?>
<breeze-manifest version="1.0" xmlns="http://breeze.macromedia.com/ns/breeze-manifest" generator="Adobe Captivate 5">
	<document type="captivate" icon="captivate" section-count="1"/>
	<assets>
		<asset type="document-view">

			<entry href="DynamicPDFExportDemo_Cp5.swf" width="641" height="512" />
			<file href="DynamicPDFExportDemo_Cp5.swf"/>
			<file href="Certificate.jpg"/>
		</asset>

		<asset type="document-metadata" location="file"><file href="DynamicPDFExportDemo_Cp5_BDMetadata.xml"/></asset>

	</assets>
</breeze-manifest>

FAQ

Q:  I inserted a variable but only 15 characters are showing up in the PDF.  Why?

A:  Captivate’s default character limit for variables is 15.  To make this higher, insert a text caption with a variable as the text.  Make sure to set the “Maximum Length” to something reasonable.  You can delete the text caption.  This “exercise” internally configures Captivate to expand the character limit.  After this, the variable will fully output inside the PDF.

Q:  When I output my PDF, all the text is bunched up and squished.  How do I fix this?

A:  Increase the “Document Line Height” property on the “Document Properties” tab.

Q:  The line breaks on my PDF are HUGE!  There is too much space between lines.  How can I shorten them?

A:  Decrease the “Document Line Height” property on the “Document Properties” tab.

Q:  I inserted a logo at the top of the page, but the text is on top of my logo.  How do I move the text down?

A:  Use the “Text Y-Offset from Top of Page” property on the “Document Properties” tab.  If you’ve added the logo to every page, this setting will work for all pages.

Q:  I want to insert a line break “</br>” in my PDF instead of using the <P> paragraph tags.  When I edit the HTML markup and insert </br> tags, it converts then to paragraph marks.  How can I insert a true line break?

A:  Great question and there are two camps of thought here.  The widget converts the HTML markup you put into the editor and translates that into PDF markup at runtime.  One line of thought is to simply use <P> paragraph tags and then decrease the “Document Line Height” property in the Widget’s “Document Properties” tab so that they look like true line breaks.  This works well if you don’t have text with a variety of disparaging font sizes. The other line of thought is to use SHIFT + ENTER to insert a true </br> tag.  So your text will look like this in the Editor:  line one</br>line two</br>line three.  When the PDF is generated, it will look like this: line one line two line three

Q:  Does the widget support image transparency for PNG and GIF files?

A:  No, however, the image is inserted as a background so all text will by overlaid on top of the image.

Q:  I want to copy and paste my editor text into a new instance of a widget.  How do I do that?

A:  From the editor, click the “<HTML>” button to view the HTML code.  Copy the HTML code.  Then view the HTML code in your new instance and paste.

Q:  I added a certificate .jpg image but when I open the final PDF, I get an error and the PDF is blank.

A:  Try a different color space.  If you don’t know your JPGs color space, it’s probably either RGB or CMYK.  Give those two a try and that should correct the issue.

Note: Paypal accepts all major credit cards. For smooth transactions, please use your PayPal primary email address if paying through your Paypal account. All licensing is per Captivate Developer. If you have 3 Captivate Developers in your company, then you'll need 3 licenses.