Just got back from a 5-day holiday off work! And I had a good time thanks (if you were asking?!).

Ahh yet another factor that I’ve encountered about the world of work.

Coming back to work after just getting used to it, even if it’s just a week off, you sure do wonder what the heck is going on!?

It’s a nightmare to try and get back on track and even more, to try and read through the hundreds of emails that flooded through my time off. Ok maybe not hundreds this time, as there were only really two internal projects going on but it was between 80 and 100 at least.

I had found that SMSGR had come to a standstill for now, until the Microsoft team release a stable version. As for the rest of the week I worked on demos previously created by some other members of the team, for Longhorn, editing and synchronising.

I had a chance to work with Sony Soundforge too, normalizing and editing audio files ready for production. This process was required due to audio output requirements set by Microsoft when publishing media which in turn help to maximise download rate (i.e. reduced wave input/quality results in reduced file size). The audio still sounded ok.

However the original professional productions could have done the same job in my opinion and the file size would only be raised by a 100k or so. However rules were rules. On top of normalizing, the audio had to be cut up, for which was a simple procedure. Listening to the audio and selecting the portion of the wave to copy/paste into a new sound file.

Some other features learnt this week included going through the process of what copy edit hand-offs and MCT review hand off emails were, and connecting with Laselle Ramsey FTP site for uploading work we’ve done at Content Master. Laselle Ramsey is a company that deals specifically with copy-editing content. They check for all grammar and spelling mistakes and send back the content for correction after a couple of days.

An MCT is a Microsoft Certified Technician. This is a quick overview performed by Microsoft personnel who would be familiar with the technology/terminology for this particular project. This check was required to ensure Content Master was on track in terms of producing valid content which covers the teaching aspects of the course provided.

Most of the week was spent on delivering the daily work performed on Longhorn, whilst producing hand offs for the various copy edits followed by incorporating changes of Longhorn. Also working on doing Quality Assurance passes (QA) on edited courses. This meant loading the content within a HTML wrapper. This wrapper is located by using software called Learning Content Development System (LCDS). I only viewed the final course in this, by clicking one icon, however the development of a course in this software was yet to be taught.

Further work included, introducing changes in LCDS Courses, transcripts and importing media images into courses. Sound editing within animations. Further hand off emails have also been done given successful QA passes and returned to copy edit for a final check.

It has been quite a dry week, but otherwise I given permission to work on personal development skills by following certain Flash tutorials on Web sites, including Kirupa.com.

Just a quick update really. Again it’s one of those weeks where nothing new has really come in.
Work is still plodding along especially on Longhorn Courses.

Continued editing on clin5135ae_02_01_03_dem01 and 02_01_05_dem01. Re-recording was required. Moved on to new course SMSGR, sent back to us. Working on XML files correlating with HTML files and reviewing course documentation – set a target to manipulate modules 1 and 3 to HTML.

Compared the different modules associated with SMSGR.

Later during that week, continued some editing on troubleshooting one of the modules and again switching to more animation Flash production for Longhorn – more in particular synchronisation of the audio.

Audio synching usually happens at the very end of most courses. This is because audio needs to be sent to an external voice master expert company and the best time is to do that is usually at the end, as that’s when the step-list narration will be fully complete and matching the actual step-list procedures. Therefore, creating the animation ready for audio, will allow for the final stage of synchronising audio, which everyone loves pick up.

There’s not really much else to report on.

Oh wait there is:

ONE WEEK HOLIDAY NEXT WEEK!

This week a new project was brought upon me to work on called, The Sales and Marketing Services Group Readiness (SMSGR). This was apparently a new branch from Microsoft. Its basis is simply to promote marketing material not just from Microsoft, but from various external courses that come into Microsoft in Word document form.

The construction/framework for this particular project has been premade. The job that was laid upon us was simply to take a bunch of documents and convert them to an html compliant standard, formatting and recognising any tags that SMSGR framework could understand and piece together. Again this was in the form of templates and a specific routine had to be followed in order for it to link in correctly.

As a result, I was assigned the task to find out how these html pages fit together and how to create the different style templates that signify specific sections to do with these documents.

This job was relatively tedious as there were no instructions on what files linked with what. Also there were at least 30 different files provided, for which no instructions were given as to how they work together.

I found the start of this project quite bizarre, as I had no idea where to start with it. But I attempted to take apart the example course that came with the content. Soon enough some aspects made sense. Others didn’t. However, I noted these down and to my understanding, the coding that was involved was incorrect.

Consequently, the project was sent back to Microsoft. Confirmation was given that the relationship between the links of some HTML content was not correlating correctly.

November already and time is flying through these projects. I have not updated in a while, due to the fact that the majority of work going on at the moment has been primarily working with storyboards, animations, demonstrations and simulations – all of which has been covered in previous entries.

VistaDell has been a monster of a course, however it’s finally complete (as of end October).
As per usual though, it has come back. The team is not worried at all though. Just a few tweaks here and there.

On the other hand some of the work that’s been going on since include:

Continuation of crse6427ae_02_02_01 simulation (a Longhorn Course). Number of issues regarding XML formatting. I was asked to look into this due to being – and I quote – “The Expert Simulation Processor.” Haha! – I was so familiar with sims that I knew a mistake when I saw it!

Continued with VistaDell crse6154ae_01_05_01 and modifying 02_02_02 from a colleague. Rewriting of storyboards was required. VistaDell crse6155ae_01_02_01, 01_06_02 storyboards needed reviewing by ID.

Some self study was performed nearer the end of October, looking into Silverlight features and Microsoft Expression Suite.

A new project started in mid-October needed some reviewing (namely Visual Studio Tools for Office (VSTO) – MSL). Therefore a bunch of animations, demos and sims came in for work. Crse3398ae demos (VSTO) were worked on as well as crse3397ae (VSTO again) – but this time simulations.

Otherwise, throughout the start of this week in November I helped with the completion of the Longhorn Courses. Crse6427ae included a new bunch of Longhorn storyboards.

I was moving away from creating animations and demos and actually did the easier job of synchronising audio to each. Simulations do not have audio.

I finally got shown how to create simulations in Flash. Phoar a lengthy process it is!

The one word that sticks to mind from this week – Keyframes!

Every screenshot exported using Adobe Illustrator (Photoshop didn’t have batch export to PNG, but Illustrator did) needed to be imported into Flash. Once imported, each image required an individual keyframe on the timeline. Each new screenshot (which was all edited/cut up in Photoshop to just show a change) – then sat on a new layer, positioned on top of a bulk image in a new keyframe. Then finally, some Actionscript is adjusted to say what point simulation is at in relation to the step-list. This process was repeated throughout the whole sim!

This was a long and fairly complicated process to get through. Given that a template for creating simulations was already created made the job 200% easier! But I couldn’t imagine how we’d have to create each simulation if we didn’t have any templates to work from.

However, as much as nobody enjoyed doing simulations, I actually loved doing them! Merely because I enjoyed taking the template apart (which was originally created by MSL) and understanding what was where, why it was there and how it linked in with localisation at Microsoft’s end.

It was an amazing opportunity (though not really necessary) to explore the complexity in dynamic integration of multimedia – something I enjoy delving into.

Nevertheless, I got working on simulations this week, which felt like it even though it felt like an eternity to complete just one! But over this week in October, I surprisingly picked up this procedure very quickly and snapped up some of tips and tricks to make it easier. I developed my first simulation within three to four days.

On top of it however, there was another file that needed to be developed and synchronised dynamically with Actionscript (an XML file outlining the narration text tips to go with each change of a screen shot when appropriate).

I have a feeling definitely I am going to enjoy these next few weeks!

The team had got rid of Groove (for which there were celebrations too!) however several other projects popped up for which the workload was heavy.

At this point, I started to take more of an interest in simulations. Simulations required a whole new parsing process, and without doubt was the longest of all elements to develop. The main difference between a demo and simulation was simply the fact that the user was given the opportunity to click through the demo and learn for themselves, where specific features are.

Again, we used VM Ware Virtual PC, yet this time we used an alternative feature which Adobe Captivate’s supports – taking individual screenshots of every step made. This meant for every click made with the mouse, Captivate would send a screenshot into memory and store it. However not every click would respond. Therefore, pressing F10 to manually take a screenshots was necessary.

For a simulation, we had to go through the whole step-list, making sure that every screenshot we took had the plain state of the screen showing and for any buttons clicking actions (e.g. close a window, hit an OK button etc.), we had to take additional screenshots to show the mouse over the button (as the design of the button changes) as well as a press state (as the button pushes in, when pressed).

This also applied to any other selection tools, such as combo boxes, radio buttons or tick boxes. Again, a very tedious task, given that if you missed out, it may be difficult to fill in the detail later, as a tick box, a radio button, or any method of input all have unique positions in the software you are recording and all different sizes.

Therefore, careful thought and concentration was required to ensure the screenshots were taken at the right time. It was important to ensure that several screenshots of the same state were taken numerous times (using the manual method), as Captivate was rather buggy in recognising that a screenshot was actually taken when clicking a mouse, and post-recording, one would come to realise that it didn’t record it. Again, going back to find that missing state would be a difficult task.

After capturing all the screen states, all the images were exported as .PNGs (to retain transparency). The PNGs are imported into Adobe Photoshop, where all the images become layered on top of each other. It was quite fun to see the transition from image to image as you show and hide layers. You could actually see the simulation “in action” by doing this, however, full functionality was to be added later in Adobe Flash.
At this point, I had to take out any duplicate images as a result of the F10 key being pressed multiple times.
At the same time, for each image on each layered in Photoshop, we had to cut out/delete any areas of the screenshot that didn’t change, and leave the parts that did.

This was a clever idea, as later when the simulation is built as a whole, a full screenshot will not be loaded each time – instead a simple extract from the cut up PNG would appear, demonstrating that change from the previous image. All the cut up images will sit on top of the one “bulk image” (bulk refers to a full on screenshot).

All simulations (and demonstrations) were recorded at a resolution of 800×600, regardless of the content. It was to retain consistency and platform compatibility. Therefore all PNGs were exported at the same resolution to retain position on the screen.

A process like this took a very long time – if you were lucky, up to a day. This process was completely new to me. I ended up taking a week just to record one simulation. The following week I had to edit the simulation and then I would be told how to re-construct the simulation in Flash.

As a note, I’ve noticed a pattern in a lot of media development. That is, there’s a recording phase, editing phase, synchronisation phase and finally a published phase. This seems to be a useful theme to follow when producing media content.

Groove was coming to an end, so priority was to finish this. Therefore, for now, most production on VistaDell came to a halt, as the team were in need for finalising the release of Groove. This included building some extra animations in Flash. Also some demo corrections in Adobe Captivate came back after reviewing.

At the same time I had a chat with the eLearning manager about how I was doing and coping, about goals and aspects of my course in relation to what I can do here at CM that may help with my course next year.

I was introduced to simulations (sims) once again, but still didn’t really have much hands-on time with it.

This week was just chuck full of finalisation and checking of animations and demos for Groove. There were no simulations associated with this course, however I was asked by the eLearning manager to get to know sims, as there were plenty in VistaDell.

Started a bit of work on simulations this week, using Photoshop PSD’s to extract the correct images and publish the PNG’s – but I required more assistance which I told my manager.

Only one other person in the team really knew how to teach sims and help on that was only available the following week, as Groove was priority.

Why does the word demonstrating have “Demon” in it? Lol, anyway, that’s beside the point.

By mid September I was in the Groove (get it? Project Groove? Sorry had to say that…), with producing storyboards, animations and demonstrations.

However, I had yet the next major step to learn, given that a new project had arisen – VistaDell.

This project was a promotional project based on Dell machines that came with Windows Vista. The deal was to show the how to use a newly purchased Dell machine, on top of Microsoft products (Vista in particular) pre-installed onto the machine.

As a result, about a total of 60 animations, demos and the new media element to me – simulations – was ready to be developed for the next few weeks.

Therefore, every media element had to be storyboarded or step-listed before creating its content. What made this project interesting however, was the fact that the team were allowed to create our own graphics, even though this was a Microsoft project. I think this was partly Dell insisting they wanted slicker graphics!

Therefore it was slightly exciting as we could all delve into the scene of graphic design and come up with various iconic representations of technical jargon.

VistaDell was set to scene as a huge project and its timescale for completion was by far, unreasonable. However, the team have set to sort out who will do what and as a result – have formulated begin to formulate a whole new graphics object library for approval. The VistaDell library will not only provide new graphics for this particular project, but other projects in the future too. Graphics can always be adapted and created into many representations.

One huge factor I’ve learnt about graphics is placing more than one graphic element on top of another. After creating many individual graphics to represent, say, a hard drive or memory or the verb to increase, further representations of technical detail can be made simply by merging two or more of these graphics elements together (layer them on top/beneath).

For example, “an increase in hard-drive capacity increases memory usage,” will utilise all three graphics and can all be merged into one at specific intervals, to describe that particular action.

It’s a very useful technique and can ease the frustration of trying to find a graphic to represent specific terminology sometimes!

I’ve recently completed several Groove animations for course 6454. There is more than one course for Groove project. Microsoft wish the learning process for their students to be split up in appropriate course structures.

Crse6452ae_01_03_04_dem01 has been completed and ready for audio.

Again, an understanding of the file naming conventions is essential. Anyone in the team could say a particular animation or demo required completion, so it was important to understand the correct way to say. In this case, following the same routines as explained in a previous diary entry, this is to say that the first demo for course collection number 6452, of module 1, lesson 3, topic 4 has been completed and ready for synchronisation.

Synchronisation was the next step after completing the visual design of a demo. This means audio for the narration of that particular demo (in the form of .wav), had to be incorporated next.

Audio requests come from the external sources and are usually requested in bulk (cheaper to source). Requests are usually to an American company called Audiolink. Sometimes voices are produced by AmazingVoices too. However, whoever the supplier, the main theme in Microsoft MSL courses must be American accent.

Unfortunately, as much as American’s love British accents, I don’t think they wanted American Microsoft products branded alongside British voices. Booo!

On the other hand, I’ve heard in extreme acts of desperation, there have been times when it’s been allowed!  Who knows, it might even be my voice!

Therefore, the process for which I completed the demos involved moving an image mouse cursor to areas of action being performed on the VPC, taking out any superfluous screen grabs and making sure all the steps were in the correct order. The next step would be to import audio into Captivate, and synchronise with the order in which the demo had been created.

However, the audio needed to be processed too (normalised) and cut up to the number of steps in the step-list to allow for flexibility when synchronising. I have yet to do that, but I’ve seen other members of the team do it pretty quickly.

Demos are always being developed left, right and centre, given that the whole team designate time on the projects. So whoever was free simply put their name down on the never-ending list of demos. After getting used to creating demos, I learnt how to publish them without audio, which included a play-bar with play, pause, rewind and forward buttons. This way I could check whether the correct timings had been made between each screenshot.

However the following week I was told I’d be looking at synchronising audio to the demos.

By the start of September, I already had around 6 weeks of training and I was so used to creating storyboards that I could probably do them with my eyes closed! I still needed to be guided from time to time, to help maintain a flow of consistency amongst the team, however this was minor compared to what was ahead of me next!

The first two weeks in September was a steady flow of work.

A large proportion of our workload was based on Microsoft Learning (MSL) projects and similar based work that was heavily focused around eLearning. It was quite a common to have numerous animations as part of the eLearning development cycle.

Nevertheless, I was now moving on to what was little more tricky and tedious – demonstrations. I tried one out today and it’s extremely difficult. I’m sure I’m just saying that now, so I have a feeling in a few weeks time I’ll find it a breeze. However, having installed Adobe Captivate a couple of weeks ago, I was asked to familiarise myself with examples of pre-made demos to see if I could work out how to develop them.

Demonstrations were recordings of the screen, either on your own PC or using VM Ware Virtual PC. Initially I started recording on my own PC, for which I kind of was laughed at (doh) – due to the amount of icons splattered across my screen which meant any recording I did, it would record personal links too. That became obvious when viewing the result. I originally thought it made a lot more sense to work from a fresh build of a PC but questioned myself about:

Where would I get a fresh PC from?

That’s where a Virtual PC (VPC) was introduced. It imitates a completely new operating system on your own PC, as if it were installed on to the hard-drive except it’s in one huge virtual environment.

In other-words I was running a virtual operating system on a physical machine which already had an operating system installed on it (i.e. running Windows Vista virtually on a Windows XP machine!) It was a strange concept to overcome and I was surprised about the compatibility.

I realised how useful this was. To have a completely new operating system from scratch without any bogus software installed – apart from the ones that I needed to use as part of the recording (e.g. Microsoft Word 2007 or Microsoft Visual Studio 2008).

Therefore, using Adobe Captivate I learnt how to directly capture screen grabs from the VPC and full motion recording of the VPC. I learnt the importance of performing rollover states, mouse movements, keyboard entries and many other features that I needed to constantly look out for when recording.

I was asked to get training on creating demos due to increase of demos piling up on courses. The team required an extra pair of hands and mine seem to be getting to grips with demos just fine (slowly… but fine!).

I’ve been told the worst part about a demo is when you finish one and you go back to check it out, only to find out it’s either corrupt or you made a mistake somewhere. Depending on the mistake, it’s possible to back to the exact state the screen was in, start one step previous to that mistake and then continuing from there. But that’s if you were lucky with all the changes made when clicking within a VPC. Otherwise the only other alternative was to start again! Therefore, it was important to concentrate and mark clearly on the step-lists provided the completion of each step. Step-lists are developed by technologists (another department internally within Torthworth).

Technologists were the ones who were providing us with the instructions to perform the demos. They are the initial people who sort out the terminology and work out what should happen when, within a demo.

The name of the course I worked on now was 6452 – Groove. I was switching back and forth this week with animations and demos – something again I found quite tedious given that you had to change your thought process about each!

Groove had various modules on the go. And as a team, we organised ourselves appropriately to take on and attempt to finish the media within strict deadlines.

I was still getting used to the virtual set up of the internal network.

However, by this time I also had my email account set up, which was necessary since I was getting involved in projects that required my input.

Emailing was a whole new scene for me, especially the methods which Content Master abides to. The Powerpoint deck project (Katmai) was becoming pretty tedious as the client kept coming back saying it was not what they expected.

However, from the eLearning department’s opinion, the work which myself and my colleague (who I might add, is known to be the graphics expert of the team and has been with the company for about 7 months) – felt it was of high standard.

In the end, the client agreed noticing a few of the animated features he missed out.

I got onto producing some animations using Flash CS2. I learnt how to use the vector graphics library and as per usual, use a uniform and structured layout when designing the animation in Flash. It was important to maintain consistency during development, in case I had to be pulled off the work I was working on for some reason. Therefore someone else could pick up from where I last left off knowing the methods used were familiar. This would also apply to me and for anyone else that would be in that same situation.

I used and learnt the features within Flash to develop a slick and meaningful animated story, for which gave a more insightful user-experience in learning about Windows XP OS. I had yet to add audio to my animation, but this would not be done until the following week as I was still in the developing stages for understanding the construction of animations.

However, I was pleased with my result and getting to see it sit in the framework for the final product – I felt like I had achieved a world targeted goal (as this was going to Microsoft to be published on their eLearning Web site).

The majority of this week was spent familiarising myself about the transition of storyboards to animations and the different techniques that support this.

I learnt about the naming convention too, specifically for animations.

crse6154ae_01_05_01_ani01 means:

crse = Course
6154 = Course number
ae = Part of a collection
_01 = Resides in Module 1
_05 = Part of Topic 2
_01 = Taught in Lesson 1
_ani01 = This is the first animation in that lesson

I was asked to install Adobe Captivate trial (for now) ready to use next week.