5 min read
2020/05/22
The latest update to Avallain Author is all about making the content creation process more accessible and giving our customers more tools to create the best learning environments they can: Quickly build entirely new products, comfortably navigate the Media Library to find exactly what you were looking for and allow users to login using their Google accounts. As always, we have also added some great new ways to further individualise learning objects within the authoring tool. Get ready for the most convenient and most comprehensive Avallain Author experience ever.
New major feature: Product Builder
Avallain Author is a flexible and powerful authoring tool for creating professional learning materials and publishing it instantly to learning platforms powered by Avallain Magnet or Avallain Unity. Now, it can even be used to create entirely new software products with only a few clicks. The new Product Builder feature allows our customers to create and publish products as applications (Windows, Mac, Linux or web-based) with all necessary files included.
The Product Builder is fully compatible with all content created in Avallain Author. This allows creators to quickly assign or update content from the authoring tool and organise it using the Structure Tool. Naturally, our customers can also manage different versions of their applications using the Product Builder’s intuitive user interface. Create different versions of your applications for different markets or target audiences and then decide which content updates are assigned to which version.
Note: This feature requires a separate license agreement and in some cases integration effort.
Enhanced feature: Next-generation Media Library
Avallain Author has several powerful features to implement media such as images, video or audio within learning materials. With the new and enhanced Media Library, finding the right piece of media for any Learning Object is easier than ever. Media assets are now more convenient to sort and filter, while extra-large thumbnails make sure that you know exactly what you’re going to get from each of your search results.
Adding to and maintaining the Media Library has also become more accessible than ever. The importing process has been simplified, and metadata can now be kept up-to-date thanks to the new bulk editing feature. To make things even easier, content administrators can now round-trip metadata with CSV.
New login option: Google authentication
The “sign in with Google” feature has been a popular option for various tools and websites in recent years. Avallain Author Release 28 now supports this method of authentication as well, allowing your content creators with Google authenticated email addresses to use the tool without the need to create specific user accounts (which only add to the long lists of passwords that need to be kept secure).
Tweak: Improved user administration
With Avallain Author, administrators have always had a wide range of roles and privileges to assign to specific users. This helps organise usage of the authoring tool, especially in large companies and publishing houses. One such role – the support user – is now set to “invisible” for admin users. This improves usability, as admins no longer need to contend with user accounts created solely to support content creators when using Avallain Author.
In addition, the Users Overview now notifies administrators if the allotted number of Avallain Author user accounts has been reached. Once the maximum number of accounts has been reached, Avallain Author sends out an e-mail notification.
New feature: Project-wide application of Specific Options
When creating or editing large numbers of Learning Objects within a project, bulk editing has been an extremely popular feature added to Avallain Author over the years. No wonder! It makes editing more straightforward, quicker and more efficient. With Avallain Author 28, bulk editing can now be used to apply Specific Options to any of the Learning Objects within a project. Simply add any Learning Object to the queue and hit the “Apply” button – Avallain Author does the rest.
New option for content creators: Two new hotspot types for eBooks
Interactive eBooks are a great way for students to revise. To facilitate this, Avallain Author now allows content creators to set two new types of hotspots which will be especially useful for solutions pages:
Using the single-solution hotspot type, users can click on a hotspot to reveal and hide a solution. Using the solutions-group hotspot, multiple single-solution hotspots can be revealed in order and hidden again once all have been revealed. This allows learners much greater control over which solutions they want to reveal during revision.
New syntax: Arbitrary hint characters for Text Gap activities
When using the Text Gap Activity Type, content creators can now choose to have specific letters in a text gap revealed to the learner. This is particularly useful for steering struggling learners in the right direction or simply to change the difficulty of a Text Gap Activity.
Avallain Author 28 – more convenient for content creators, more options for learners
“Avallain Author is a flexible and powerful authoring tool that fits smaller companies just as well as giant publishing houses,” says Max Bondi, Product Manager Avallain Author. “Thus, streamlining the content creation process and helping our customers with administering even extensive user bases is very important to us. Avallain Author 28 has taken a huge step in that direction. We’re very eager to hear our customers’ thoughts on the new features so we can use that feedback to make Avallain Author 29 even more accessible and efficient.”
Avallain Author Release 29 will be rolled out within the next three months, while the implementation of Avallain Author 28 has already begun.
