[GerryWaz]

Hi!

Let me ramble a bit here . . .

While most of our developers use Articulate software, we have a small few that use Lectora. Most of our developers are SMEs/non-power users and Articulate works best for them.

Despite its early approach to empower SMEs, Articulate software has been evolving to enable power developers to more rapidly develop their content.

In the right hands, Lectora is a very, very good tool, like Articulate

We tend to "market" Lectora for the "power developer," the ones who have a programmer's bent. Among other things, Lectora lets you add many actions to pages and supports the use of variables. With actions, you can add a lot of interactivity.

For example, a programmer could send variable info to an LMS and use it later at re-launch. We have one developer who does this. By use of variables she keeps track of how many times a learner has failed a quiz. After three attempts and no passing, the course sends a "Failed" status to the LMS and the quiz is hidden from further viewing.

Lectora produces pages in HTML so it is sharper than Articulate's Flash content, and can also be copied and pasted by the learner (though that, depending on the circumstances, can be a disadvantage).

Lectora can also very easily publish a course to a single EXE file. This is something, IMVHO, it would be nice that Articulate could do.

Both products use templates.

As far as user interface, I like Articulate's better. I feel more productive with it.

I'm also not a big fan of how Lectora AICC/SCORM content keeps a heartbeat with the LMS. Out-of-the-box, it sends a post to the LMS after 5 minues have passed and an event happens like moving to a new page. Go to lunch in the middle of taking a course and, if your LMS has an inactivity timer, you may get logged off and ther LMS may or may not accept course posts after that.

Articulate's heartbeat is far better, IMVHO. Every 10 minutes, the course talks to the LMS to maintain a user's session with the LMS.

You have to program Lectora's heartbeat to be similar (but you can).

Lectora defaults to using Java to talk to the LMS with AICC or SCORM. We've come not to like this as we've had problems in the last few years with any course that uses Java. We now prefer JavaScript methods (like Articulate uses) as it is more reliable in our environment.

Lectora supports JavaScript also but the method requires server-side processing and Trivantis only provides a way to do this in their documentation (at least up to Lectora 2008) with ASP and IIS servers.

Articulate doesn't have that restriction. Just put the content on a server that can serve up the usual web content as well as XML and Flash and you are set.

(We do use a server-side ASP component from Articulate, but that's due to a LMS processing of posts issue and not the software.)

Even though I have Lectora, I rarely use it. I still reach for Articulate first. I don't want to be a programmer. I just want to worry about the content and how to creatively present it for the learner.

Also, use of Articulate Presenter reinforces and helps my PowerPoint skills grow and build.

Also, everyone here has PowerPoint. So in developing a course, a developer can work on just the PowerPoint "stuff" first and then pass it around the PPT to other people with PowerPoint to review it (or the client/SME can start the PPT and send it to the developer). After the review, the developer can then add the unique Articulate elements and then publish to the web for final reviews.

With Lectora, you only have the method of publishing the content for others to see--or everyone needs a copy of Lectora.

One nice thing about Lectora, you can have source files on network shares and multiple people can work on them and publish from them. It's also a little easier moving source files around--just move the AWT file and any support folders to another location and it all works.

Because of Flash limitations, with Articulate its best to keep source files on your PC and publish there. Sharing projects across developers requires a little more work and cooperation but it can be done.

Despite that, there are two more things that edge us toward Articulate. Engage and (in particular) QuizMaker are powerful adjunct tools for Presenter. Quizmaker has developed into a great tool for quizzes and surveys. It is far more powerful and easy to use than doing quizzes in Lectora. I daresay Quizmaker 09 is revolutionary in its approach to empower both newbies and power developers.

Lastly, while I think that Trivantis, maker of Lectora, is a very good company, I believe Articulate is even better. The resources, blogs, support resources, and forums that Articulate provides us users--and backs with an active presence of good people-- are just outstanding, IMVHO. Articulate gets "service after the sale."

Anyway, enough of the ramble . . . I could go on longer back and forth but its getting late. Hope this helps.