SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Tim Beachy -
Number of replies: 6

It seems like someone should have encountered this before, but I have yet to find any posts or discussions on it....

Background info:

  • In-house Ubuntu server
  • Moodle 2.1 (a site we cloned from another 2.1 installation we run)
  • SCORM 1.2 -- created using Trivantis Lectora (I'm not sure of the version because they are developed offsite at another vendor)
  • This is not a browser issue as it performs consistently across IE, Firefox and Chrome.

Basically, the first package I received from this vendor worked - it opened, played and reported pretty much as expected.

They've sent me subsequent packages however that, instead of playing in the SCORM player, try to download the first file in the package.  The files are too large to upload here, but if needed I can make them available somewhere. 

The course itself, with a variety of test packages in it, is available here, and is open to guests at this point:

http://iowafamilysupport.training-source.org/familysupportlearn/course/view.php?id=4966&topic=0

I've tested the following:

  1. Whether the files are uploaded through file picker or put into a moodledata repository.  Makes no difference.
  2. Whether the package is set to open in current or new window.  Makes no difference.
  3. Whether the grading is set to "Learning Objects" or "Highest Grade".  Makes no difference.
  4. Besides the original file that still works, I've uploaded and tested several other diagnostic packages and packages from Storyline that do work.
  5. I've run it through Reloaded, saved and repackaged -- didn't help.
  6. I've turned the debugger on -- it is still on -- and it seems that the bad packages aren't initializing and can give the SCORM 301 error.  The good packages of course have normal output.
  7. The zlib package on the server is installed and functioning normally from php info.
  8. Permissions on the moodledata directory are recursively set to 777
  9. Tested same packages in another 2.1 installation (site that this one was cloned from) with the same results.
  10. Doesn't matter whether I'm logged in as guest, student or admin -- results are the same.
  11. I've search this Moodle forum, Lectora's forums, and the web at large to no avail.  Either no one else has this problem or it is being described differently.

Any help in the right direction is greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

Tim

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In reply to Tim Beachy

Re: SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Tim Beachy -

So, as usual after having wallowed around with a problem for several days, and having finally gotten fed up enough to post the question, I discovered the answer soon after.

Posting here in the hopes that it can help someone someday.

 

We discovered that the length of the IDs in the package were what were causing the trouble.  In fact, the Instructional Designer found a setting in Lectora to generate Short IDs.  Once we did that, the package played flawlessly.

 

Cheers!

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In reply to Tim Beachy

Re: SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Matteo Scaramuccia -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Peer reviewers Picture of Plugin developers

Hi Tim,
thanks for sharing the solution: it would be nice, if possible, to have two versions of a sharable package (kind of POC with a simplified HTML page as single SCO) to look at the end differences in the package given the change in that setting in Lectora, to see if the last version of Moodle could have some roles in mitigating what you've described here.

TIA,
Matteo

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In reply to Matteo Scaramuccia

Re: SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Tim Beachy -

Matteo,

I can share what works and what doesn't of what I have, but I'm not the creator nor am I very versed in SCORM.  All I know is that Moodle was choking on the ID size (I've read something somewhere about an 8kb buffer?)  and shortening them fixed the problem.  Undoubtedly, a newer version of moodle would help, but we are going to be tied to 2.1 for a long time I think.  We are using mutiple customized modules and functionality which make upgrading too large of an undertaking in the foreseeable future.

Thanks,

Tim

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In reply to Tim Beachy

Re: SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Matteo Scaramuccia -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Peer reviewers Picture of Plugin developers

Hi Tim,
if you can share it please send me a PM with the details to download them and I'll take a look at them in my spare time: I'll use them for testing purposes and nothing more.

It's a strange issue: I'd like to see what "ID" they are talking about, maybe something related with the tracking data before with the file names.

Matteo

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In reply to Matteo Scaramuccia

Re: SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Tim Beachy -

Thanks Matteo,

I will PM you in a minute that should hopefully demonstrate the following conclusion.

From what I can tell, what the course designer was referring to were the *file titles*, and not necessarily "IDs".  It makes sense too, if the file titles they were using were too long, the browser was choking on them because they were truncated before getting to the file extension, so it didn't know how to handle it, and defaulted to download.

Hope that helps, might be less enigmatic than you or I originally thought.

Tim

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In reply to Tim Beachy

Re: SCORM 1.2 package is trying to download instead of opening in player

by Matteo Scaramuccia -
Picture of Core developers Picture of Peer reviewers Picture of Plugin developers

Hi Tim,
just tested your bigger package on the latest 2.7 (dev version) and it works fine, regardless the filenames being quite long: as said in the PM the truncation could potentially happen when the package is imported into the SCORM activity i.e. the browser will play no role here, just Moodle, since the truncantion will probably remove the filename extension so the assigned MIME type will be document/unknown instead of text/html, forcing the browser to download that file instead of showing its HTML content.
I could be wrong but when I clicked on your link at the time of your first post the filename was not truncated instead it missed dots e.g. a_long_filename_with_no_dotshtml.

I'll try to find some spare time to test it on 2.6 and 2.5 (the latest being now supported) to exclude any issue in the last Moodle versions.

BTW, I'm happy you've found a working workaround for your 2.1 instance.

HTH,
Matteo

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