There is a little bit of irony going on here: this is an article about a software package that will go a long way toward rendering printed technical media, such as this journal, obsolete.

Last year Macromedia purchased the company eHelp and, as a result, acquired RoboHelp, RoboInfo, RoboHelp for Framemaker, RoboPDF, and RoboDemo. This purchase, in my opinion, has made Macromedia a major player in the e-learning/e-publishing market. In this article, we are going to focus on the lynchpin of that market: RoboDemo.

RoboDemo is a way to create highly interactive software simulations. This means that you can record the steps necessary (mouse movements, key strokes, menu options, etc.) to accomplish a task in a video. However, as you will soon see, that is not the end of the possibilities.

Creating a Movie
As a simple example, let's assume that I want to demonstrate how to start a new HTML document in Dreamweaver. I would begin by opening Dreamweaver and RoboDemo. Image I shows the opening RoboDemo screen.

A screen will come up allowing you to select the open program you want to record the video in. This screen is shown in Image II.

After selecting, in this case, Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004, a screen comes up that allows you to pick the hot keys you want to use to start and stop the recording process. There are suggested defaults which, in most cases, work fine.

You are then taken to the application you are recording with a panel, as shown in Image III, in the upper left corner.

At this point, there are adjustable graphic handles that will allow you to block out the area of the application in which you want to record. In most cases, however, you will use the default of the full screen.

After selecting Record, you simply go through the steps necessary to accomplish the task you want to show. Once you complete the steps, press the End key and RoboDemo will build the video. When completed, you will be returned to RoboDemo with thumbnails of the key frames of the video. You can see this in Image IV.

You can now preview the video in either RoboDemo's own player, or in your Web browser. The one thing that will strike you is that RoboDemo automatically added some captions for you. - an example of this is shown in Image V.

These captions are fully editable for both content and style. In addition, you can create your own captions and place them where they are necessary.

E-Learning
If you are on a sales team and want to demonstrate the features of your software, you have a powerful tool. However, RoboDemo now goes one step further. If you are doing this demo as part of an e-learning project, RoboDemo will now allow you to create an interactive situation that will allow users to try the steps themselves. You can even program the responses to right and wrong choices.

To create the interactivity, all you need to do is double-click on the thumbnail frame to which you want to attach the interactivity. Once open, you select Insert>Click Box. You will be brought to the dialogue box shown in Image VI.

Here you can decide how the movie will respond to right and wrong responses. Notice that you can add Success and Failure captions. Also, if you are comfortable with programming, you can tie the movie into a JavaScript file.

If you are in an e-learning environment, chances are you will need to test the student and track the scores. You can insert Quiz Frames as shown in Image VII.

Here you can decide the questions asked, the type of answers, scoring, and responses to right and wrong answers.

To aid the in the learning process, RoboDemo even allows for branching. For instance, let's assume someone answers a question incorrectly about attaching a template in Dreamweaver. You could branch into a movie that would review those steps in greater detail. If the user answered the question correctly, you could simply move on to the next topic.

If all this is not enough, you will notice in Images VI and VII that there is a tab to help decide scoring for the response. This could be important for corporate and academic environments. As a matter of fact, RoboDemo is SCORM- and AICC-compliant in order to integrate with a Learning Management System.

If you are in a corporate environment and need to analyze scores, RoboDemo will generate a manifest that will integrate with an XML file created for this purpose.

I work with Macromedia's Authorware often to create learning programs. Integration of RoboDemo into Authorware is nearly seamless. However, I got my best results when I either exported the movies as SWF files or incorporated them into larger Flash presentations.

PowerPoint Integration
One of the features I found especially interesting was how RoboDemo integrated with Microsoft PowerPoint.

You can easily place PowerPoint slides between existing frames of the RoboDemo movie. This helps to make the presentation run smoother by allowing you to add slides with descriptive text. By simply selecting Insert>PowerPoint Frame you are presented with the dialogue box shown in Image VIII.

Here you can import a single slide or an entire PowerPoint presentation. This can be handy in both demonstration and e-learning situations.

Nowhere is this integration more noticeable than in RoboDemo's MenuBuilder feature.

In many situations you may want to break your presentation down to a series of shorter movies rather than one long movie. MenuBuilder employs Microsoft PowerPoint to create a menu so that the user can choose what movie/demonstration they want to see. The menu can then be incorporated into the project.

As an interesting note, I recently did a RoboDemo tutorial with 10 movies and a PowerPoint menu to connect them together. I then exported the menu as an EXE file and put the whole tutorial on a CD for distribution.

If you are not a PowerPoint user, don't worry. RoboDemo has a built-in means of creating text slides with a feature called the Text Animator. This is shown in Image IX.

Here we can create simple text slides and transition effects for the text. While, in my opinion, it does not have the flexibility of PowerPoint, it does get the job done quite nicely. I found it especially helpful in creating an Introduction and Exit for the presentation.

Of course, the best solution of all is to integrate your movies within Flash. Let's take a quick look at that, as well as various other output options.

Output
RoboDemo offers a variety of outputs. As we just mentioned, you can export as an EXE file. However, if you want to really create a very professional looking presentation, you might want to consider exporting the movies as Flash SWF file. By doing that, you can incorporate your movies within a larger Flash presentation. Using the power of the Flash timeline allows you to integrate sound, movies, text, and transitions seamlessly. In my opinion, after integrating RoboDemo and Flash, you will not want to go any other way. The presentational possibilities are nearly endless.

Unfortunately, if you want to create Flash editable FLA files, you will need to purchase an add-on module for $99.00.

During output you can also set an expiration date. This option will prevent the movie from being seen past a certain date. This can be handy for versioning control.

You can also e-mail your movie from within RoboDemo. You can email it as a SWF, EXE (Windows or Linux), or HQX for the Macintosh.

While exporting, you can also select from a number of playback control styles or, if you want, design your own control graphics using BMP graphic images.

If bandwidth size is a concern, you can quickly get the statistics of your movie with the Bandwidth Monitor shown in Image X.

Here you can analyze your movie either textually or graphically. In addition, you can break the analysis down to individual frames and components.

Conclusion
Due to space constraints we could only touch on the main points of this remarkable and feature-rich program. Whether for sales presentation or instructional design, this program is going to change how you design your solutions.

Macromedia has a 15-day trial version available for download on its site. Trust me, once you try it you will be sold.