SuccessFactors SCORM not completing: the Storyline fix

Fix it in Storyline

1. Open the player settings

   In Storyline, go to Home → Player, then Other.

2. Turn on the new window

   Under Browser Settings, tick “Launch player in new window (creates launch page)”.

3. Republish and check again

   Publish for LMS again and drop the new zip into Alder with SuccessFactors still picked. The manifest now launches launcher.html, and the LMS-001 note is gone.

4. Test one learner in SuccessFactors

   Upload it, launch it as a test learner, finish it and check what SuccessFactors recorded before you roll it out.

Rise and Captivate. The reports and Alder's note are about Storyline only. We have no source saying whether Rise or Captivate courses need anything similar in SuccessFactors, so Alder doesn't guess.

If the new window doesn't fix it

The course may simply never send “complete”: a tracking option the learner never meets, or a quiz result that keeps the course incomplete. SCORM Cloud would usually show those too, so test there with the same path a learner takes. SuccessFactors can't record a completion the course never sends.

Check the zip before you upload it again (free)

SuccessFactors is one of the three LMSs whose notes are free in Alder, with Moodle and Workday Learning.

1. Pick SAP SuccessFactors

   Open Alder and choose SAP SuccessFactors under “Where is this course going?”. Alder remembers the choice in this browser.

   

2. Drop the published zip

   Alder reads the manifest in your browser; nothing is uploaded. If it is a Storyline course that launches anything other than launcher.html, the findings include “SuccessFactors may record no progress for this course” (rule LMS-001). It names the file the manifest launches and gives the Storyline fix.

3. Run it once in the test player

   Click “Launch the course”, take it as a learner, and click “I'm done”. “What an LMS would record” shows whether the course itself sent a completion. SuccessFactors' dot says “may differ” for a Storyline course that plays in the same window, because the reports depend on how it is opened.

If the test run shows the course never completes, the window is not your only problem: fix what the findings say first.

What Alder doesn't know about SuccessFactors

No source we could read says how SuccessFactors records a status or a score, so Alder predicts the same result as SCORM Cloud for those. SAP has further knowledge-base articles on content not completing (for example 2316953), but they need an SAP login and we have not read them. If you have access, they are worth a look.

Why it happens

The course can't find the LMS connection. A SCORM course talks to the LMS through code the LMS puts in the browser window (the SCORM API), which the course finds by looking at the windows around it. SAP documents that content opened inline, inside the LMS's own page, can fail to find that connection (KBA 2808684, “Content not communicating or loading when opening inline”; an SAP login is needed). When it can't, nothing the learner does is recorded.

The Storyline setting decides which file the LMS launches. Every SCORM package has a manifest, imsmanifest.xml, that names the file the LMS opens. Without “Launch player in new window”, a Storyline publish launches index_lms.html, and the course plays inside the window SuccessFactors gives it. With it, Storyline adds a launch page, launcher.html, and the manifest launches that instead; it opens the course in its own window. Course authors on E-Learning Heroes report that SuccessFactors records progress once the setting is on (one thread, another).

Still not working?

• Start with the general checklist: works in SCORM Cloud but not in your LMS.
• Learners lose their place on long courses: see the suspend_data limit.
• Passed in the course but failed in the LMS: see mastery score vs quiz passing score.