Project-Wide Asset Replacement - A Powerful New Authoring Gesture
Asset replacement in ZebraZapps has always been a powerful concept, allowing authors to quickly turn interactive sketches into production-ready, quality learning events. However, asset replacement (images, audio, video and gadgets) has been limited in scope to the current event that an author is working on.
This month that changes. ZebraZapps authors now have a powerful new asset / project management goodie: project-wide asset replacement. Authors are now able to replace any object used in multiple events with another asset from your project’s asset library. This can be done in one of two ways:
The familiar gesture: hover over the object you want to replace on the stage with a new asset, until the construction tape appears. Then before the construction tape disappears (about 4 seconds), drop the thumbnail to complete the object replacement. If the object has been used multiple times or in multiple events, a popup dialog will appear with new options for replacing: just this object, all in the event, all in the project or canceling.
This method will replace any ZebraZapps object (rectangles to arenas) on the stage with new images, audio, video and gadgets from the library.
New alternate gesture: using the same hover -> construction tape -> drop gesture, drag the new asset you would like to use directly over a currently in use asset in the actual asset library and replace it directly in the library. The usage count on the right hand side of the asset library will help you identify which objects are replaceable.
This method will only replace other objects in the asset library that are currently in use.
Reading might not give you a good enough understanding of the new function, so I’ve created a short tutorial video showing the use of both replacement gestures, as well as the new dialog box and an example of when and where this new capability might be immediately beneficial to current ZebraZapps authors.