1. We have increased the number of languages in eLeaP so that you can have the choice of your preferred language: Spanish, French, Chinese, Portuguese, and German.
2. We added an option for your users to ‘hide completed’ courses so they can focus on pertinent, up coming training deadlines.
3. For users, a quick and easy way to download their training completion records right from their home page. Now all they have to do is to click on “Download Completion Report”.
4. For Admins, you can easily file employee records by downloading comprehensive individual user records in Excel. Save time and make sure your compliance records are up to date

Other new features:

How to set Non-Completion alerts:

This enables account Admins to set an automatic email notification to email addresses they specify which will indicate which of their users have not completed their assigned course(s) as of the deadline date

This feature is critical if you have any audits or compliance requirements for users to complete their courses and trainings by a specific date. The system sets and monitors the deadline and an email summary is sent to emails the admin sets. This is a great time savor and increases your training and legal compliance needs. Learn more >>

How to set Quiz Retry options:

We have upgraded the eLeaP quiz tool to now include a new feature which prevents users from checking their answers in between retries. For example, you have a multiple choice quiz question which has 2 retry opportunities. Previously, users could simply submit their attempts, make note of the right or wrong quiz answer, and try to use that information to ‘guess’ the right answer in their next attempt. While we don’t believe this behavior is widespread, we at eLeaP are continually working to make sure the integrity of our online training system is maintained and the authenticity of quiz results is enhanced. This upgrade now ensures that users who submit quiz answers during retries are not able to decipher that quiz scoring is till their final submission. Learn more >How to set Feedback as Required:

This feature enables you to set the feedback form as a required component before eLeaP can release a certificate of completion to a user. The feedback form is a survey tool built into your course. To enable feedback, make sure your course details (click ‘edit course details’) indicate Active Feedback as YES

Next, click on [Feedback] within your course and add your feedback forms. Once satisfied with the feedback form questions, click [Advanced Settings] and make sure ‘Require Feedback’ is set to ‘YES’. Once set, eLeaP will then monitor the course completion data to ensure that your users have provided you with feedback by completing the feedback form prior to allowing them download their certificate of completion. If users attempt to download a certificate without providing feedback, eLeaP will remind them to complete the feedback form. Learn more >>

Upgraded Advanced Settings:

We have upgraded the course settings and Advanced settings tabs.

Learn more and get your free account here.

Major changes we have made to the eCommerce LMS interface:

1. Pricing: We have revamped the pricing by adding in Tiered pricing and Volume pricing. Tiered pricing enables the system to charge different rates based on the number of users set for each user limit. For example if you buy 19 licenses it will be 10 x $10 plus 9 x $8.50. Volume pricing uses the total user limit associated with the purchased licenses to calculate the fees. For example if you buy 19 licenses, it will be 19 x $8.50. See a screen shothttp://screencast.com/t/mOf2jGUIK4To

2. We have added option to calculate re-ordering or upgrade pricing either using sum of the previous order and the new order or only using the new order to calculate the re-ordering or upgrade. This way, you can choose if you want your repeate buyers to benefit from lower pricing based on a total of their orders or simply keep each order as a unique transaction. See screen shot http://screencast.com/t/kBYC6toKpH

3. Added option for single users or corporate buyers to create a one-time account for their purchase. Corporate buyers will create a License Distribution Account (LDA) to enable them distribute their purchased licenses to their users. This gives them access to tracking and easy management as well as certification and interactive tools. See screen shot at http://screencast.com/t/E9nLZESXbgVH

Use your eLeaP LMS Forums or White Board features to generate discussions – you never know when the next million dollar idea is lurking!

Supported Formats:

Flash

Flash based videos have revolutionized the online training space. Using flash based videos in your presentation provide additional interactive and formative learning. If you need help converting your videos into Flash, use this link to send in your files https://dropbox.yousendit.com/Telania and we will be happy to help.

You can upload your videos in the popular .SWF format or the robust .FLV format.

Other Supported Formats: MPG, MPEG, MOV, WMV, MP3, MP4, M4V

Some also utilize the SCORM format to upload video based training.

What to Watch for:

While video is compelling, it is important that you understand the limitations of this medium. Video files by their very nature are large. This means that users who have slower connections might need to wait for the dreaded ‘buffering’ process before they can view your training. This is normal and a simple message in your course that this can occur typically solves the problem.

Another potential issue with video based training is downloading. Since certain formats require the user to download a copy of your video to their computer, this can lead to potential copyright abuse. While we have not detected this as big problem, it is important that you are made aware. One way to get around the download issue is to use Flash formatted videos since these typically play within the browser and are not ‘downloaded’.

Uploading Videos:

While the eLeaP allows you to upload up to 500MB per file, we strongly urge you to consider breaking up large files (greater than 100MB) into several chunks. By breaking larger files into smaller chunks you not only improve the upload and access process, you also enable your users to engage in the presentation by taking an action to continue viewing the rest of the chunks instead of having to sit through one ‘long’ presentation. Simple is best. By the way, the size of a video depends on several factors: quality, screen size, length. There’s no hard and fast rule but this link will give you an idea: http://www.evdoinfo.com/content/view/846/63/

Support:

If you need support uploading videos into your account, contact eLeaP for help. Alternatively, you can send us your video files so we upload them for you. To send us files, use this link: https://dropbox.yousendit.com/Telania .

Don’t forget to check out the online training how-to video tutorials for how to upload videos. For tutorials go to: http://www.eleapsoftware.com/support.html

Recent Trends:

Five recent developments in employment law including compliance legislation, litigation, personal liability and high cost of training have conspired to make an already difficult situation get even more and less certain. In our 10 + years of serving the workforce development and e-learning technology needs of our clients, we have never seen a more complex, confusing and frankly scary landscape as we are seeing right now – when it comes to corporate compliance documentation.

Some of the most recent dangerous trends facing organizations and professionals like you include:

1. Overwhelming growth in Employment laws
2. Increasing Personal Liability of Professionals like you
3. Increasing Governmental/Legal Fines and Penalties
4. High Costs of Poor Training
5. Declining Competitive Advantage

Read more about this announcement.

http://www.prweb.com/releases/2011/03/prweb5121344.htm

Since our first launch in 2005, eLeaP has been upgraded four times. Each new release is the result of intensive analysis, client interviews, and usability experts’ reviews incorporating the latest in e-learning, web-based training technology and web software architecture.

With our release of eLeaP4, we have provided our customers with cutting edge technology, extremely easy usability and unparalleled security and speed.

Read more here…

The industry may be seeing some new changes coming down the road. Smartphones have been used for just about everything. Ever since Apple released its iPhone SDK, thousands of people have decided to become developers—and today there are huge numbers of small, mom-and-pop iPhone app development companies. So what’s next? It won’t be long before we start seeing training courses on the smartphone.

At last week’s Consumer Electronics Show, we saw a couple of interesting developments that portend great changes in this industry. First, Skype announced that it is acquiring Qik, a mobile video software company, for something along the lines of $100 million. This is a lot of money even for deep-pocketed Skype (which is getting ready for an IPO), and there’s tremendous potential there. The Qik platform creates an environment where users can enjoy real-time video across multiple mobile platforms. The deal doesn’t have anything immediately to do with e-learning, but the potential is there. Successful e-learning rests on the ability to provide a dynamic, multimedia presentation, and companies like Qik are bringing that capability to the smartphone.

Another cool iPhone tool is the Vaestro Voice Blogosphere, which is a type of audio blog network that lets you record blogs, as well as comments, as voice files instead of text. It’s an iPhone app available for $2.99, and is just one more tool with potential to be used in the e-learning space.

This of course, brings up the question: Do we really want to put e-learning modules on smartphones? To answer that question, we have to determine whether it would add value to the e-learning environment. And to do that, we have to consider how ubiquitous the smartphone has become, and how mobile our staff has become at the same time. Certainly, a bigger screen is more desirable for most e-learning programs , but there are two goals to any good e-learning program: To provide educational material and facilitate an educated workforce, and to disseminate that material to as many people as possible. In accomplishing that second goal, it is important to allow access through as many avenues as possible. Because almost every professional has a smartphone in his or her possession at all times, it makes sense to include that platform in the e-learning environment. While longer sessions may be better left to a full-size screen, shorter on-demand sessions are well-suited to a mobile platform. Having an ad hoc client meeting is an excellent example—a casual client conversation may lead to a “how can I do this” question, and if the full-size laptop isn’t available, the salesperson can always whip out the iPhone for a quick demo. To date, e-learning has focused on other platforms, but it’s inevitable that some e-learning applications will move to the smartphone, at least as a supplementary method of educational training.