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Overall Planning

In the Altoura Experience system, each training step is configured as a node. So the number of nodes in the Experience Builder should match the number of training steps that is being created. There are two mechanisms that you can use to move from one node to another.
  1. Manual advance: In this case, the user has to explicitly click the next arrow on the text panel to advance to the next node.
  2. Auto advance: The Experience system can detect if the user has performed a certain action and use that information to mark the current node as completed and move to the next node. This is done by a. Creating a collider which is larger than the training object the user is interacting with and placing it where the user needs to move the training object to complete the step. The system monitors the position and rotation of the training object and once it is within the collider, it marks the step as completed and auto advances the training to the next step.
Please note that if you are configuring the step to auto advance, then one node can only have one action that will cause the experience to advance to the next node. In some cases, the system might need to be modified to be ready for the next node. This modification can be done using transition animations. You can create these animations in Unity and input the name in the transition animation field in the Experience Builder.

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Persistent modifications using Transition animations

Any change to the virtual model, that needs to persist needs to be made through transition animations. The Experience system uses these animations to get all users in a meeting in sync. When a new user joins a meeting in the middle of an Experience , the transition animations are used to communicate the state of the Experience to the new user.
To summarize, each node should represent a step in a training and use transition animations to change the state of the virtual models between steps if required.

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Configuring nodes

The first step while configuring an node is to figure out is how complex does each training step need to be. The following points can help you understand the different complexity levels to consider for each step in the training process
  1. Information presentation: Typically each training step needs to communicate to the user what they need to do. This can be done in the following ways a. Low Complexity: Use the text and media panels to communicate the required information. This typically is the simplest and cheapest way to present the required information as in most cases, the assets are available from existing trainings. b. Medium Complexity: Use the in built instruction animation to communicate what the user needs to do. In some steps, it may be helpful for the user to see the exact step that they have to perform. Altoura enables this by showing a simple animation of the training object from its current location to the snap to position configured in the node. c. High Complexity: In extremely rare cases, the trainee may need to view a custom animation to understand what they have to do. The creator in such cases can create a custom animation and pass the name of it into the instruction animation field in the node. This typically is the most expensive way to create a step.
  2. Target Object and Training Object: In most cases, the trainee needs to pay attention to a certain virtual object in a step. There are two fields used to identify this object. The Training object is the object that the trainee is expected to interact with. The Target object is the virtual object that the tethered line from the text panel connects to, to draw attention from the trainee. In most cases these are the same object but if needed the Creator can choose them to be different.
  3. Collider Name: If the step needs to auto advance, the Creator can create a collider in the scene at the location where the training object should reach for the step to auto advance. The system will keep checking and once the training object is inside the collider, it will auto advance to the next node.
  4. Snap To Position: This is the precise location where the virtual object should end before the system transitions to the next node. The system will automatically snap the training object to this location once the training object is inside the collider.

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Automated Instructions

The Altoura Experience system can also automatically generate an instruction animation using the snap to location and the training object. To do so, it basically creates a blue shaded clone of the training object and animates it going to the snap to location in a loop thus giving users a clear idea on what they have to do in this training step.
For more details on configuring nodes please take a look at the page titled Step by Step Node Outline.