Three Easy Ways to Start a Project in dominKnow | ONE

Three Easy Ways to Start a Project in dominKnow | ONE
February 14, 2023
7 minutes
Three Easy Ways to Start a Project in dominKnow | ONE

dominKnow | ONE is a robust, full-featured authoring tool, but that doesn't mean it's difficult to use. In fact, we designed it to be easy and useful for all skill levels, from total novices to experienced professionals.

While it's possible to start a project from scratch, that can be a little overwhelming if you're new to dominKnow | ONE or to eLearning development in general. Below, we'll go over three easy methods for getting a jump-start on your first project.  

We'll also discuss custom quick-start options (called baselines) that you may want to use once you've found your organization-specific groove.

Method #1: Pick a System Template Design

When you start a project in dominKnow | ONE, first you'll need to commit to one of our two primary authoring modes: Claro, which creates traditional PowerPoint-like projects, and Flow, which produces responsive content.  

Claro vs Flow is a whole separate article in itself, but either way, you'll have plenty of ready-made design template sets to choose from.

Starting an eLearning course from a design template set will ensure a polished look even if you don't have a design eye. You'll have a dozen or more page layouts to choose from with each set. These layouts support different kinds of content and provide visual variety with little effort.

The best news is that if you're designing for Section 508/WCAG compliance, most of the available options are designed to take these requirements into account. Just look for the WCAG badge before you commit.

You focus on the content because the design is covered.

Method #2: Browse the Marketplace

Templates are great, but what if you want a bigger head start on effective, engaging digital learning?  

In that case, the dominKnow | ONE Marketplace is your best bet. You can find it on the sidebar of the new project screen.

While our system templates give you a general look and layout for your content, Marketplace templates tend to be geared toward replicating a specific digital learning experience.

All of our eLearning samples that showcase what's possible in dominKnow | ONE are available as templates for your own use. That makes it easy to create your own version of something more complicated, like a knowledge base or eLearning game.  

For example, you can get the template for a crossword puzzle made in Claro – one of the samples we featured recently.  

Some Marketplace templates are free, while others are available for purchase.  

The Headset Hero game, developed in partnership with Harbinger, is a great training tool for customer service. It's an interactive scenario-based game that simulates a "learn on the go" environment. It leverages audio clips, not just to make the experience more engaging, but to reflect the listening skills and tone choices that matter in the real world. To top it all off, this template is optimized for mobile!

Finally, you can also find off-the-shelf content in our Marketplace from partners like Vado. These courses are developed by subject matter experts to fulfill common training needs, including safety, compliance, and managerial skills.  

What's the point of off-the-shelf content in an eLearning authoring tool? The content's editable!  

This allows you to customize independently developed courses to meet your organization's needs. You can brand the courses to look like your own, swap out generic images for ones that suit your audience better, and tweak the content to be more relevant to your audience. Remove content that doesn't work for you or add company-specific policies and resources.

Editable off-the-shelf courses help you find that sweet spot between the efficiency of purchasing pre-made content and the freedom of creating custom content.

That's a common theme with our Marketplace offerings. They let you skip certain digital learning development steps – like game design or content creation – so you can focus on the aspects that need to be tailored for your purposes.

Method #3: PowerPoint Import

Sometimes you don't need a head start on creating something new; you just need to update eLearning that already exists.

It's quick and easy to convert a PowerPoint file into a native project – just choose the Import option on the Create a New Project screen. dominKnow | ONE will extract the content  and rebuild it as a fully-editable Claro project.

There are a few tips and tricks you can use to make your import go as smoothly as possible. For example, make sure to optimize your PowerPoint for Web output before importing it into dominKnow | ONE. This will help speed up the conversion process as well as reduce bandwidth impacts on your learners.  

PowerPoint imports are readily available for all users, but that's not the only type of eLearning course you can bring with you to dominKnow | ONE. If you want to convert content created in other eLearning authoring tools, talk to us about our content conversion service. We have a proven track record of helping clients convert legacy digital learning into fully-editable content for dominKnow | ONE – with the success stories to show for it!

+1 Advanced Method: Build Your Own Baselines

Once an organization has been working with dominKnow for a while, they typically find their own groove. They have their own way of doing things and their own distinct look and feel.

How do you get an easy start when your content is more customized?

You could duplicate an existing project and go from there, but that's messy. It's better to create a baseline as a sort of custom starter template.

The great thing about baselines is that you can have as many as you want. It's as easy as an administrator checking the "baseline" box in the Properties settings. Once a project is designated as a baseline, anyone in the organization can use part or all of that project even if they don't have the permissions to change the original.

There are a few different ways you can use the baseline concept.

You can make baselines that will serve as full-project templates.  

Baselines can have as many pages and learning objects as necessary, and they can be set up with a standard project structure. This makes it easy to give authors a blueprint for new content, including standard course introduction pages, one or more learning objects with test questions, and conclusion pages.

You can apply a custom theme to each baseline, which lets you designate additional standard elements like:

  • Color scheme, font, and other project styles
  • Copyright or disclaimer text through Project Metadata
  • Footers and headers through Master Page settings
  • Shortcuts for page elements through saved Claro layers or Flow sections
  • Common publishing profiles

You can set up as many themes and baselines as your organization needs, then pair them however it makes sense for you. For example, if you have three different subsidiaries with their own branding (saved as a theme) and each subsidiary may use one of two project structures, then you can save six baselines to cover all combinations.

Once these baselines are set up, it's very easy to create a new project with a standardized look and structure. You just choose a baseline on the Create New Project panel.

Alternatively, you can use baselines as a custom version of the system templates we described at the beginning of the article.  

You can make a baseline that's basically just a collection of pages in various custom layouts. When an author is creating a project, they can copy a single slide from this baseline through the Add a New Page panel. They can even copy part of a page, like a Claro layer or Flow section, through the Add to Page panel.  

When you're ready to use baselines, there are plenty of other tips and tricks you can learn.

Try dominKnow | ONE for Free

Not signed up for dominKnow | ONE yet? You can see how user-friendly it is for yourself.  

Our quick-start options are just the beginning. Other ease-of-use features include:

  • Pre-built interactive components for a quick way to build engaging eLearning courses
  • A scenario builder widget for effortless branching simulations
  • A software simulation tool for Show/Guide/Try tutorials
  • An adaptive user interface to streamline work for different experience levels and roles in eLearning development
  • Collaboration and review tools so you can work together more easily

Experience it for yourself by starting your free 14-day trial today or requesting a demo from one of our experts.

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