When I first started creating the tutorials for our electrical training I put them on youtube. I found that there were a couple of issues with this, one being the quality of the upload (due to limitations with file size) and the length restrictions (only 10 minutes). So I went and searched for an alternative. Viddler was my next stop and if you watch the linked videos you can see the differences.

Viddler let me upload larger files, with no time limit on them, which worked out well. But I still had a problem- video quality. My e-learning system could never be effective if students had trouble viewing what was in front of them.
While I never received very many complaints (everyone understood this was a trial and error process), I was still personally unhappy with it.

It was then that I started to get serious about alternatives to what I was doing. The complaints I had received were ones about people’s download limits and internet speeds, so I needed a solution that would allow them to just download once, if that’s what they wanted, or view online. But I was always looking to increase quality.

I thought that podcasts were the answer, and if I were doing this a university class, or even a high school, it might work, but not for apprentices who really just want to get their training out of the way, and get back on the tools (which is fair enough).

Then I found Slideshare.net, and I nearly had a heart attack. As I uploaded my pdf files (simple process of exporting from power point/ keynote), and uploaded the voice over to my personal server, I looked at the quality on other slide shows. It displayed on my ENTIRE screen (1680x 1050), and was as easy to use as any other program I’ve seen. I was a little worried about how the audio I had uploaded would sync with the slides, but this was a really easy process.

Just dragging and clicking.

My first one is here, so why not have a look and tell me what you think. I think my apprentices will be VERY happy with this improvement from the originals.

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