The Adobe Connect team has started rolling out version 12.6 of Adobe Connect to customers. This update brings some excellent new enhancements – here are some of the new features that you should see on your account soon.
Broadcast Control
The Host and Presenter Area provides an excellent option for Hosts and Presenters to collaborate backstage before, during, and after an event. They can use a Chat pod, Notes, and other pods as a back-channel.
Adobe wanted to give customers even more options to communicate privately. The new Broadcast Control feature adds a virtual green room to your Adobe Connect sessions. It enables Hosts and Presenters to speak and see each other privately using their microphones and webcams without broadcasting these devices to the participants in the room.
This is ideal before a session to test your microphone and webcam. It also provides a way for the speaker and producers to debrief with each other privately after a session.
Even better – this can be linked automatically to the recording. You no longer have to remember to manually start and stop the recording. Once you begin the broadcast, Adobe Connect can automatically begin the recording. Pausing or stopping the broadcast can also pause or stop the recording. Everything is automatic.
Recording Transcript
While captions provide an important way of supporting those with difficulty hearing during an event, they aren’t ideal as a post-event transcript.
In this release of Adobe Connect, customers will have access to a new Recording Transcript. This transcript, which is generated immediately after a session, is available for those accessing the recording. The recording transcript is diarised – it includes the names of each speaker – and properly formatted with timestamps.
The transcript is also interactive. It will highlight the section which matches what is being played on the recording. It has a search bar at the top enabling customers to quickly find parts of the recording relevant to their search term, and it will even jump to the relevant section of the recording if you click on the transcript.
The transcript can be edited by the room owner, correcting any text which has been automatically generated. The transcript will also automatically reflect any edits you make to the recording; so, if you cut out parts of the recording, the transcript will be updated to reflect that.
While we’re talking about the recording viewer – you may also notice a new control that lets you adjust the playback speed of the recording – an often requested feature.
Quiz Pod Improvements
Adobe launched the Quiz pod last summer and they’ve been delighted to see so many customers use it. It an excellent way to test the understanding of your learners, or to add some game-based learning mechanics to your virtual sessions. Adobe Connect 12.6 brings some improvements to the Quiz pod.
Short Answer Questions
In addition to multiple choice, true or false, fill-in-the-blank, and multiple answer, customers can now add a ‘short answer’ question to their quizzes. Participants can respond via a text field that allows for up to 2,000 characters. Since these questions don’t provide answer options, they will not be included in the automatic scores, but hosts will have the ability to evaluate the answers in the Quiz reports.
Import and Export Quizzes
Another new feature Adobe is very pleased to bring to the Quiz pod is the ability to import and export your quizzes. This makes it incredibly easy to re-use a quiz in a completely different room. Better yet, Adobe supports the standard GIFT format, in addition to CSV files, which is also used by other Adobe digital learning products – meaning you can share quizzes across products!
Exporting a quiz is easy. You’ll find it as a new option in the Quiz pod options menu.
You’ll also see a new button on a blank Quiz pod to import a quiz. It includes an option to download a sample .CSV file to help get you started crafting your next quiz.
Closed Caption Improvements
After adding automated captions last summer, Adobe has been working steadily to improve them – including adding additional languages, profanity filtering, and more. This release brings some additional improvements to captions in Adobe Connect.
Adobe has simplified the overall workflow for captions. Once enabled, they’ll be available for everyone from the start of the session without needing anyone to start them. The option to stop automated captions has also been removed from the captions menu to reduce any confusion with hiding captions.
You may also notice that closed captions are now supported in breakout rooms in Adobe Connect.
Mixed Audio in Breakouts
Speaking of breakout rooms, Adobe is now able to support breakout rooms with mixed audio. Participants using telephony will be able to speak and interact with participants using VoIP for audio.
This has been a challenge in the past, and Adobe is excited to bring support for mixed audio in breakout rooms to this release.
And more…
In addition to the features listed above, Adobe Connect 12.6 brings lots of quality of life improvements to you. These ‘minor’ changes can have a major impact:
- Improved PDF sharing: PDF documents look better than ever in Adobe Connect and are optimised to use the width and height of the pod.
- Recording playback control: You can now change the playback speed of a recording; either slowing down fast-talkers or speeding up the slow-talkers.
- Engagement Dashboard reporting: By default, the Engagement Dashboard will now only reflect Participants and not Hosts and Presenters.
- Device preferences: The Adobe Connect application does a better job of remembering which microphone and speaker preferences you’ve set and will intelligently switch to the correct device.
- Still more: Lots of accessibility improvements and bug fixes.
It’s exciting to see the progress the Adobe Connect team has made and Adobe is eager to get the latest updates to you soon. Contact Dax Data for more information on Adobe’s range of eLearning solutions.
