RapideL Tool Review

Brainvisa have recently made some big claims about RapideL, their rapid eLearning authoring tool. They say content development is up to 50% faster than other tools. So we thought we'd take it for a spin.

Rapid is the word:
Unlike many of the other rapid tools which use PowerPoint as their content creation tool, RapideL enables you to edit and create content directly in Microsoft Word, which may appeal to users who are not so familiar with PowerPoint and may not be comfortable with some of its trickier functions. We were initially skeptical about the claims regarding speed of development but having used the authoring tool, it probably is one of the fastest tools on the market. Despite a wide range of templates more experienced learning designers may find the lack of flexibility frustrating, as your design options are somewhat limited, but others may be comforted by the structure it provides.

The Rapid eLearning scorecard:
In summary, we rated RapideL as follows: Criteria – Score (1-5) – Comments

Ease of use – 5 – Once you get the idea of using content templates, creating fit for purpose content is quick and easy.

Instructional design flexibility – 4 – The tool can be frustrating for an experienced designer as there is little flexibility. However, there are 29 templates you can use. The templates provide consistency at least.

Ability to incorporate existing content – 4 – It handles existing content reasonably well, but you have to size any graphics in another tool first to fit the template you have chosen, whereas other tools like Breeze and Articulate allow you to resize on screen.

Ability to handle variety of topics – 4 – Not designed for system training but good based for product knowledge and information delivery.

Ability to incorporate graphics and media – 4 – Handles these files well but only once they are ready to be imported. You have to do a lot outside RapideL, e.g. create animations in flash and size correctly; you need to size images correctly; you need to produce audio files. This makes it less flexible than the PowerPoint tools.

Ability to publish SCORM/AICC compliant courses – 5 – A straightforward process. It also allows packaging for CDs.

Technical support available – 4 – Immediate offer of support and follow up.

OVERALL SCORE: 30

RapideL is a very fast tool that produces consistent content in an environment that may be more comfortable for many users than PowerPoint. As always with authoring tools, there's a trade-off. The price of the familiarity with Word is less flexibility, and a requirement to do a lot of the work outside of the tool environment.

The price tag: RapideL is currently priced from $1,999. For more information, go to the RapideL Website http://www.rapidel.com.

You can see an example of what we created below. You can see the short example that I produced here http://www.rapidel.com/kineo/shell.html.

Read on for a full review of the product.

RapideL: the full road test

Ease of use: 5/5
The demo version lets you produce up to 5 screens in two modules so we decided to produce a few screens on equality and diversity. RapideL creates an extra top menu item in Word much like Articulate or Breeze do in PowerPoint. It was very straightforward to create a course and a module. You then simply select a template and RapideL creates a table for you in word that you complete as shown here:

The preview feature is very useful and gives you an instant view of what the build page will look like. The notes section is also a nice feature allowing you to add extra information to a page that the learner can refer to such as more information, reference or a case study.

It is also very easy to browse and select audio and images. They do need to be sized correctly though. We would say you can probably produce content faster in RapideL than other tools as long as you have your assets ready. The easiest way is to source your images in a folder, select the templates you want to use and then run a macro to simply resize all the images appropriately.

Instructional design flexibility: 4/5
RapideL is designed for you to organize your courses in courses and modules. The menu structure is preset but works well.
RapideL comes with a wide range of template types (29 in all) such as:

• Teach Text left with media right
• Text right with media left
• Interactive image blocks
• Text left with animation right
• Multiple Selection Multiple selection using images
• Multiple selection using text

While there are a range of template types there is limited flexibility when working with a template. However, you may find the templates very helpful if working with a range of SMEs that are authoring their own content and consistency.

Ability to incorporate existing content: 4/5
It’s built to handle existing assets very well. You simple browse and select the asset you want. The only difficulty is that assets such as images and animations have to be appropriately sized to work with the template. It is not possible to do this with the tool itself. Similarly any audio has to pre-existing the tool doesn't let you create audio, as Breeze or Articulate do.

Ability to handle variety of topics: 4/5
RapideL is a good choice for briefings, information delivery, and subjects such as product knowledge. It is a serviceable tool where you need to work with SMEs that typically work in word or where you want scripts in word. If you want systems training at this price then you may want to look to a screen capture tool like Captivate or Camtasia.

Ability to incorporate graphics/media: 4/5
As indicated earlier you can use existing images, animations and video (if published as a swf). The tool comes with its own player to control flash movies that you can turn on or off.

Ability to publish SCORM/AICC compliant courses: 5/5
The program produces scorm compliant content for scorm 1.2 and scorm 2004.

Conclusion:
RapideL is potentially a very fast tool for rapid eLearning and a great vehicle for simple content that you need producing quickly. It uses Word as the authoring tool that will appeal to some users.

The downsides are that the templates are quite rigid and more experienced learning designers may find this frustrating as will corporate branding departments as it is not possible to re-brand the look and feel.

Kineo has accepted no payment or reward of any form from any tools company for this independent review.