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cc_armidale · ‎05-14-2019

I've not had much of a play, but from what I've done so far in SpeedGrader, this is working much, much better. Being able to move the page with my finger and write much more naturally with the stylus (given it's on a screen rather than on paper) is what was needed. I haven't road-tested the update very extensively, but in terms of the basic functionality that we were seeking, it's now in the right place, for sure. Thanks for the heads-up, Gideon! Thanks for the great work, Instructure engineers!

cc_armidale · ‎04-18-2019

PS: I'm not alone in my school in feeling this way. The sense of disappointment among my colleagues when they found out about the button issue was palpable. We are all still downloading documents to annotate them in other platforms (MS Office, Acrobat Reader, etc.) and uploading them into the SpeedGrader comments for student access when we finish. It's a workaround, but it adds multiple steps to what should be a seamless process within Canvas.

cc_armidale · ‎04-18-2019

I entirely support this suggestion (surprise, surprise). I'll pass on the details to my colleagues and see if we can't push the vote up significantly over the next week or so. It's a term break here in NSW, though, so maybe we won't have a significant response immediately. However, I'm passionate about this and will ask others to respond. Power to the people!

cc_armidale · ‎04-16-2019

I'm more interested in this from a logistical perspective as much as my desire to be able to annotate effectively in SpeedGrader. With so many examples of apps running serviceable handwriting features on so many platforms, we know there's a way for this to happen. Here we are, though, stuck with a somewhat clunky solution that kind of works but doesn't. SpeedGrader works fine for me on an iPad Pro with Apple Pencil but is not functionally usable on a Windows 10 touch-screen laptop. For work purposes, I need it to function on the latter. You're so close to a solution, Canvas! I hope the team haven't thrown their arms up over this in exasperation, but it has become quite hushed in here on the Instructure front. Is there any movement on this? If not, do we (as Gideon asks) need to submit another idea and go through the process again? I'd love to hear from someone who knows. Kudos to Gideon and others for keeping the issue alive. Cheers!

cc_armidale · ‎02-20-2019

I've given annotation in SpeedGrader a try with the action button (right-click) down on my stylus, and it works in Chrome and Edge. (I didn't bother going into Firefox.) Unfortunately, I don't know how long I can maintain the very uncomfortable and unnatural grip on the stylus to annotate student work on SpeedGrader. Here is my natural pen grip on the Lenovo stylus: And here is the grip I must maintain to annotate in SpeedGrader: When I tried writing on a student paper, I found the latter quite uncomfortable and unnatural, because not only must I shift my grip upwards along the staff of the pen, but I must also put constant pressure on the button. Writing style aside (and no, it wasn't as good with the second grip, although perhaps more practice is the answer there), it wasn't long before the muscles in my hand began to feel the strain. For the record, I know of no other application, web-based or desktop, that requires me to hold down a button on my stylus to write or draw. (I'm happy to stand corrected on that.) So while I wholeheartedly applaud the efforts of all concerned to enable us to annotate in SpeedGrader, I feel that unless the requirement to hold down the button is remedied, a lot of stylus users are going to find it a chore rather than a natural, digitised extension of their normal student feedback routine. I'll watch this thread with great interest. Cheers David

cc_armidale · ‎02-19-2019

Hi, Renee I've tried to use SpeedGrader on a Lenovo X1 Yoga this morning (Australian time) and had the following results: Microsoft Edge 42.17134.1.0: Finger and stylus move the page when attempting to use highlighter or brush tools. No annotations appear. No response when trying to use the mouse. (The cursor moves across the screen as usual, even with the left button clicked.) Google Chrome 72.0.3626.: As above. Firefox 64.0.2: Finger and stylus create annotations with the brush tool, but they are jagged, and it seems impossible to write this way. The mouse does seem to work all right, but it isn't an optimal tool for writing. I haven't had the opportunity to test the SpeedGrader update with a Wacom tablet yet and will do so at the earliest opportunity. However, I would rather be able to use my built-in touchscreen facilities than an additional device for several reasons, including the need to carry extra equipment, which seems redundant given the capabilities of the laptop. Thanks to all concerned for the work you're putting into trying to make this work. So many of us are excited to see it up and running, and although we appear to be undergoing a little setback here, I'm sure it will work in the end. Cheers David

cc_armidale · ‎02-18-2019

Not working for me either. The stylus on my Lenovo touchscreen is laggy, the lines jagged and the "writing" keeps going even when I lift the stylus from the screen. In short, I think it may be worse than before the upgrade. At least I could create a basic tick, previously. SpeedGrader needs to recognise that it should stop writing when you lift your stylus or finger. If I use a mouse, right-clicking stops the writing, so I guess I may be able to find a button on my stylus to do the same. To all intents and purposes, though, this is not yet functional. Oh well, back to the drawing board. (Or not, as the case may be ...)

cc_armidale · ‎10-10-2018

This is a platform-independent issue with DocViewer in SpeedGrade and as far as I know, no-one can effectively use a finger or stylus to create freehand annotations. It is, though, an issue on which Instructure is working. As far as I can see, there haven't been any progress reports since 28 September, but we're all pleased that this is on the radar for Canvas. Many of us are waiting for the glorious day when we can hand-annotate documents in SpeedGrader. As they say in the classics, watch this space!

cc_armidale · ‎08-29-2018

Here's hoping, Gideon! I'm thrilled to see that there's been a positive response from Instructure. The teachers at our school are right behind you. It's been more than a year since you put up this idea. It seems to have gained traction. Thank you.

cc_armidale · ‎08-16-2018

One little tip just popped to mind. When I worked for a book publishing house (all those years ago now), if we did set material in all caps, we used to pop a double-space between all of the words to help alleviate the impression that the words were running together into a "blob" of text. TITLE OF THE BOOK TITLE OF THE BOOK It's not a big thing, but some may find it useful.

cc_armidale · ‎08-16-2018

Somewhere in the depths of my home office, or perhaps in my school one, I have a little book, based on research, that talks about all sorts of aspects of typography. I can't even remember what it's called (something like Communicating, Not Making Pretty Shapes. The author measured the comprehension rates among groups reading all sorts of text types, such as serif versus sans serif, caps versus upper and lower case, white on black versus black on white, and on and on it goes. He concluded, if I remember correctly, that there is a penalty on comprehension of blocks of text written in all caps, which we should best save for small bursts. I'd love to have the book here to be able to supply you with a quote and the figures. If I find it later, I might scan the relevant section and add it as a reply to this post. Reading through this fascinating thread, I can see good points on both sides. I fall somewhere in the middle. For headlines and BRIEF points of emphasis, caps can be a boon. For anything more than a few words, though, they become more difficult to read and comprehend, and we can lose our readers. I feel it's easier to differentiate between words in upper and lower case, and our letters have been designed that way, with ascenders and descenders and all. Thanks for an entertaining and informative discussion, everyone. Cheers!

cc_armidale · ‎08-14-2018

I'm marking 54 examination papers using Adobe Acrobat because the functionality isn't there in Canvas. I love just about everything about this platform and get excited about finding out new ways to do things. However, the deficit in being able to provide feedback on papers niggles away at me daily. Yes, you can do it, but the grading facilities are just plain clunky. So what am I thinking? Simple stuff. I want to be able to use the free draw tool to tick answers correct or write comments on the papers using a stylus. And I would love, as mentioned by Jeff Lloyd in the previous post, not to have to confirm every action on the page with an extra click. (Great call, Jeff!) I have faith in you, Canvas folks! Imagine the positive responses when you make this happen!

cc_armidale · ‎05-23-2018

This is a good question. Is there somewhere we can find out whether this feature is being considered? Within the school I work in, it's a very hot topic. Teachers with online classes have just been provided with great new laptops, complete with touchscreens and styluses. We're very keen to be able to use the devices to the fullest extent in SpeedGrader.

cc_armidale · ‎05-22-2018

It's a couple of years since this thread was active, but I was looking to set button widths and found it this morning. After some experimenting, I found the percentage width HTML coding useful for my purposes. It made the buttons a consistent width on my Canvas pages. Because I wasn't worried about height, it did the job. All of my buttons are now the same width, and if the text is too long to fit in a single line the button automatically resizes to accommodate it. If you want consistent width and height, this may not be what you need. I'll take some sample code from the fantastically helpful Buttons on Canvas pages thread: <a class="btn" title="Front Page" href="https://community.canvaslms.com/courses/346426/pages/front-page" data-api-endpoint=" https://weber.instructure.com/api/v1/courses/346426/pages/front-page " data-api-returntype="Page">Plain Button</a></p> To this I'll add the style code (blue and bold for visibility) to set the button width: <a class="btn" style="width: 40%;" title="Front Page" href="https://community.canvaslms.com/courses/346426/pages/front-page" data-api-endpoint=" https://weber.instructure.com/api/v1/courses/346426/pages/front-page " data-api-returntype="Page">Plain Button</a></p> You can change the percentage to any number that is appropriate for your purposes. This won't work for everyone and every Canvas page, but for what I'm doing in my courses, it neatens things up very nicely.

cc_armidale · ‎03-30-2018

I can't agree with you more, Gideon. And let's also think about how software developers are moving in this area. Microsoft and Adobe, for example (and there are plenty more out there), are marketing their products on the basis that they have features that allow us to use a stylus (or finger or tablet) for markup and even intuitive editing (Microsoft Office). Really, all I'm asking for is markup, so that I can quickly use my stylus (or finger or tablet) to comment on student work, or circle or tick things. I could do so in Moodle's PDF submission module (a rather clunky beast, if I'm honest) some years ago. I'm genuinely surprised (and I'm not being the slightest bit disingenuous here, I promise) that Canvas is lagging in this area. SpeedGrader is almost there. I think you'd be surprised how much kudos you would gain for Canvas were you to make this feature available. Cheers!

cc_armidale · ‎03-22-2018

A big, "Yes, please!" for this one. With tablet notebooks becoming increasingly common, this would be a very helpful feature. Two thumbs up!

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