Elabora user manual
What Elabora is, the life of a course, and how this manual is organised.
Elabora is a desktop app for Mac and Windows, made for people who produce e-learning courses: freelancers and small studios.
You work in it with your own AI. Your agent (Claude Code in the Claude app, Codex in the ChatGPT app, or any other AI you paste the request into) writes the course plan and the screens. Elabora shows you the screens exactly as your learners will see them, lets you retouch them by hand and undo what the agent did, keeps track of the plan your client approved, collects your reviewers’ comments through a simple link, and delivers a SCORM 1.2 package for your client’s LMS, or a web version.
Elabora is in beta: the app changes quickly, and some features are marked Beta. Your feedback is welcome at contact@elabora.studio.
The life of a course
- You describe the course. On the New course page, you write your request and attach your client’s documents (a brief, a storyboard, a PowerPoint mockup, recordings). You can also start from a Storyline or Rise course.
- The agent writes the course plan. You read it, make a version of it (V1), send it to your client as Word or PDF, then record their approval.
- The agent writes the screens. You watch them being built and retouch them by hand: text, images, the order of blocks, interactions, voices.
- You have it reviewed. Preview plays the course as an LMS would, Checks list what is left to fix, and a review link lets your client comment online, without an account.
- You deliver. A SCORM 1.2 package set up for your client’s LMS, or a publication on the web.
How this manual is organised
- Getting started: installing Elabora, a tour of the app and working with your AI.
- Making a course: the New course page, bringing in a Storyline or Rise course, the course plan, screens and blocks, starter blocks, events, layers and steps, branching dialogues, the look, voices and narration and translation.
- Review and deliver: preview and checks, online reviews and publishing.
- Settings and help: the library, archives and history, Elabora settings, troubleshooting and the learning science behind Elabora.
Each page answers a practical question (“how do I…”). Names in bold are the ones you see in the app. When something is done by asking your agent rather than with a button, the page says so and gives an example request.
Elabora’s interface is in English or French, following your system’s language preferences. This manual exists in both languages.
For developers
The course format, the elabora command, the MCP server that agents use and the details of SCORM and web delivery have their own section, “For developers”: /en/docs/developers/.
Getting started
- Installing ElaboraWhat you need, how to install Elabora on Mac or Windows, and what happens the first time you open it.
- A tour of the appThe home page, a course’s window and its five views, and the shortcuts you will use every day.
- Working with your AIElabora’s chat and its free models, or your AI in its app: send a request, follow and undo what the agent does, and know what stays in your hands.
- Does Elabora work with Claude Code?Yes, with nothing to install. Elabora opens Claude Code in your course’s folder, and Claude Code edits the course with Elabora’s own command.
- Does Elabora work with Codex?Yes, with nothing to install, in the ChatGPT app or in a terminal. Elabora opens Codex in your course’s folder, and Codex edits the course with Elabora’s own command.
- Does Elabora work with Claude?Yes, through Elabora’s extension for the Claude desktop app: Claude’s chat then works on your courses, with Elabora’s own tools.
Making a course
- Creating a courseDescribe the course, attach your client’s documents, refine the request and let your AI write the first course plan.
- Bringing in a Storyline or Rise courseImport a Storyline project, a published Storyline course or a Rise export, then make your choices in the import report.
- The course plan, from draft to approvalRead and edit the course plan, make versions of it, send it to your client as Word or PDF, and record their approval.
- Screens and blocksSee screens as learners do, retouch text, add and move blocks, replace images and videos.
- Starter blocksElabora’s ready-made blocks, family by family, as you add them; what the inspector sets, “Transform into…”, required exploration and the Opening layout.
- Events, layers and stepsRead and retouch what happens when learners click or answer, open layers, reveal a screen step by step, remember values.
- Branching dialoguesAdd a dialogue, write it in Script, see it as a Map and a Table, set its characters, modes and voices, play it and send it to your client.
- Look: theme and playerSet the course’s colours, fonts and styles, choose between slides and a scrolling page, and set up the player.
- Voices and narrationWrite a screen’s narration, choose the voices, have them spoken on your computer or with ElevenLabs, and time blocks to the voice.
- Translating a courseAdd a language, translate with your AI, a translator or by yourself, review on screen and build one package per language.
Review and deliver
- Preview and checksPlay the course as a learner, simulate a screen reader or keyboard-only use, and deal with what the checks point out.
- Online reviewsShare a course through a link, read your reviewers’ comments in place on the screens, reply, and hand them to your AI.
- PublishingBuild the SCORM 1.2 package for your client’s LMS, set what the LMS receives, or publish the course on the web.
- Weight and energyWhat loading a course costs in energy, how Publish works it out, and what matters more than weight.
Settings and help
- Library, archives and historyWhere your courses live, how to import, export and delete them, and how to go back to an earlier version.
- Elabora settingsYour preferred AI, your Elabora account, your ElevenLabs key and its quota, the chat’s agent and what Elabora downloaded on your computer.
- TroubleshootingKnown problems and their fixes, and what to send us when something goes wrong.
- The learning science behind ElaboraWhat research says about predicting, narration, charts, motion, steps, feedback, branching dialogues, flip cards, reveal blocks and drag and drop, and what Elabora does with it. With references.
- Tested modelsHow AI models do on six real author requests in Elabora, how long they take, and what they cost.
For developers
The open format, the elabora command line, the tools for AI agents and SCORM delivery: the documentation of the open-source core.
- Getting startedRequirements, install, then validate, build, test and preview the sample courses, and start a course of your own.
- Working with an agentMCP, shell calls and direct file edits, the workflows each covers, tool selection for hosts, and the decisions only people make.
- Format specificationThe files of a course and their rules: the plan and its versions, screens, blocks, events, components, free objects, tracking, translation and archives.
- Built-in blocksEvery built-in block type with its props and how to fork its template.