MB protocol size

Help & Support
1

Dear all,
My network canvas protocol is 213 MB and network canvas interviewer on the android tablet cannot import it. Is there anything you could suggest I can do? I am running a parallel protocol using Fresco but I need the option offline for where respondents cannot access to wifi.
Many thanks for the help,
Chiara

2

Hi Chiara

Thanks for your question!

I am honestly quite impressed that you’ve managed to construct such a large protocol. Can I assume that you are making quite extensive use of photos or videos?

If so, my suggestion is that you look at compressing those assets further so that the file size is reduced. If you aren’t familiar with how to do that, I can possibly assist you if you tell me what kinds of assets you have.

With that said, the Android version of Interviewer should still be able to import your protocol. Can you say more about what happens when you try?

If you are able to send it to me, by emailing joshua@northwestern.edu, I can also take a look.

3

Dear Joshua,

Thank you so much for your response and assistance! After comparing the file sizes with previous protocols from other projects, I noticed a significant difference, which led me to realize that the video might have been the issue. I’ve now created a version of the protocol without the introductory video for offline interviews, and Canvas is working perfectly.

Lesson learned: no introductory video on Canvas, but it’s all good for Fresco.

Thanks again for your help!

Best regards,
Chiara

4

Ah, okay!

It seems a shame to remove the video for Android users. If you’d like me to either talk you through how to compress the video, or look into why it wasn’t importing correctly, please let me know.

Otherwise, glad to have been able to help.

5

To update anyone interested, I was able to compress Chiara’s protocol down from 213mb to 6.3mb.

I did this using two tools:

  • Handbrake - This is a free and open source video compression tool. I used the preset “Web → Email 25mb 5 Minutes 480p30”. This will compress the video quite substantially. You can use one of the 720p presets to keep more video quality. In my experience higher resolutions are not needed.
  • ImageOptim - This is a small free app for macOS only (sorry!) that allows you to drag and drop images which will then automatically be compressed. You can achieve the same results by using photoshop or GIMP, and carefully setting the quality setting of JPEG files, reducing the resolution of the image, and potentially also reducing the color depth.

Please also take care to remove any unused assets from your protocol, as these will also contribute to the size. Do this by checking for assets labelled “unused” in the Resource Library from within Architect.

Hopefully this is useful!