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04 · Lessons and Steps

One lesson or an entire manual.

Give larger processes a clear structure that readers can navigate without getting lost.

Tutorial → Lessons → Steps

Every Gradatimo project has a top-level tutorial title, one or more lessons (managed in the left-hand Lessons tab), and an ordered sequence of steps inside each lesson. You can begin with a single short lesson and split or expand it into multiple lessons later.

Gradatimo lesson selector and numbered steps sidebar alongside the screenshot canvas

Reordering, combining, and moving steps

As your guide takes shape, you can reorder steps within a lesson, duplicate a step, combine related recorded actions into a single numbered step, delete redundant captures, or move a step into another lesson without rebuilding your project.

Text-only steps

Not every step requires a screenshot. Click + Text in the left sidebar to insert a text-only step for lesson introductions, prerequisites, materials lists, checklists, or safety notes. Text-only steps render cleanly at full width without empty image placeholders.

Attachments and supporting files

Instructional guides often require starter files, templates, or reference links. In the right-hand Step Attachments section, you can attach resources directly to a step:

  • Web links (http:// or https://): Included as clickable links in both PDF and HTML/website exports.
  • Local files: Stored inside your .gradatimo project and bundled as downloadable files in HTML and multi-lesson website exports.
  • Dedicated Attachments sidebar tab: Once an attachment is added anywhere in your project, a conditional Attachments tab appears in the left sidebar (Lessons | Steps | Attachments). This gives you a centralized overview of every project resource, allowing you to jump directly to the parent step, edit metadata, or manage files in one place.

Project storage optimization (File → Optimize Project…)

As tutorials grow with repeated recording takes, image edits, and narration clips, unused media can accumulate inside your single-file container. Gradatimo includes a transactional storage optimizer accessible from File → Optimize Project…:

  • Purging unused media: Safely purges unreferenced screenshots, deleted narration takes, and orphaned attachments from the project database.
  • Deduplicating identical screenshots: Consolidates identical captures across steps into single-source image records via SHA-256 content hashing.
  • Lossless WebP conversion: Converts active screenshot captures to lossless WebP whenever smaller, preserving 100% pixel fidelity while shrinking file size.
  • Compressed AAC audio transcoding: Transcodes legacy uncompressed audio recordings to compact mono 44.1 kHz AAC (.m4a) narration, reducing audio footprint by over 90%.
  • SQLite VACUUM & integrity check: Reclaims freed database pages and executes an integrity check to produce a compact, defragmented .gradatimo project file.
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