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Thoughts and impressions of happenings in the world of PowerPoint and presentations, continuously updated since 2003.
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PowerPoint and Presenting Notes
PowerPoint and Presenting Glossary
Liber Rodriguez-Florez was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, but is resident in Sweden. He holds a Master of Science in Engineering Physics and works as the Sales Director of Novatrox AB where he is responsible for the technical sales towards international customers. Prior to joining Novatrox AB, Liber worked several years at Relevant Traffic, a highly competitive Search Engine Marketing company, as Technical Director cooperating closely with the Relevant Traffic sales department.
In this discussion, Liber discusses Novatrox’s Slide Executive product.
Geetesh: Liber, tell us more about the improvements in Slide Executive Professional 2.3?
Liber: We have improved and streamlined a numerous number of things that will increase usability and make working with Slide Executive even easier. I can’t tell you everything we’ve done because I would go on for too long. But here are some top picks:
Search improvements: A search form is now accessible from the toolbar so you can start a search for slides or files without needing to click any menu or button first. This is very handy not only for slides but also if you want to look for some file you know is far down in the folder structure. Just as before you can limit your search by searching just a part of your slide library from folder down to presentation level. Also, the relevancy of the search is improved since Slide Executive takes account of more parameters when sorting the results. We also added some nice shortcut buttons for each slide in the slide search results, allowing you to immediately download a slide’s master presentation or going to that slide’s master presentation directly within Slide Executive.
Auditing and statistics: For managers, we have added auditing and statistics to improve the possibility to track how Slide Executive is used in their user base. We have added both general statistics and audit trails on file and folder level. This way you can see exactly who has viewed or downloaded a particular presentation/file in the system in any period of time. The general statistics give you numbers like the total number of indexed slides and indexed presentations resident in the system and much more. Thanks to the easy access of information we now know that having thousands or even tens of thousands of slides in a Slide Executive slide library, is a common thing among our customers.
Progress details: Now when you import or export presentations to the system you are shown continuous information of what Slide Executive is doing, basically you see the progress slide by slide from indexing to creation of thumbnails. You can also choose to cancel a job at any time.
Export options: Slide Executive has always allowed a variety of export options. A new feature is that you can now export to older PowerPoint versions. Together with the already existing export possibilities to PDF, web archive, web page, etc.. we now offer a complete set of export options reducing the steps for preparing materials for professionals.
Previews: Now you can preview how a virtual presentation will look when new versions of master presentations have been imported. If you have chosen to update your virtual presentations manually (the automatic update works as before, updating immediately) you will be able to see all new versions of updated slides on the forehand, before choosing to update. You can also choose to update slide by slide on an individual level. Of course, you can also preview the new slide version before updating a single slide.
More features: We have also introduced other new features like a garbage can to be able to restore deleted files, the ability to add discussion posts per slide (not just per presentation like before) to allow user comments on ongoing work, new actions added to the roles section for customizing what each user can do within the system, a last visited files section with links to the files you looked at recently and many more minor things to improve the user experience in Slide Executive.
Let me also mention our coming release which I am very excited about. If 2.3 has been packed with new, truly good features, our 2.4 release in the first quarter of 2009 will be introducing some new functionality to improve the user experience dramatically.
Geetesh: Can you give us an idea about your support infrastructure?
Liber: Novatrox always gives personal support from highly skilled people. We provide support in form of phone, mail, and even by remote desktop connection if needed. Having support staff who have thorough knowledge about development allows us to respond not only with immediate qualified support but also to collect new ideas and requirements to implement for “the next version”.
On our website, we have a Support Center where we have all kinds of information available for our users. Apart from document downloads, an extensive forum, and contact information, we also have flash video instructions for paying customers.
The views and opinions expressed in this blog post or content are those of the authors or the interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.
Filed Under:
Interviews
Tagged as: Interviews, Liber Rodriguez-Florez, PowerPoint, Presentation Management, Slide Management
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AnimationFactory is a huge resource of visual content that we have known for a very long time now. Founded in 1996, the site now comprises over 500,000 animations, video backgrounds, PowerPoint templates, backdrops, web graphics, sound clips, Flash source files, etc. They have a dedicated team of on-house artists who create this content. Their media elements can be used in any kind of presentation.
Filed Under:
Clip Media
Tagged as: Animation, Clip Media, PowerPoint, Review, Templates
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Ebba Åsly Fåhraeus is VP of Sales Marketing Forms at Anoto, a leader of digital pen & paper technology. Anoto was founded in 1999 and is the pioneering leader of digital pen & paper technology, based in Lund, Sweden. Anoto technology optimizes paper-based processes by rapidly and reliably converting handwritten information from business forms into digital documents.
In this discussion, Ebba discusses the use of Anoto technology for PowerPoint usage.
Geetesh: Tell us about the Anoto product line-up, and which of the Anoto products work best with PowerPoint.
Ebba: Anoto is the pioneering leader of digital pen & paper technology. Anoto technology optimizes paper-based processes by rapidly and reliably converting handwritten information from business forms into digital documents.
By far the most exciting product offered by Anoto is a PowerPoint add-in called Anoto penPresenter. It utilizes the Anoto digital pen and Bluetooth technology, enabling real-time collaboration during presentations. Users can make notes or sketch on their printed PowerPoint slides using an Anoto Digital Pen and instantly see them appear on their computer, projector, monitor, or flat-screen LCD screen. The slide can then be saved, printed, or e-mailed.
Geetesh: Can you share some scenarios in which PowerPoint users can benefit from the Anoto penPresenter?
Ebba: Anoto penPresenter allows users to have a more engaged audience in a meeting room environment and puts focus on the meeting itself.
Scenarios in which users can benefit include having to use an electronic whiteboard and not being able to easily transport it from room to room or floor to floor. They aren’t as portable as penPresenter.
Have you ever needed to transcribe notes for data entry after a meeting? Or have you ever brainstormed an idea on a whiteboard only to have it erased before anyone “took notes”?
Anoto penPresenter allows you to make notes and sketches on your PowerPoint slides with the Anoto Digital Pen and see the results instantly on the meeting room screen. Later on, they can easily be saved, printed, and emailed to the meeting room participants.
Most importantly, have you ever tried to do something to make your PowerPoint® slides more engaging? Anoto penPresenter enhances your slides in creative ways and you certainly won’t put people to sleep with them!
The views and opinions expressed in this blog post or content are those of the authors or the interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.
Filed Under:
Interviews
Tagged as: Add-in, Delivery, Hardware, Interviews, PowerPoint
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Andy Pope works in London, UK, developing in-house reporting systems. He uses VBA to automate Excel and PowerPoint. In his spare time, he frequents various Excel forums and maintains his own website on Excel charting. His contributions to the Excel community have resulted in him being awarded as a Microsoft Excel MVP since 2004.
In this discussion, Andy discusses the Chart Pattern Fills add-in for Excel 2007.
Geetesh: Andy, tell us more about your Chart Pattern Fills add-in for Excel 2007, and what motivated you to create this add-in?
Andy: I developed the add-in in response to posts by users who need the pattern fills feature that was depreciated in Excel 2007. Apparently, pattern fills are heavily used by those in academia. I was aware that, actually only the user interface for the feature had been removed, so I went about reconstructing the Patterns dialog. I enjoyed the challenge of creating a dialog that would dynamically reflect the user’s color choices, rather than just using static images.
It’s a totally free add-in and available on my site.
Geetesh: PowerPoint 2007 users also no longer have access to the pattern fills so will this add-in work for them too?
Andy: Unfortunately, not directly within PowerPoint. The porting of the add-in to PowerPoint is not currently possible. This is due to limitations in PowerPoint’s VBA Object Model and how the add-ins function works compared to those in Excel. As and when/if Microsoft makes appropriate changes, I will attempt to make a PowerPoint version.
In the meantime, for those wanting to use the add-in, you can create their chart in Excel, format it as required using the add-in, and then insert the saved file as an Object within PowerPoint.
See Also: Pattern Fills Add-in: Conversation with John Wilson
The views and opinions expressed in this blog post or content are those of the authors or the interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.
Filed Under:
Interviews
Tagged as: Add-in, Andy Pope, Charting, Excel, PowerPoint
Design Science announced the new 6.5 release of MathType for Windows. Starting from this release, Design Science is positioning MathType as a universal editor for mathematical notation. There are no new PowerPoint-specific features, but here’s a list of the updates, provided by Bob Mathews of Design Science:
Up until now, MathType has been thought of mostly as a tool that works with Microsoft Word and PowerPoint. But it has always been much more than that. You can label graphs with equations, create equation images for websites, blogs, wikis, export equations to TeX or MathML, and much more. See Works With to see our MathType Interoperability Registry, which lists the many, many applications and websites MathType works with. More info here.
If you know the TeX typesetting language, you can type it directly into your Word document. When you are done, the TeX code will be converted to a MathType equation. [Bob’s note: This isn’t automatic. You can either click an icon on the toolbar or Ribbon or use the Alt keystroke.] The TeX Toggle keyboard shortcut allows you to toggle between TeX and MathType views of the equation.
Many of our customers like to use the keyboard. Now you can open an equation next to the insertion point using a keyboard shortcut. Together with our new TeX Toggle feature, you can now enter and edit equations completely from the keyboard without leaving Word.
As part of our “Equations Everywhere and Anywhere” effort, we have added new translators for many applications and websites.
Now you can import mathematics defined using MathML from the many applications that produce it. MathML code can be either in the new MathML Clipboard Format that is supported by a growing number of mathematical and scientific applications or plain text, such as from an XML editor, for example. The MathML can be imported via cut and paste or drag and drop.
Thank you so much, Bob!
Bob Mathews is the Director of Training for Design Science. A former military pilot, Bob came to Design Science in 1999 after teaching high school mathematics for several years. MathType from DesignScience is probably the foremost equation program available today — it integrates seamlessly with Microsoft Office programs including PowerPoint.
The views and opinions expressed in this blog post or content are those of the authors or the interviewees and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company.
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Companion Programs
Tagged as: Bob Mathews, Education, Equations, MathType, PowerPoint
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