PowerPoint and Presenting Stuff

DataPoint: Conversation with Kurt Dupont

DataPoint is an interfacing product that links PowerPoint to database sources opening up many new possibilities for developing dynamic, data-driven presentations.

There’s no one better than Kurt Dupont who heads PresentatonPoint, creators of DataPoint to tell us more about the features and possibilities of the product.

Geetesh: Tell us more about the new DataPoint enhancements and how can users benefit from them.

Kurt: DataPoint is our Microsoft PowerPoint add-in that links your presentation to dynamic and external data sources like databases and Microsoft Excel worksheets. It can be used as an information board or to keep your sales presentations really up-to-date.

Our customers are happy with its functionality but sometimes they come up with a suggestion for new functionality that we didn’t think of. Based on this user feedback we assemble a wish list. Now we made time to implement the 2 most wanted functionalities; multiple data scrolling on 1 slide and slide master linking.

Data scrolling already existed in previous versions. You add 1 slide to your presentation, add a text shape, connect it to a database and activate data scrolling. As a result, DataPoint will display each database value for a given time until all data (returned from the data connection) is displayed. It actually creates different virtual pages for all data. This feature can be used e.g. in a school where you display classroom information. You can put 5 classes on 1 slide but when you have 10 records of information in your database, DataPoint will display the first 5 records and afterward the following 5 records, with 1 physical slide only.

Now the data scrolling enhancement becomes active when you have a second data scrolling connection in use on the same slide. E.g. you want to add announcements to your slide. So first you specify that the classroom information is the master connection while the announcement connection is a slave connection. DataPoint will now continue to alternate all text shapes but now it will be able to detect when to jump to the next slide (when the last record of the master connection was shown on the screen).

A second most requested feature was slide master linking. Users wanted to place a dynamically linked text shape or just a simple live clock on the slide master so that it would appear on every slide in the presentation. This feature saves time as before the user had to create this text shape on every slide.

Geetesh: How do your other products integrate with DataPoint.

Kurt: First of all we have our MessagePoint; a screen saver solution that runs a PowerPoint presentation when the computer is idle. In combination with DataPoint you can have live production figures of a factory on the director’s desktop.

Secondly we have OutlookPoint which is an add-on for Microsoft Outlook. It copies all selected folders and items to a database such as email messages and appointments from your calendar. DataPoint will visualize this information in your PowerPoint presentation. With this scenario, you actually use OutlookPoint as a data entry application or content management system to feed your PowerPoint presentations. You can use a public calendar to enter appointments or announcements. When it nears the start time of the appointment, DataPoint will display the subject of that appointment on your monitor. Companies are using the mechanism to e.g. welcome people at the reception desk.

Finally we have NewsPoint. It retrieves RSS news feeds from the internet and inserts this information into a database. DataPoint technology is then used to add live business or sports news to your information system, next to the other data. The big advantage here is that with live news you get more attention from your audience where before only ‘boring’ company information was shown.

In the near future we will release TickerPoint; a database-driven scrolling text and image banner for Microsoft PowerPoint. It already includes the DataPoint kernel.

Thank you, Kurt. Check out DataPoint and other PresentationPoint products on their site — there are trial versions available for all products.

Filed Under: Interviews
Tagged as: Add-in, Data, Interviews, PowerPoint, PresentationPoint

PowerPoint 2007: A Tale of Two “Points”

Woodrow Windischman explains how you could use the new slide library feature in PowerPoint 2007.

PowerPoint presentations are the lifeblood of many a corporate meeting; however, getting a consistent message across has been difficult due to the fact that a PowerPoint deck is one big file. Sometimes, it is one really big file. If you have certain key business information and you want to ensure everyone presenting “gets it right”, your choices have generally been limited to providing a “standards” deck, containing all of your company’s boilerplate, and making everyone pull out the slides they need; or going through the tedious process of saving each slide or small block of slides individually, then having your users merge each file them into their working presentation…

Read the solution here.

Filed Under: PowerPoint 2007
Tagged as: Microsoft Office, Office 2007, PowerPoint, PowerPoint 2007, SharePoint

Web-based PowerPoint Killers?

By way of an entry on Bob Sutor’s blog, I found CNET editor Rafe Needleman talking about the various entries in the marketplace that could eventually serve as Web-based replacements for PowerPoint. Microsoft is already getting some pressure on the word processing and spreadsheet fronts. Should Web-based PowerPoint replacement get any traction, the implications for Office could be serious.

Read more on David Berlind’s blog on ZDNet.

Filed Under: Thoughts
Tagged as: Microsoft Office, PowerPoint

PowerPoint Cartoon Movies

And now you have PowerPoint cartoon movies! These cartoon movies are PowerPoint presentations that have been illustrated and animated within PowerPoint itself. Such a high level of animation or illustration would not have been possible without the synergy of both skills, as we found in this “movie” downloaded from Shawn Toh‘s PowerPoint Heaven site. We’re left wondering if the bar of PowerPoint skills has been elevated yet again.

I asked Shawn about the term “PowerPoint Movie,” and he explains that a PowerPoint Movie is an animated show or cartoon similar to those done using Adobe Flash. It is animated using a series of custom animations such as motion paths and emphasis effects.

Currently, Shawn has two movie series on his site: Shadow Fighter and Evolution Warriors.

Check out the series here.

Filed Under: PowerPoint All Versions
Tagged as: Animation, PowerPoint, Shawn Toh, Templates

Serious Magic: Conversation with Michelle Gallina

  Serious Magic creates award-winning video and presentation tools. Their newest offering Ovation makes it easy to bring professional effects to your existing PowerPoint presentations with a few clicks. In this conversation, Michelle Gallina, the Director of Marketing at Serious Magic joins us to discuss Ovation.

Geetesh: What does Ovation offer to PowerPoint users who have tons of existing presentations?

Michelle: Ovation is a software companion to PowerPoint that quickly transforms plain PowerPoint slides into a great-looking presentation. The result is a presentation that looks as if you hired a graphic design team to create it. It’s really quite powerful when you have a lot of presentations that need a facelift. Ovation also offers tools that help presenters stay on point and on time.

Geetesh: Are their original presentations altered in any way?

Michelle: Ovation doesn’t alter a PowerPoint presentation at all; it works alongside PowerPoint and performs as a player for presentations.

Geetesh: What are the requirements for Ovation in terms of hardware?

Michelle: Because the product adds a lot of movement to PowerPoint slides, it works best on newer laptops (less than 2 years old) with a good graphics processor (GPU). But I’ve seen Ovation produce great results on older computers too.

On our website, we run a system check to tell the user how Ovation will run on an individual computer.

Geetesh: What is the learning curve with Ovation?

Michelle: What’s great about Ovation is that you don’t have to spend a lot of time learning a new piece of software. You create and edit your presentation in PowerPoint like you normally do. Then just drop your PowerPoint file into Ovation. There are some slide customizations that Ovation offers and they’re easily accessible through Ovation’s tab-based interface. It’s really quite simple, but if users like more help, we offer a free video tutorial that is easily accessible within the program.

You can download a trial version of Ovation from the Serious Magic site.

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, Interviews, Ovation, PowerPoint