Mike Power is the founder and Managing Director of Neuxpower, a software solutions company based in the UK. Neuxpower custom-build both stand-alone applications and add-ins that enhance existing software such as Microsoft Office. Their commercially-available PowerPoint optimizer, NXPowerLite, radically reduces the size of PowerPoint files.
Geetesh: Tell us more about the new NXPowerLite 3.
Mike: NXPowerLite 3 is a compression tool created specifically for Microsoft Office users. It can dramatically reduce the size of Word, Excel and PowerPoint files -- sometimes by as much as 98% -- with no discernible loss of quality. It does this by intelligently compressing the graphics and embedded documents contained within your files, as well as removing the 'junk data' that builds up during the creation and editing of Office files.
We released the first version of NXPowerLite six years ago as a PowerPoint-only product -- and it quickly became the de facto standard tool for PowerPoint compression. NXPowerLite 2, which followed in 2005, contained a number of significant improvements. It worked directly on the PowerPoint file (rather than by automating PowerPoint), enabling lightning-fast compression times. We also added new features such as batch processing and an Outlook add-in that automatically optimized email attachments before sending them.
Our customers loved the software, but kept asking us to develop something similar to reduce the size of Word and Excel files. We eventually decided to create just one program that worked with Word, Excel and PowerPoint files, in order to offer ease of use and the best possible value for money. We are very proud of NXPowerLite 3, which was released in February. It is currently the only product of its type that works with all three of the main Microsoft Office file formats -- and customer feedback has been fantastic!
Geetesh: Tell us more about your plans to support Office 2007 file formats.
Mike: NXPowerLite 3 does not currently support Office 2007's new XML file formats, as the structures were finalised too late in our development process. But our developers are currently working hard on the new formats and a fully-compatible version of NXPowerLite 3 will be available later this year. Our Office 2007 Guarantee means that everybody that has purchased NXPowerLite since Office 2007 was released last December was will receive a free upgrade.
Meanwhile, the current version of NXPowerlite integrates perfectly with Office 2007, but you will need to save your files in '97-2003' format ('compatibility mode') before compressing them with NXPowerLite. Of course, this will also ensure that your files can be opened and edited by people with older versions of Office.
When will the 2007 compatible version come? I only became interested in Powerpoint since the 2007 version, so that converting to 2003 version, I would lose what I like best about Powerpoint 2007 - the graphical effects.
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posted by ByteDreams : Friday, July 13, 2007 9:49:00 AM
