PowerPoint Notes
Info-things on PowerPoint usage including tips, techniques and tutorials.
Here's a question that I was asked recently: Labels: office_mac, powerpoint_2007, powerpoint_2008
Geetesh, I hope it is OK if I ask you a question about PowerPoint. You seem like the expert that can help me. I have a Mac with PowerPoint 2004 installed on it. My daughter created a PowerPoint at school on a 2007 version and can't make it work on our 2004. Should we buy the new 2008 version of Microsoft Office for the Mac. If we do, is that compatible with the the 2007 version. I want her to be able to take her work from school and be able to work on it at home. What do you think? Thanks for your time.
I am guessing your daughter created a PowerPoint presentation in the new PPTX file format that is native to both PowerPoint 2007 for Windows and PowerPoint 2008 for the Mac. So, yes upgrading to PowerPoint 2008 on the Mac will allow you to open and save PPTX files that will let your daughter take her work from school to home, and back.
Alternatively, you can get the free Open XML File Format Converter for Mac that will let you open and save these PPTX files from within your existing PowerPoint 2004. This is a great solution if you just need to view the PPTX files in PowerPoint 2004. On the other hand if she needs to work on those files at home, and move them often between home and school, then I suggest you upgrade to PowerPoint 2008. Since she is a student, you can get the three-license version of the Microsoft Office 2008 Home & Student version for around $100.
This quick tutorial was provided with George McCaskill of Visual Exemplars, a UK based company that creates Perspector, a 3D add-in for PowerPoint. Labels: perspector, powerpoint_2007
Figure 1: A Perspector 3D list.
Figure 2: A Perspector list with PowerPoint 2007 effects.
Labels: case, language, powerpoint, powerpoint_2007
Echo Swinford, PowerPoint MVP resolves the mystery of the algorithm behind the changing cases in PowerPoint!
Do you use Shift+F3 to toggle through the change case options on selected text in PowerPoint, and wonder why sometimes only the first word gets a capital letter, but at other times all the words get capitalized?
Here's a more detailed example -- suppose I double-click to select all the words in a text box on the slide: fetal and neonatal disease. I hit Shift+F3. I expected to get Fetal And Neonatal Disease and then, if I hit Shift+F3 again, FETAL AND NEONATAL DISEASE.
Instead, the first time I hit Shift+F3, I get Fetal and neonatal disease. The second time, I get all caps, and the third time I'm back to all lower case as expected. But how do I know when to expect sentence case (e.g., Fetal and neonatal disease) and when to expect title case* (e.g., Fetal And Neonatal Disease)?
*And yes, I know it's not a true title case -- in fact, you'll notice that in 2007 this is now called "Capitalize Every Word," not "Title Case."
I think this has to do with punctuation, or, rather, an invisible paragraph marker at the end of text.
Here's what Beth Melton, Word MVP (thanks, Beth!) and I figured out:
If you select text in a Title Placeholder and Shift+F3, you'll get title case.
If you select text in a manual textbox, which you get depends on what you've selected and also HOW you've selected it. In the case of selecting all text in a textbox, for example, "fetal and neonatal studies"...
Personally, this all seems overly complicated to me. Sure wish we could see the non-printing characters; I probably would have figured this out years ago....
*I'm assuming an invisible paragraph marker because if you try the three ways to select text and then paste the text into a new empty textbox, the first two ways give you an empty "paragraph" below, while the third way (right-to-left) doesn't.
Echo Swinford runs EchosVoice, a site containing many PowerPoint tips. She is also author of Fixing PowerPoint Annoyances and PowerPoint 2007 Complete Makeover Kit.
Here's a question that I received from someone who once sent me an animated Christmas game! He's probably got a lot of other animated stuff that might get you either mad or mesmerized (or both!) -- but for now, here's his question: I'll spare you the details but can you now no longer ungroup charts in PowerPoint 2007? Labels: charts, graphics, powerpoint_2007
The answer is yes, you can -- but the route to ungroup nirvana might be new -- but fear not, let me get you there:
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