PowerPoint and AutoPlay Media Studio
Covers PowerPoint 2003 Viewer and AutoPlay Media Studio 5
By: Geetesh Bajaj
Date Created:
Last Updated: March 3rd 2009
Back To Our Splash
Button Actions
Refining Your Splash
Compiling Your Autorun
Support
Step 7 - Back To Our Splash
Open your saved project from Step 5. Anytime you want to preview your work in AutoPlay Menu Studio, press the F5 key.
- Go to Insert | Label and type any name in the Text area of
the resultant Label Properties dialog box. Change to any font
as required. I set my Normal State Color to White and opted to
match my Highlight and Click colors to White as well. Click OK
to exit the dilog box and reposition the Label text within the
work areas as required.
- Go to Insert | Button and choose one of the readymade button
styles included within Autoplay Media Studio - you'll have to
click the Open icon next to the button name on the dialog box
to find these.
- Resize the button as required - then duplicate them to end
up with 6 buttons (see screenshot). You'll need to align and
distribute the buttons through the options available from the
Object | Align menu.
- Select any of the text boxes and format the font and captions
using the Properties Inspector panel. If the Properties panel
is not visible, choose View | Property Inspector. Format all
the buttons as required - choosing a different caption for each
of them.
- Now, we have the basic structure of the autorun CD ready with
the splash screen. Let's now add some actions for all the buttons.
Step 8 - Button Actions
- Right click a button and choose Properties (or double-click
the button).
- In the resultant Properties dialog box, select the Actions
tab. Click the Add Action button found on the bottom left.
- Choose 'File' in the Category drop-down box and 'File.Run'
in the Action drop-down box. Click Next.
- In the next dialog ox, click the ellipses next to the Filename
option. In the Select File dialog box, select the Project tab.
You'll probably need to move up two folders above the visible
folder to find the four folders that I saved to contain the presentations.
- I then opened the folder called 01 and selected the pptview.exe
file. Click OK.
- In the area next to the Args (Arguments) option, I'll type
in the name of the PowerPoint file that needs to be played -
in my case, that's called Presentation1.ppt - also I chose a
working folder. Autoplay Media Studio might change the location
within the Filename option so make sure everything matches with
the screenshot below.
- Assign the other three presentations in the same way.
- Open Windows Notepad and type any information which you think will
be helpful for your end-user. Save this text file as 'readme.txt'
within your CD_Root folder. Link the Readme button to the text
file using a File.Open Action (see screenshot)
- For the final web site link button, choose a File.OpenURL action
and type the URL of your web site (see screenshot)
- Press F5 to preview your autorun CD. Save the presentation.
Step 9 - Refining Your Splash
This step is entirely optional.
You've successfully created an autorun splash and the other files that activate from hyperlinks within that.
Now you can spend some time in fine-tuning and refining your splash to include your company logo, background music and other paraphernalia.
Save your project.
Step 10 - Compiling Your Autorun
If everything seems fine, publish your autorun CD using the Project
| Publish (or F7) option. Choose to output to a folder or burn
straight to CD.
Support
Although you should have no problems replicating this tutorial step by step, I don't welcome support queries especially since I don't have the time to respond to each question. That doesn't mean that you won't get support for anything related to this tutorial.
Indigo Rose has probably the best support options - you'll find FAQs, knowledge bases, forums and email support on their site in addition to tutorials. I strongly recommend you post your problems or doubts in their support forums.
