DonationCoder.com Forum
Main Area and Open Discussion => General Software Discussion => Topic started by: JavaJones on April 20, 2010, 07:45 PM
-
I'm currently having to edit a bunch of Powerpoints for the school I work for because they were created by people who don't know how to make Powerpoints properly. I'm dealing with things like lack of master slide use, inconsistent font types and formatting, horrible color use, photos thrown around randomly on slides, and (not Powerpoint's fault) rampant copyright issues.
My question is twofold.
First, when it comes to making presentations, are there any better options that:
A: Can easily enforce or at least suggest good formatting practices (e.g. auto-align photos, auto-crop text boxes to their necessary size - and no larger, perhaps even automatically select complementary colors)
B: Ensure consistent styling across *multiple* presentations
C: Ideally allow single sourcing and central styling adjustment for all presentations, so for example I could change the border color for all photos using "PhotoStyle1A" and it would change all related presentations
Actually, come to think of it, it sounds like I'm describing HTML and CSS. But are there any good, easy authoring tools that create Powerpoint-like results, and accomplish the above as well?
Second, assuming that visual learning materials that structure an instructor-led class are a requirement, does anyone have any recommended alternatives to a Powerpoint or other slide-based presentation? Particularly something that will enhance engagement and retention for the audience, provide structure and ensure consistency in presentation across multiple sessions of the same class topic, and be easily re-used in other formats (e.g. handouts or workbooks, etc.).
Feel free to think creatively - really creatively if you want to - e.g. web-based Flash learning environment, or whatever. As long as it can be functionally used in the classroom for a lecture-style teaching model at the least. Direct relationship/links to other systems and information would be a nice side-effect, but simplicity is also key.
Oh great DC community, I beseech thee. Rescue me from Powerpoint hell!
- Oshyan
-
I can't think of anything easier to learn for school kids (but then I haven't really looked).
Rather than bemoaning the lack of control surely this is golden opportunity to teach about the need for consistency and design methods (such as master slides) as well as the need to involve an audience.
Second, assuming that visual learning materials that structure an instructor-led class are a requirement, does anyone have any recommended alternatives to a Powerpoint or other slide-based presentation? Particularly something that will enhance engagement and retention for the audience, provide structure and ensure consistency in presentation across multiple sessions of the same class topic, and be easily re-used in other formats (e.g. handouts or workbooks, etc.).
-JavaJones
The big problem is that most of these slide presentations are tediously dull and getting duller by the day. The only thing that will make this sort of thing exciting it a good speaker presenting them and getting the kids involved.
I think schools and teachers have a huge problem: as more and more technology is integrated into the teaching process (and in the UK forced upon teachers) it will get harder and harder to be distinctive in classroom presentation.
There are only so many power point shows anyone can watch in a day and I predict that within the next five to ten years either a lot of computer based presentation will go from the classroom or kids will be supplied with a cheap laptop and told to stay at home and be taught remotely - the you could have virtual classes of thousands with automated marking systems ;)
Either welcome back proper teaching (giving teachers real flexibility to be creative) or brave new world here we come.
-
Thanks for the reply Carol. Your first sentence confuses me a bit though. It seems to imply you thought I meant that kids were creating powerpoints? If so, that's definitely not the case. Actually, no kids are involved at all, as I work for an adult vocational education institute. ;)
As for your later comment about over emphasis of technology in education, I do somewhat agree. However in our particular case we are teaching a vocational curriculum and it's extremely important to maintain consistency across multiple campuses (and Distance Learning), even while allowing teachers enough room for their own lecture style and added knowledge. We're certifying people in health-advising positions (not medical degrees though), and so having a common standard of education is key.
Anyway, I think perhaps your answer might simply be that we need to train anyone doing Powerpoints on how to do them right. And that's probably true. It's just not something I relish being responsible for doing, let alone doing it myself. The sad thing is this stuff comes intuitively for me, but I'm not the one with the knowledge to write the actual curriculum materials. ;)
- Oshyan
-
You know, I have never used Powerpoint, but a quick and easy way to do a slide show is to create a series of images in Paintshop Pro, Photoshop, or some other graphics application, name them beginning with numbers to keep the images in order, and stick them all in the same folder.
When you view that folder in Explorer, there is an option to view the folder as a slideshow. Stick it on pause and use the arrow keys on the keyboard to navigate through the slides.
They get autosized to fit the screen, black bordered if they don't fit quite right (wallpaper sized works best and won't be bordered).
The images can be used for a whole bunch of other things, including printing them or inserting them into other documents, if you want.
And if you need to fix or replace one slide, that's easy enough, and adding more is easy too. Need to change the order? Just rename the files.
And you don't need to install any extra software to show the slideshow. It's built into Windows.
As far as creating consistent looking slides, that can be done with a layered template in PSP or Photoshop, where you set the image size, the background color, a logo in the corner of the top layer, a text layer with the font, style, and color pre-selected, and an image layer to insert a graphic.
When it needs to be edited to make a new slide, you just change the text on the text layer and insert a new image on the graphic layer.
-
Misunderstanding - the word school doesn't translate well into different countries (in the UK it means for children - adults go to colleges or universities)
If people are having problems using and being consistent in Powerpoint I somehow doubt that moving to PhotoShop (or PSP) will make that any easier!
Why not simply issue a style guide for PowerPoint (if you want people to use master slides try the help option in Powerpoint and lookup Master Slide - it gives a very good overview of what they are and how to create/use them - you can cut and paste from the help section to create a quick style guide with instructions). You could even give them a couple of powerpoint presentations to illustrate how much better a well styled presentation looks (even better run it in a staff meeting and grab their attention).
Give them a handful of master slides to base presentations on - they will probably appreciate that even more!
-
If people are having problems using and being consistent in Powerpoint I somehow doubt that moving to PhotoShop (or PSP) will make that any easier!
amen to that.
i understand JavaJones desire for consistency and it would be nice to hear if there is a solution to that, but i've found PowerPoint to be an excellent tool for presentations, and don't think you should even entertain the possibility of switching to a non-presentation-specific tool.
that's not to say that one of the powerpoint clones might not be better for your use, i can't speak to that.
-
Whenever I do slides for presentations or talks I use Beamer (http://latex-beamer.sourceforge.net/). Perhaps not for the faint of heart but if you want consistency you cannot do better than separating content from structure through use of a mark-up language.
-
This doesn't help you, Oshyan -- sorry -- but for the benefit of other readers:
Please don't create those awful corporate presentation that have the entire content of the presentation in outline bullets, shoveled into page after page of presentation. And please don't do a presentation that consists of paging through that slide deck reading the bullets. You're wasting your time and mine; better to invest it in writing real prose and sending me the email. Here's a great example of how corporate presentation-ism can ruin one of the world's greatest presentations: http://norvig.com/Gettysburg/
Use your slide deck to highlight what you're talking about, and let your audience focus on you and what you're saying.
See http://www.presentationzen.com/
-
I wish I could better explain the complete environment, history, and challenge(s) here, hehe. I appreciate all the input, but I don't have any really new info yet.
I don't think a graphics app program workflow would be an improvement on what we're doing now. It does give *more*flexibility in design, which could be a good thing if expert designers were involved, but since the opposite is true, more flexibility is actually dangerous. ;) There are also missing features like a "presenter" view that shows note. And almost everything else mentioned in this workflow is actually easier in Powerpoint already, e.g. rearranging slides, etc. If I were looking for a super simple, low-budget solution, an image-based slideshow is certainly a viable option however.
I know how to use Master Slides, and there are some notable improvements in that for 2007 which are very welcome. However there are a lot of problems with the implementation, at least for our needs. First and foremost you can't (as far as I know) easily use the same master slide design in multiple presentations. Of course you can copy the master slides from one to another and build your presentation on them, but if you ever make a change in them, you have to go through each one and re-apply. A way to manage styles centrally would be very welcome.
The way that content area formatting and copy/paste is handled also seems to be problematic. For instance a lot of our content developers might initially create their base content in another app, or be using at least some info from it. When you copy/paste, often times the source formatting is maintained, Powerpoint doesn't necessarily enforce its master slide content formatting. Now in some cases this is obvious, like the text being a totally different color or something, but often times it will just be a subtle difference in font types (or at least subtle to a non-designer, many of whom can't easily tell the difference between Times New Roman and Arial at a glance).
Even assuming the master slide functionality worked well and enforced standards, there are further issues. For one thing, different slides need different layouts. So you create multiple child master slides. Except then people need to actually use them properly, and they seldom do. Defining the slide layouts in advance of the content authoring is problematic in itself, but even once that's in place people often find it too restrictive and, since the formatting tools are there at their disposal, they just start tweaking until they get what they want. Often it's not even an aesthetic thing so much as "I need the photo to go here instead of over there so I can fit all my content in". Now here is the point where you probably think "If there's a problem fitting the content on, they're probably not using Powerpoint right", and you'd probably be correct. But such is the environment I'm dealing with - it's seldom within the power of the IT department to enforce standards of content authorship (i.e. "Use Powerpoint the *right* way or don't use it at all"), much as I would like to.
Ultimately I'm sure it's clear by now that this is a human problem, but I'm looking for a technological solution since I can't easily change all the humans in the equation. ;) You may say training will address these issues, but I've tried that, and it's only a partial solution. People often just forget to use the right layout, or don't reference the style guide for particular design choices, whether willfully or simply by accident.
I think the reality, as I alluded to above, is that the more options you give people, the worse it often is. I'm envisioning kind of my ideal system right now, and it looks to me like a super stripped down HTML editor, with 1, maybe 2 font choices, 6 (maximum) text size options, 1 "box" item (for adding boxes), an "add photo" function that automatically ads a copyright attribution when enabled, and has limited position options within the content frame (and text areas will be automatically adjusted based on where you place the photo), maybe 5 pre-chosen color options, no overlapping allowed, etc. *Maybe* they'd have the option of choosing a few template layout options, but ideally the main content area would just be adjusted between a few very simple designs based on what elements were added by the content author and where they were placed, i.e. the photo option above. All the styling would be driven by a CSS file, so I could easily change it across all presentations instantly. It would be super limiting, but it would enforce a clean design, and if these people didn't know there was an option to have more freedom, they wouldn't really miss it.
Now there are plenty of WYSWIYG HTML editors out there, but none that are that customizable as far as I know, nor do they necessarily fulfill all the above requirements. Does anyone have an idea of what else might even come close to this?
Eoin, Beamer looks cool, but way overcomplicated for this. ;)
Thanks for all the input thus far. As I suspected it's looking so far like there is nothing that can really improve on Powerpoint (though I'm curious about alternatives like Keynote - anyone have any experience?). I'm also curious if anyone has any experience with or advice on what might be used to help guide a class *instead* of a traditional Powerpoint-type presentation.
I think for now the best thing I can do is just continue working on education and best possible enforcement of appropriate standards and styles, using master slides and style guides. It's just a lot of work to do this, and we don't have a Powerpoint expert on staff besides myself (I wouldn't really call myself an expert), so there's no one with the right combination of design and technical knowledge to do it "right". The one person we had - my girlfriend as an intern - quickly got fed up with the haphazard lack of adherence to standards here and decided not to work on these projects. :P
- Oshyan
-
I'd be surprised if you can find something that addresses your first point.
Far better to give your teachers the skills to create strong, engaging designs without losing Powerpoint's flexibility.
I'd suggest Death By Powerpoint (http://www.slideshare.net/thecroaker/death-by-powerpoint) for a good presentation specific introduction, and Robin Williams' The Non-Designer's Design Book (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Non-Designers-Design-Book-Robin-Williams/dp/0321534042/ref=pd_bxgy_b_text_b) for general design skills.
For the second point, have a look at Adobe Captivate (http://www.adobe.com/products/captivate/) or Articulate (http://www.articulate.com/) - Flash based elearning authoring tools.
Though why your teachers think their students will learn by watching an instructor run through a slideshow, no matter what authoring package they used, is beyond me. It's not the 1950s any more ;)
If you want a quick and dirty solution, then just remove the formatting. Completely. 18 point Times Roman black on white background might be the dullest design ever, but at least the design won't distract from the content.
Please, I don't want to know how bad the content is ;)
-
Thanks Katy. I'd love to give the writers (not all of whom are the teachers) the skills they need, but these are people with limited time who are focused on either writing content, or teaching it (or both). They simply don't have the time (or energy, probably) to read through dedicated Powerpoint books and learn how to do it right (much as I agree with the necessity and value of it!). Even if they had the time, I'm not in a position to enforce them doing so. That being said I will recommend those books to the content authors for the future.
I'm familiar with Captivate (expensive!) and Articulate (also expensive, but we bought it anyway :D). We'll be using Articulate, but it's really just a Powerpoint converter for the most part. It makes nice Flash format presentation conversions with integrated audio, which will be a nice upgrade for our future programs, but it doesn't help much with the problems I'm trying to tackle.
As for why we're using Powerpoints, first I don't want to give the impression that we're just doing "by the numbers" presentations, simply reading the Powerpoints. Far from it. If anything some of the teachers stray too far from that. The thing is I think there's a knee-jerk tendency whenever anyone talks about Powerpoint to blame the usage of it at all rather than try to fix the problem. It's not fair to assume we're using Powerpoint in the wrong way, or that using it is unnecessary in our context. One very good reason for its use, which I described above (and asked for alternative solutions to), is the need to maintain consistency in basic information instruction across sites. As a vocational school it's very important for us to have standards and consistency, and to teach reproducible competencies across multiple locations and formats. So *something* that teachers can reference to avoid going off in "fun-riffing-lecture-land" is important. Riffing and fun are also important and there's room for that, but the basis of the lesson should always be pretty much the same, hence "anchoring" our presentations with Powerpoint.
Finally, as for removing the formatting, I would be happy with that, but there is significant disagreement from the content authors, who may have legitimate points. For example there is the argument that adding pictures makes the presentation more visually engaging and helps with information retention, whereas a boring, white background, everything-the-same formatting would quickly bore and numb people, and hurt their ability to absorb the key points. It's certainly arguable just how the presentation should be impacting the education process in-class, but I find it hard to dispute their core arguments, at least without data to back it up. They also feel that more well designed Powerpoints are more professional and give a better impression to the student. So it's hard to get away from formatting at all, otherwise I would - lord knows it would make it easier!
Thanks,
P.S. I think the content is pretty good, honestly. Certainly better than the formatting. ;)
Oshyan
-
Second, assuming that visual learning materials that structure an instructor-led class are a requirement, does anyone have any recommended alternatives to a Powerpoint or other slide-based presentation? Particularly something that will enhance engagement and retention for the audience, provide structure and ensure consistency in presentation across multiple sessions of the same class topic, and be easily re-used in other formats (e.g. handouts or workbooks, etc.).
-JavaJones
One solution that could be worth looking at is Vue http://vue.tufts.edu/index.cfm
Here is a snippet from their web page
"The Visual Understanding Environment (VUE) is an Open Source project based at Tufts University. The VUE project is focused on creating flexible tools for managing and integrating digital resources in support of teaching, learning and research. VUE provides a flexible visual environment for structuring, presenting, and sharing digital information."
One of the presentation benefits, is the ability to set up more than one pathway through a collection of slides so that you are not constrained to one particular linear sequence.
If nothing else, the price is right.
It might not be what you are looking for, but maybe it will be of help to someone.
David
-
Thanks for the link David. It looks very interesting. One of our staff members went to Tufts as well, so she might have comment on its use. I'll take a closer look ASAP.
- Oshyan
-
http://www.apple.com/iwork/keynote/ for Mac only
Beside 'everybody' saying Keynote is FAR better than Powerpoint, Apple also gave it this:
Compatibility and sharing
Approved for all audiences.
Keynote gives you a variety of ways to bring your show to the people. You can use it to import presentations created in Microsoft PowerPoint and to create presentations that can easily be saved as PowerPoint files. You can also export your presentation as a QuickTime movie or a PDF, HTML, or image file, or even directly to YouTube. Keynote does the format conversion for you.
Share your work on the web.
When you need to share your presentation, but aren’t sure whether your colleagues use a Mac or PC, iWork or Microsoft Office, publish it to iWork.com Public Beta (http://www.apple.com/iwork/iwork-dot-com/). Reviewers receive an email with a unique URL where they can view your presentation’s slides, post comments, and download a version ideal for them in Keynote, PowerPoint, or PDF format.
Unfortunately Keynote seems only to be available as part of the Mac office pack, iWork (http://store.apple.com/us/product/MB942/iWork-09), starting at $79.
-
To be fair Powerpoint can output to a web site too (its crap but you can do it) and there is an addon that will allow you to generate DVD Video.
-
Hmm, well, nothing is seeming like a particularly compelling alternative unfortunately (especially since we're a PC shop - I wouldn't relish trying to convert everyone to Mac just for Keynote :D).
Oh well. Thanks for all the input folks! :)
- Oshyan
-
JavaJones, consider using ProShow.
http://www.photodex.com/
It's an amazing slideshow making tool. I happened across it by accident several years ago, and was blown away by it. It's relatively easy to use. Not super easy, but pretty easy. The great thing is that the slideshows will end up coming out looking fantastic. And you can export it in a variety of ways, i don't remember them all. I always liked the stanalone exe files.
The point is, it's easy to use, you get professional looking results with the least amount of effort. And there's a lot of power under the hood if you care to explore.
And you know what I've seen? The program gives such great results that I've noticed that it makes people WANT to use it more. Give it a shot.
If you want a small example, I've provided a link below of a slideshow I made for two of my coworkers. I make fun of them pretty good, and it was hilarious. I had a couple of people in tears with this one. This is all ProShow, it makes it so easy and fun to use:
http://aram.dcmembers.com/wp-content/uploads/misc/hooters-pola.exe
-
Photodex is great for producing slideshows and video output (inc. DVD) but can you use it interactively or non-linearly?
-
Photodex is great for producing slideshows and video output (inc. DVD) but can you use it interactively or non-linearly?
-Carol Haynes
No, I don't think you can. If you buy the more expensive version (Presenter) you can pause it in the middle of the slideshow. But you can't skip around like in powerpoint.
Another option I've used often that works well, especially when trying to throw together a quick presentation is a PDF. I make a pdf, save it so that it opens up in fullscreen mode, and flip through the pages as if they were slides. I use bluebeam to mark them up if necessary. In emergency situations, this works the fastest for me. Good bang for your buck also, as far as quality vs. effort.
-
I have Photodex presenter but I wouldn't see it as an easy replacement for Powerpoint.
PDF is an interesting idea - but it still doesn't really solve the issues of the original post.
-
ProShow is interesting, but the problem is I don't need to have *more* flexibility, I need less. ;) Nor would it probably be very welcome to have to learn a totally new UI, heh. While I *am* looking for an alternative, which potentially implies a different interface, ProShow is really a fairly different approach, which would be more jarring than I would like.
What I basically need is to define a fairly rigid format and make people stick to it when designing. Powerpoint has some ability to do this, but in practice it doesn't work nearly as well as I'd like.
- Oshyan
-
Yeah, I understand. I can't think of anything to do what you're asking. it's a good idea. It would be nice to be able to quickly whip out a nice presentation based on some preset styling.
-
I'm thinking it might be fairly easily do-able with a customized HTML editor like Komposer or one of the other open source options:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_HTML_editors
Then just put it in a Javascript-driven page transition fader. Run all the styling off a central CSS file. Hmm...
- Oshyan
-
You could take a look at Prezi (http://prezi.com/). I don't have any real experience of it; it is just sitting on my "Cool looking things to take a proper look at" list :)
-
You could take a look at Prezi (http://prezi.com/).
-markan
- the "Math is not linear (http://prezi.com/aww2hjfyil0u/math-is-not-linear/)"-prezi is fantastic. Not as much for the Prezi itself but because of the subject which Alison Blank is really good at explaining.
-
An interesting relic from the past - way back in Opera 5.x times, they had a thing called "Operashow", aimed at using html markup and css to do presentations with Opera.
It might have been relevant to you, apart from the Opera lockin, but I think the idea was subsequently abandoned. Shame.
Maybe someone with the knowhow could write a quasi html editor, which uses stylesheets, dhtml etc to produce slides for a browser.
-
You could take a look at Prezi (http://prezi.com/). I don't have any real experience of it; it is just sitting on my "Cool looking things to take a proper look at" list :)
-markan
I haven't tried creating a Prezi yet but it looks fantastic.
The best thing is that it is non-linear and also you can embed SWF, PDF etc.
My first reaction was that an online tool is not ideal but you can download the prezi when finished and use a standalone player so you don't need to have an internet connection.
It isn't clear whether the desktop software is limited to the license period or whether that is just the length of hosting. It would be nioce to think if you sign up for the Pro version you get to keep the desktop app in perpetuity without the hosting package.
-
it was my impression that you'll lose even the value of the desktop version, if you stop paying:
4) Prezi is sold as a service, which means you pay an annual fee. ... If in the future you decide to cancel your payments, you will not be able to create new or edit existing prezis, but ...
-
it was my impression that you'll lose even the value of the desktop version, if you stop paying:
4) Prezi is sold as a service, which means you pay an annual fee. ... If in the future you decide to cancel your payments, you will not be able to create new or edit existing prezis, but ...
-Curt
Also best to be aware of:
By submitting User Content ... you hereby do and shall grant to Prezi (and its successors, assigns, and third party service providers) a worldwide, non-exclusive, perpetual, irrevocable, royalty-free, fully paid, sublicensable, and transferable license to use, reproduce, modify, create derivative works from, distribute, publicly display, publicly perform, and otherwise exploit the content on and in connection with the manufacture, sale, promotion, marketing and distribution of products sold on, or in association with, the Service, or for purposes of providing you with the Service and promoting the same, in any medium and by any means currently existing or yet to be devised.
-
JJ, you said to think out of the box, so here goes:
Back to my pdf idea. I know it's not exactly great, but hear me out. I've had to put together a lot of presentations in my job, and a lot of emergency ones at the last minute. When push came to shove, I've used pdf and it has worked out pretty good. Especially with a program like Bluebeam to streamline the workflow, I think it's a good idea. The only thing that it wouldn't be so good for is doing some kind of batch editing to a bunch of pre-existing powerpoint slideshows that you already have.
I don't know, I don't have any good suggestions. I'm interested if what you're looking for exists, because I can use it as well.
-
You're right Curt, that was a fantastic math presentation! And it showed me how cool Prezi is at the same time (that's for the recommendation markan!). However, it's a real shame about their terms of service, as that means I simply can't use it for my job. I might use it for my own purposes though. I'll definitely tinker with it and see what the actual presentation building process is like...
Superboy (or what should I call you? :D), I appreciate the out of the box thinking. PDFs do have some merits. Unfortunately I think the "design enforcement" part of the equation is seriously lacking with any PDF editor, including Bluebeam (though I don't have particular experience with it). As you mentioned the ability to centrally modify the styles for a group of presentation is also lacking.
It occurs to me once again that HTML and CSS are *built* for this, and it only makes sense to try to leverage that. The idea of being able to modify a CSS style and instantly change the picture border color or background of every presentation in our 80+ class curriculum almost makes me giddy! Especially as I am currently looking forward to the prospect of doing them all myself *manually* (along with a bunch of other style changes that CSS would make trivial).
While I don't need yet another project to take on, the fact that there are a number of existing, open source HTML and CSS editors out there that might serve as a basis for the kind of tool I have in mind is rather encouraging. I might just tackle it at some point. If and when I do, you guys will be the first testers, of course. :D
- Oshyan
-
Keep me in the loop here for whatever you figure out. I'm pretty interested now, since this thread began.
-
Excellent, the more people who are interested, the more motivation there is to do it. I'll definitely keep you updated, probably through this thread until/unless it starts to justify its own app discussion.
- Oshyan
-
i like powerpoint. but i thought you might enjoy this article from today's ny times:
WASHINGTON — Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, the leader of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan, was shown a PowerPoint slide in Kabul last summer that was meant to portray the complexity of American military strategy, but looked more like a bowl of spaghetti.
“When we understand that slide, we’ll have won the war,” General McChrystal dryly remarked, one of his advisers recalled, as the room erupted in laughter.
The slide has since bounced around the Internet as an example of a military tool that has spun out of control. Like an insurgency, PowerPoint has crept into the daily lives of military commanders and reached the level of near obsession.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/world/27powerpoint.html?hp
-
Holy crap, and I thought I had it bad! That's really... sad. But an interesting read. Thanks mouser. :D
- Oshyan
-
More along the philosophical than practical, dont forget to read some of Edward Tufte's ideas on data presentation. His critique of Powerpoint (more of a critique on the way it is used) is well worth the read:
Main Site (go to ET Notebooks (the forum)):
http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/
Main Powerpoint essay (but look around the forum for plenty more good discussion):
http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0001yB&topic_id=1&topic=Ask+E%2eT%2e
Another good powerpoint thread:
http://www.edwardtufte.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg?msg_id=0002PP&topic_id=1&topic=Ask+E%2eT%2e
-
Softmaker Office (http://www.softmaker.de/) has included Softmaker Presentations for something like that. The old SO 2008 is offered for free very often like here (http://www.loadandhelp.de/).
-
very nice links kfitting :up:
-
Thanks kfitting. That was an interesting read.
-
While I don't need yet another project to take on, the fact that there are a number of existing, open source HTML and CSS editors out there that might serve as a basis for the kind of tool I have in mind is rather encouraging.
-JavaJones
I think you're on the right path with that approach. The one really big advantage web markup has going for it is how versatile it is. I've done quite a few "presentations" using nothing other than web technologies and apps, and I've been very happy with the results.
The biggest advantage to "going web" is that files based on such technologies re-purpose themselves relatively easily. So if you do a slide presentation as a series of HTML/CSS pages, it's a small task to convert them into hardcopy or PDF. And it's only marginally more work to use them to create a standalone e-book or autoplay/interactive media application. You could even dub the presentation's audio onto the individual slides for an instant 'video' of the presentation which could be then be archived, distributed, or streamed.
It also makes the presentation playable on any machine that has a web browser - which basically means all of them. Have USB - Will Travel! Hook a laptop up to a projector and it can be used in a conference room. There are even inexpensive remote control devices that can emulate the old "pickle" controllers from back in the days of carousel slide projectors, so the presenter can have heads-up control of pacing in real time.
Can't get a conference area? Then simply share the presentation over your LAN - or WAN if you need to include remote locations.
There's a good article over at A List Apart (another great site BTW! :up: ) about doing something similar when creating e-books. Although it's not specifically about presentation graphics, much of what's discussed will apply. (Note: Feel free to ignore the inevitable nod towards the iPad. The article was written back in early March when people didn't know any better! :P ;))
Flip a page...change a slide...the basic mechanics are much the same even if the content density and presentation goals differ.
Link: http://www.alistapart.com/articles/ebookstandards/
Web Standards for E-books
by Joe Clark
Web Standards for E-books
The internet did not replace television, which did not replace cinema, which did not replace books. E-books aren’t going to replace books either. E-books are books, merely with a different form.
The electronic book is the latest example of how HTML continues to win out over competing, often nonstandardized, formats. E-books aren’t websites, but E-books are distributed electronically. Now the dominant E-book format is XHTML. Web standards take on a new flavor when rendering literature on the screen, and classic assumptions about typography (or “formatting”) have to be adjusted.
HTML isn’t just for the web
It’s for any text distributed online.
Technology predictions can come back to haunt you, but this one I’m sure about: The fate of non-HTML formats has been sealed by HTML5 and the iPad. People are finally noticing what was staring them in the face all along—HTML is great for expressing words. The web is mostly about expressing words, and HTML works well for it. The same holds true for electronic books.
<more>
Something to think about... :Thmbsup:
-
Yep, all good points 40hz. I think the idea of an HTML/XHTML and CSS-driven presentation system makes a helluvalot of sense in fact, and I'm surprised it doesn't exist yet. So, wait, *does it*? Anyone?
The simple fact of being able to maintain a common stylesheet separately and make instant global changes is reason enough for me.
- Oshyan
-
I think the idea of an HTML/XHTML and CSS-driven presentation system makes a helluvalot of sense in fact, and I'm surprised it doesn't exist yet. So, wait, *does it*? Anyone?
-JavaJones
Well, maybe not as a presentation package per se.
But you could easily press the Adobe Creative Suite or Microsoft Expression Studio offerings into service to create presentations. And there's a lot more you can use if you want to mix and match products from other sources. Especially if you don't insist on working in a WYSIWYG or all-in-one environment. Many excellent tools are even free.
Look at it this way - a slide show, a book, or a web site are all basically the same thing - a collection of dimensioned areas containing text and graphics designed to be presented in some sort of ordered sequence.
Websites have the 'advantage' of being less linear in fundamental structure (hence the hyper reference in HTML). But that is more of a feature than a requirement since many websites (blogs, shopping carts, reference works, forums, magazine sites, webcomics, etc. ) tend towards linear presentation in actual use.
So what's the main difference? Page size - and colors supported.
With print, you can go as high and as colorful as your budget can afford. For web-based technologies, there are some technical limits that are well documented in any web design book you'd care to look at. But basically, anything you design on screen should look good when projected (@1280x1024) so long as you use something like a 1200 wide page with 20 or 24-pt type. Again, it's hard to be specific for all cases so you'll need to do a little experimenting to see what looks best for what you're working with.
Once you've got that worked out, it's a simple matter to create style sheets and a 'design manual' for future work - or rework in your case! ;D
Luck! 8)
-
Of course the various high-end HTML-ish design systems could be used but, as you said, they're a lot more flexible, and as I've noted a couple times in this thread, for my particular needs flexibility is a *minus*. ;) I *don't* want to mix and match anything from anywhere. We have a very clear, precise need that I'm trying to meet. That the output could then be flexiblty adapted is a bonus, and one for which others might be then more inspired to use any product selection resulting from this discussion. But again for my specific purposes the more limited the better (to a point).
I want the actual language and output to be flexible, but not the tool it's constructed in. For me HTML/CSS is perfect in that regard because I can make a limited tool to create it with WYSWIYG (and WYSIWYG is very important for my users on this project incidentally), and then adjust things to my heart's content globally later with the CSS.
So yeah, I think this is a good approach. But I'm still surprised nobody has made a presentation-oriented tool that is based on HTML/CSS since it'd be so easy to do. I'm not even surprised so much from a "hey, this is a good idea" standpoint as from a "hey, it'd be super easy to make a 'presentation' program with HTML/CSS and cash-in on the biz market. Let's do it!" standpoint. You know what I mean? But maybe it only makes sense to me...
- Oshyan
-
maybe someone can make a powerpoint plugin that prevents you from changing the style of a chart and forces you to base it on the single master chart style (or from a set of approved ones).
-
But I'm still surprised nobody has made a presentation-oriented tool that is based on HTML/CSS since it'd be so easy to do. I'm not even surprised so much from a "hey, this is a good idea" standpoint as from a "hey, it'd be super easy to make a 'presentation' program with HTML/CSS and cash-in on the biz market. Let's do it!" standpoint.
-JavaJones
Yup, it is a great idea.
Unfortunately, Microsoft owns the presentation graphics market.
Even Adobe couldn't wrestle it away from them. That's why they abandoned Persuasion (anybody else remember that horrendous product and originally from Aldus?) and ceded the field to Gates & Co. PowerPoint is now the undisputed standard for business presentations.
"Mother, forgive me!" as the Comedian so aptly said in the movie Watchmen. ;D
The only other serious competitor was Harvard Presentation Graphics - and that once proud standard of the business world has been reduced to YAVCIW, but (oddly enough) still maintains its existence in a weird sort of 'half-life' arrangement under the Serif software banner:
Link: http://www.harvardgraphics.com/about.asp
In 1986, the first version of Harvard Graphics was released (then known as Harvard Presentation Graphics). Harvard Graphics was the first presentation graphics program to include text, graphs and charts in one program. Harvard Graphics made it easy for people to put together presentations with text slides, charts based on numeric data, and graphics drawn with various tools. In the early years of these applications, the results were typically sent to a slide printer or a color plotter to use in making transparencies. Over time, capabilities were added to present slide shows from the program itself.
The first version of Harvard Graphics was a DOS-based application. Over the years, Harvard Graphics has received top honors in numerous reviews of presentation graphics programs for Intel-compatible computers. In 1991, Harvard Graphics was ported to Windows. Reviews through this period often favored Harvard Graphics as being the most powerful.
Harvard Graphics has continued its tradition through the years as the best solution for communicating and presenting your information to the world. As technology has advanced, Harvard Graphics has evolved to meet the demanding needs of the business community. Many professionals, both past and present, depend on Harvard Graphics to provide the cutting edge needed to rise above the competition. Now it's your turn to let Harvard Graphics forge your place at the top.
In 2001, Serif Incorporated acquired the exclusive marketing rights to all Harvard Graphics products. Additionally, Serif Incorporated provides complete support solutions for all Harvard Graphics customers. For more information on Serif Incorporated, please visit our Web site at: http://www.serif.com.
I'm surprised to see you can still buy it...
I'm even more surprised anybody still wants to. ;)
:Thmbsup:
-
Well, yes that's true, except for the exceptions posted in this thread (showing that some people are still trying to innovate), and of course the existence of OpenOffice, SoftmakerOffice, etc. that all feature presentation components (that admittedly are direct clones of Powerpoint, for the most part).
I have a habit of being optimistic when considering the potential market for a product idea of mine, but having seen the dedicated software that is used in the technical documentation industry, I can't help but think there is room for a more flexible, centrally administratable tool than Powerpoint. In fact, wait a minute, aren't Google and Zoho basically already doing this? Hmm...
- Oshyan
-
Well...the only real way to find out is to write it.
And I share your optimistic mind set.
I have no patience with cynics.
From The Gospel According to Mung:
We can't afford to be cynical. There's too much at stake! :)
-
Unfortunately I'm not a coder. :( But I hope I'll be able to find someone to work with on it at some point.
- Oshyan
-
I'll have another go - have a look at http://philburns.com/quickshow.html to see if it's relevant to the discussion.
-
?? I looked at the 4 examples listed on the QuickShow website - am I mssing something?
I can't really see what it does apart from produce pretty ugly web pages (the 4th example didn't seem to work at all)
It also looks old and not updated often - the latest supported version of Windows listed is XP, only supports 32-bit and was released in 2004.
-
I guess I was trying to point towards an attempt from some time back to develop ideas similar to some of those proposed here, in case a read of the site I pointed to stimulated ideas from someone with some programming talent. It wasn't intended to be a "look, here's the final solution to your problem" post.
-
@tsaint- You have my sympathies.
I've felt in the same boat at times.
There's a big difference between an FYI and a personal recommendation. Why do people tend to believe that whatever gets offered for consideration is automatically being recommended?
Such is life I suppose... ;D
-
Interesting, it does appear that this has been tried before, albeit not (apparently) that well done, and no longer updated. I'm thinking one of the modern open source HTML editors really might make a great basis for this. Having pre-built CSS layouts with empty divs would be a good way of making fairly rigid templates, too...
- Oshyan
-
@tsaint- You have my sympathies.
I've felt in the same boat at times.
There's a big difference between an FYI and a personal recommendation. Why do people tend to believe that whatever gets offered for consideration is automatically being recommended?
Such is life I suppose... ;D
-40hz
Reminds of a quote in one of Stephen Fry's America documentaries. He's talking with a Harvard prof, and the prof explains how it's a very American thing to want all answers in black and white. Very simple, short, definitive answers. What's the best? Is this right or wrong? When, in fact, the world operates mostly in shades of gray.
-
@tsaint- You have my sympathies.
I've felt in the same boat at times.
There's a big difference between an FYI and a personal recommendation. Why do people tend to believe that whatever gets offered for consideration is automatically being recommended?
Such is life I suppose... ;D
-40hz
I wasn't quite suggesting that it was being offered as a full solution (just commenting on the fact it dated back half a decade).
My comment was more that having read the rest of this thread I couldn't really see any way that the app mentioned approached any sort of solution (in fact I couldn't really see what problem it was 'designed' to solve - even in the 'demonstrations' suggested as an illustration).
-
If you do visit the link I gave and then want to view the example pages, use opera to do so if you have it (the 4th example does work by the way)
-
Ohhh! Yeah they look/work totally different with Opera. Interesting. The backgrounds and general formatting still suck, but you get the idea.
- Oshyan
-
How about good old MS Word?
I suppose it is not that nice presentation-wise (although I bet you could fool quite a few people with fullscreen print preview), but you do have much more control over the style vs. content. As long as there is no "manual" formatting used, you have some of the things you ask for... Namely, use of a template allows you to give an underlining style structure, it can be updated after the presentations are created, etc.
Other things you mentioned could be done as well (such photo sizing, cropping, aligning), but that would require writing several macros. However, once you have them, they can be attached to the same template so the users can apply them as required.
Edit: jumped in from the newsletter, didn't noticed it's quite old...
-
Thanks for the reply Jabberwock. Late April is too old? :D Well I'm still looking for a solution, so input continues to be appreciated.
While you make some interesting points about Word, I'm not aware of it being able to truly lock down formatting in the way that I want. It's funny actually, because it's rare that I actually want to impose *more* limits on an application, but in this case it's really best to avoid the ability for content authors to "get creative" with layout and design. I've seen first hand that the end results are seldom better than a simple, generic layout. The trick is enforcing layout and design standards. Also does Word have the ability to easily update the style across multiple documents? For example if we later decide we want to change our font from Arial to Times, could we do this to 50 Word documents without opening and applying a style to each one? Think of how this would work with CSS - I would change the single CSS file that every document references, and viola! It's done.
Anyway, as you can probably see, I'm still thinking an HTML and CSS based solution may be the ticket. But no progress on developing that thus far on my end...
- Oshyan
-
The "lock down" depends on how obedient the users are :) Templates allow you to reassign key shortcuts, menus and toolbars (at least in 2003, I'm not sure about 2007), so in a way that takes away ability to mess up the document manually, but it is not that difficult to circumvent (so some user discipline is required). Instead, you could give them large buttons titled e.g. "Main heading", "Bullet point" etc. that would be linked to particular styles.
If a document is tied to a template, it should update automatically to the changes in the template whenever it is opened. Unfortunately, it is rather easy to modify the formatting (so it shows up as "Style + Arial", for example) - then of course manual overrides remain, even if the template is changed. Still, you could have a macro that reapplies the styles if needed (based on this tip):
http://www.elharo.com/blog/word/2005/12/28/word-tip-1-reapplying-styles/
Another option is to link documents in a master document - this allows to modify all of them at the same time without opening each inidividual document. The disadvantage is that each document has to be linked to the master manually, which might get tedious. Also, with a large number of documents this might become unwieldy.
-
Mouser, at post 33 in this thread on page 2, mentions a New York Times article, entitled "We Have Met the Enemy and He Is PowerPoint (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/27/world/27powerpoint.html?hp)," which has a main take-away that a slide analysis can give an illusory sense that complexities have been mastered. The article looks at military uses (apparently at epidemic levels). Here is one quote from the article: “It’s dangerous because it can create the illusion of understanding and the illusion of control,” General McMaster said in a telephone interview afterward. “Some problems in the world are not bullet-izable.”
For the purposes of this thread, particularly useful reflections on Powerpoint are in two follow-on Times posts. First, there is a lesson plan based on this article (http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/03/point-counter-point-how-to-use-and-avoid-misusing-powerpoint/?scp=3&sq=powerpoint&st=cse) for using it as a basis for discussing Powerpoint itself, adaptable to any group discussion. Second, more generalized observations and comments appear in this article addressing improving educational presentations, with tips for graphic and quotable source material (http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/03/is-powerpoint-in-the-classroom-evil/?scp=1&sq=powerpoint&st=cse) (and the author also likes Prezi (http://http://prezi.com/).
Hope this adds to this thread ...
Dallee :Thmbsup:
-
Hope this adds to this thread ...
Thanks for the input.
Apparently there's little truth to the rumour that the army might be running out of bullets!
-
Chris,
That was a good one! 8)
Thanks for brightening my day ...
Dallee
-
It is surprising that no one in here has mentioned Presentation, part of OpenOffice 3.x. With its wizards, extensive help files, easy learning curve and plethora of formatted templates (more downloadable), it's a "natural", and best of all, it is FREE! :Thmbsup:
-
Hi daver, thanks for jumping in! I'm pretty familiar with Presenter having converted my whole company to OpenOffice a couple years ago (and recently, back to Office 2k3 :( ). But it has the same problems as Powerpoint, and - in my experience - the templating is even harder to modify, apply, and restrict. It's a fantastic free replacement for Powerpoint, but I don't think it quite fits my needs in this case. Indeed, we had been using OOo and Presenter to do our presentations initially, but found even the normal styling functions to be challenging to actually use consistently. Even Office 2k7 was an improvement, though I don't appreciate everything about it to be sure.
- Oshyan
-
What about creating a Google Docs Presentation Template and then have your users create presentations based on that template?
(This is just an idea for your problem. I didn't test it)
-
I did check out Google Docs, but I couldn't see a way to create templates. Do you know how? I did see they have several pre-defined, very simplistic templates, which might work to keep things simple in content creation. Unfortunately no way to lock down what tools can be used, so while it's not as full-featured as Powerpoint, you can do just as much damage with the tools available. ;)
- Oshyan
-
You can create a template by creating a presentation, saving it and then Create New, From template, My templates, Submit a template and select the previously created presentation.
But maybe you have already found a solution: HTML and CSS and in the end export as PDF. I think it solves most of your problems...
-
Ah, thanks for that info about template creation. This doesn't work quite as I was hoping however. There is a template selection for an individual slide layout that you get whenever you create a new slide ("two columns", "title", "caption", "blank", etc.). I want to be able to edit *those* so that new ones can appear in that prompt. I doubt Google allows that though, it seems like a rather hard-coded function.
I agree that HTML + CSS is probably the best approach. So now the trick is finding a good authoring tool for my users. :D
- Oshyan
-
This might be a very long shot, but did you have a look at XML + XSL-FO?
The burden on the users would probably be the same as with HTML-CSS (or less, as you could abstract the XML structure so that it directly reflects the presentation structure), but you would have much more work... Still, it might be worth it, as it would be much more presentable (if I recall correctly, there even XML-FO to PowerPoint converters).
-
I assume you mean XSL-FO. It's an interesting system, but it would be a whole new system to learn, and I don't really see the advantage over CSS and HTML really (for my purposes). It does support some fancier stuff like text orientation and whatnot, but explicitly want to avoid most fancy formatting.
Still, a cool tech to know about, and I appreciate the suggestion. :)
- Oshyan
-
The only thing is, it looks like Prezi requires a subscription.
-
Hey, thanks for reminding me about this project. Gotta put it in my project manager for future reference. I still think this could be useful, although with the increasing prevalence of web-based everything maybe it should be a web service...
- Oshyan
-
Reviving this one as I just randomly ran across a couple of interesting related projects.
S5 is an HTML, CSS, and Javascript slide show system that appears to be a descendant of Opera's early slide show concept: http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/s5/
HTML Slidey seems to be in a similar vein and I'm not yet sure what sets it apart from S5: http://www.w3.org/Talks/Tools/Slidy2/#(1)
Slideous is the project that made me aware of the other two so is presumably more advanced, though I'm not entirely sure how yet: http://goessner.net/articles/slideous/
None of these include full-on authoring tools, which would be necessary for my original needs (which actually still exist!), but at least they define a standard way to represent slide shows in HTML and CSS such that perhaps an open source HTML authoring tool could be made to create this stuff...
- Oshyan