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The PowerPoint Ezine - 43
by Geetesh Bajaj, May
25th, 2004
Get this ezine in your mailbox...
There's so much happening in the world of PowerPoint and you'll
stay informed about everything because you read this ezine. And
since we have so much ground to cover, let's get started...
Prizes Again
By being subscribed to this ezine,
you are eligible to win!
Now everyone can be a winner - UniqueTracks is giving away
ten high quality PowerPoint loop sound tracks for you to use in
your presentations! Thank you, John Bickerton. Here's
a link to download...
You can still download Simon Newlyn's PowerPoint based
game - here's the download
link... Thank you, Simon.
Steve Rindsberg of RnR is
providing two free copies of any of their mainstream products.
This means any of their amazing PowerPoint add-ins except the batch
version of PPT2HTML. Incidentally, RnR offers a free version of
their amazing PPTools
Starter Set. Thank you, Steve.
Now, for the winners! John
Nichols and Devine Boop won copies of CaptureWork's
Point Capture program. Allen Zielnik won a copy of Crunchy
Software's WowChart program. Congratulations to all of you!
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Microsoft Releases Office 2004 for Macintosh
Microsoft announced the release of Office 2004 for the Macintosh
in three editions. Both the Standard and the Student
and Teacher editions include new versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint
and Entourage. The Professional edition, which is not released
yet will include a copy of Virtual PC 7 for the Macintosh in addition
to the other programs.
Microsoft also announced the availability of a free
30 day test drive version of Office 2004. PowerPoint
2004 includes new features like an on-screen timer, presenter
tools, improved animations and smoother transitions.
PC Magazine called the new Office 2004 a
must have upgrade.
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Special Offer
 Can
you imagine watching TV without a remote control to change the
channel? So why would you try to deliver a presentation to an audience
while tethered to a mouse or keyboard to change the slides? It
doesn't make any sense, does it? Well, it doesn't have to be that
way - CrystalGraphics is providing RemotePoint Presenter,
the Winner of the Presentation magazine's 2003 Standing Ovation Award for " Best
Remote Control " at a special price of US$139 - RemotePoint Presenter
normally sells for US$199. More
info here...
Kathy Jacobs on PowerPoint
Kathy Jacobs, a PowerPoint MVP has permitted Indezine to post
excerpts from her book 'Kathy Jacobs on PowerPoint' - do
take a look here... Kathy's book is very different from other
PowerPoint books since it takes a practical, hands-on approach
rather than an academic one. You can pre-order
the book here...
Kathy was also interviewed by Indezine - here's an excerpt:
Geetesh: You've been using and teaching PowerPoint, writing
articles and books and helping end users. What motivates you?
Kathy: What motivates me? Chocolate, good food, great people...
Oh - you mean what motivates me to help end users? I want to share
what I know. The more I share, the more I learn. Being innately
curious, I want to know everything about everything. I like to
be able to take a shot at whatever questions strike my fancy.
I have been a volunteer all my life, helping others communicate
better is just a natural extension of that. It is summed up in
my life's philosophy:
I believe life is meant to be lived. But, if we live without making a difference,
it makes no difference that we lived.
Read the full interview
here...
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PowerPoint and Video Part II
Before I get started with the second part of this series, I must
tell you how much fun it is to use muvee. muvee, or rather muvee
magicMoments is an amazing program that automatically creates
movie collages from your video clips. Try
downloading their trial version here...
You'll find Part I of this series in the last
issue of this ezine...
Which Codecs Are Installed?
You can only convert between the codecs that are installed on
your system. In Windows 9x and ME, you could view the codecs installed
on your system through the Multimedia applet in the Control Panel.
Windows XP no longer contains that applet - to view the codecs
installed on your system in Windows XP, you need to:
- Open the Control Panel.
If your Control Panel is in Category View, choose Sounds, Speech and Audio
Devices | Sounds and Audio Devices.
If your Control Panel is in Classic View, choose Sounds and Audio Devices.
- Click the Hardware tab of the resultant tabbed dialog box.
- Scroll down the Devices listing to 'Video Codecs', select it
and click the Properties button.
- The Properties tab of the resultant dialog box will provide
you with a list of installed video codecs.
It's probably easier to use a third party tool like AVICodec or GSpot - both are freeware.
In AVICodec, you'll find a tab that lists all installed codecs
with their version numbers - you can view a listing of audio and
video codecs separately. You can also export the entire list.
In GSpot, choose View | Installed Codecs | Video.
This will show you a listing of all installed video codecs.
Determine and Download Codecs: Quite often, you cannot
play video files because of missing codecs. However, there are
times when you cannot play video files in PowerPoint even though
you have the codecs installed - this happens when your MCI settings
are changed. You must read the PowerPoint
and Multimedia page to find out if changing your MCI settings
helps.
If changing your MCI settings does not resolve the problem, you
can find out which codec a particular video file uses with AVICodec.Assuming, AVIcodec is already installed on your system, right-click any video file in Windows Explorer and choose AVIcodec: detailed information to know which codec the media file uses. Thereafter, you can probably find a link to download your codec from these sites:
- You can download Microsoft's WindowsMedia codecs from the Microsoft site...
- Illustrate's Codec Central has more info and downloads on codecs than anywhere else.
- Codec Corner is another cool codec site - I love their codec test links that allow you to load 3 second test clips!
- The FOURCC
site has extensive information on all types of codecs.
- The Nimo All in One Codec Pack includes many of the possible
codecs you might need. Be careful though, too many codecs do
not translate into too much good. Click
here to get the download...
The next part of the PowerPoint
and Video article will be included in the next ezine issue.
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News & Content
Read the
PowerPoint Blog here... The PowerPoint Blog now includes
the Atom syndication service so that you can use a Atom compatible
newsreader to read all postings.
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Events & Seminars
InfoComm 04
June 5 to 11, 2004, Atlanta, USA
InfoComm
http://infocomm04.expoexchange.com/
Winning Presentations Seminar
June 10 and 11, 2004, Boston, USA
Claudyne Wilder, Wilder Presentations
http://www.wilderpresentations.com/
PowerPoint Live
October 10 to 13, 2004, San Diego, California, USA
Rick Altman, R Altman Digital Consulting
http://www.pptlive.com/
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Credits
During the preparation of this issue of the PowerPoint Ezine,
I received assistance, content or feedback from Adam Schwartz,
Betsy Weber, Claudyne Wilder, Glen Millar, John Bickerton, Kathy
Jacobs, Nicole Ha, Paul Jones, Peter McClard, Simon Newlyn, Steve
Rindsberg, TAJ Simmons and Tania Chew (all in alphabetical order).
I would like to use this platform to thank them for their help.
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