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New Stuff (PowerPoint
2007)
Here's
a link to the Microsoft version of what's new in PowerPoint 2007.
http://www.microsoft.com/office/preview/programs/powerpoint/highlights.mspx
And
here's a link to the PPT and Office
Art blog. Good stuff there.
2007
Tutorials
And
in no particular order, here's my
list of new stuff in PowerPoint 2007. (click
here for a list of missing stuff)
1.
We can add our own
placeholders to slide masters!
Woohoo!
Finally! We can even make it say what we want if we don't like "click to
edit text."
2.
Custom slide layouts
PPT
2007 allows you to create a variety of slide master layouts now -- chart slide
layouts, subtitle slide layouts, table slide layouts, picture slide layouts,
whatever you want. And they provide a bunch of 'em for us, too.
In
the new PPT-speak, a "slide master" governs a bunch of "slide
layouts." So you have a slide master and then an associated title slide
layout, a title and content slide layout, a section header slide layout, a two
content slide layout, and so on. The individual layouts will inherit their
default settings from their parent slide master, and then you can go in and
tweak the individual layouts as necessary.
3.
SmartArt diagrams
Use
these to create slick-looking organization charts, flowcharts, and other
diagrams. Upping the coolness factor is the ability to turn a list of bulleted
text into a SmartArt diagram at the click of a button.
4.
Outline text
We
can now apply separate colors for a font's "fill" and
"outline." No more struggling with WordArt to create outlined text.
5.
Other text effects
Shadows,
reflections, glows, bevels, 3D rotation, and transforms (like the old WordArt
shapes)
6.
Shape effects
Shadows,
reflections, glows, soft edges, bevels, 3D rotation and better 3D depth and
rotation control.
7.
Shape and text presets
These
make it really easy to apply a preset look to an object or text.
8.
Selection pane
Woohoo!
A taskpane lists all objects on the slide. We can rename objects (and that name
shows up in the custom animation taskpane, YEAH!), change the stacking order, and make the
object visible or invisible in the pane.
9.
Themes
Themes
include color schemes and fonts (one for headings and one for body text) that
carry through all the Office programs. This means it's easier to make
PowerPoint, Excel, Access and Word all work together aesthetically.
10.
Custom colors
It's
now possible to specify custom colors that travel with the Themes. This means
it's finally possible to specify your corporate color and make it easily
available in all the Office applications and in charts (!!). Unfortunately, there's not a user
interface for this, so you'll have to hack the Theme XML. (But I'm still excited
to have this ability!)
11.
Photo edges
These
are way cool. Torn edges and reflections and shaped pictures and simple borders
and complicated borders and all kinds of stuff. AND each PowerPoint template
(Theme) has its own photo edge effect already available. Just add a picture
using a provided "picture with caption" slide layout; then you can see
the picture effects change as you change design themes.
12.
Recolor picture
My
old buddy the Recolor tool is gone. In its place are
a number of more sophisticated recoloring options. While that gives us many more
options to tint photos and things like that, it doesn't make it easy to simply
recolor clipart.
13.
Shadows
Shadows
in general are so very nice compared to those in previous versions of PPT. We
can actually control the transparency, amount of blur, and color now.
14.
No more MS Graph
Charts
are now done in Excel. But don't panic! It's not scary, I promise. When we
insert a chart in PPT, we still get a dummy chart to begin with, just like
always. I think in the long run the change to charting in Excel will make
charting much better.
15.
Chart elements work more
like drawing objects
This
means all the effects we can apply to shapes, we can now apply to elements in
the charts. Sure makes it much easier to add nice drop shadows to charts!
16.
Real-time previews
When
you scroll over the various galleries in PowerPoint, you'll see your slide and
various objects change to display what they'll look like if you decide to apply
those settings. Just click on the thumbnail in the gallery to actually accept
the changes. This makes it a lot faster to see, for example, how changing a
color scheme will affect your slides. Unfortunately, the real-time preview
doesn't work on everything.
17.
Kerning
Woohoo!
We can finally kern text! YEAH!
18.
Quick layouts and quick
styles
When
you select an object on your slide, you'll be presented with a gallery of
layouts and/or styles. These provide quick formatting options for the object in
question, and make it easy to create good-looking slides with just a few clicks.
Some
of the objects that have style galleries are pictures, SmartArt diagrams,
charts, WordArt, text, autoshapes, and tables.
19.
Tables
Duh!
I almost forgot tables. The quick styles make the new PPT tables look really
nice right off the bat. AND we can specify sizes for cell height and width now.
20.
Zoom slider
It's
quicker to zoom in and out now using the zoom slider in the southeast corner of
the screen.
21.
Presenter view
Oh,
man, you're gonna love this! You can resize the slides and notes and all kinds
of stuff in the new presenter view. More
information here.
22.
Ctrl+G now groups selected
items!
Thank
god. PPT finally joined the rest of the world. Use Ctrl+Shift+G to ungroup.
23.
Insert and Link
Now
when inserting a photo, we have the option to 1) Insert, 2) Link to File, or 3)
Insert and Link.
24.
Save as PDF (and XPS -- XML
Paper Specification)
This
may end up being a separate download instead of being included in PPT out of the
box.
25.
New file format
PPT
file format is now XML, which should mean fewer corrupted files. It also means
there are a bunch of different file extensions.
PPTX
format (regular PPT 2007 file)
PPTM (PPT + macros)
PPSX (PowerPoint 2007 Show file)
PPSM (PowerPoint 2007 Show + macros)
POTX (PPT 2007 template)
POTM (PPT template + macros)
PPAM (PPT add-in)
26.
Columns
Add
columns to a textbox. Very slick.
27.
Tabs
We
now have a real tab setting dialog box. (We can still add tabs by clicking on
the ruler.) Tabs also apply to each paragraph now, not to the entire textbox.
28.
Slide libraries
Requires
Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 (MOSS), but if you have it, you can
upload and download slides from a slide library. Among other things, slide
libraries make it much easier to ensure that you have the latest version of a
slide.
29.
Workflow services (review processes)
This
also requires Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007
(MOSS). And that's really all I know about it, since I don't have MOSS to see
how this works.
30.
Mark as final
Lets
you mark the presentation as final and make it read only. This should be a nice
way to ensure you're working from the correct file when you go back to it later,
but the jury's still out as far as I'm concerned -- I can't make changes to my
"marked as final" file in PPT, but when I check the file properties in
Windows Explorer, it's not flagged as "read only." So I think "read
only" is probably not the best term to use for the description of this feature.
And the bigger problem is, I
didn't get any kind of "marked as final" notification when I reopen the
file in PPT, so I've no idea
*why* I can't make changes to it. There is, though, a small icon that shows up
on the lower left of the status bar; it will show a "marked as final"
tool tip when you hover over it. Hmmm...I can tell already this will be a
frequently asked question....
31.
Compatibility checker
This
could be better, but it's still a pretty nifty utility. Basically, it checks
your file to see what will cause problems in earlier versions of PPT (in other
words, what features you'll lose if you backsave the file to the PPT 97-2003
file format).
32.
A few new autoshapes
Not
many, but some. Half-frame, decagon, equation shapes, etc.
33.
Better autoshape
manipulation
That
yellow diamond thing works better on most of the autoshapes.
34.
Font effects
Just
like Word! Woohoo! We now have strikethrough, double strikethrough, small caps,
all caps, and equalize character height in addition to superscript and
subscript. And we can choose from a huge variety of underline styles!
35.
Clear all formatting
Select
text or a textbox and click this button to strip all the formatting.
36.
Better
contrast colors when
typing
So
I used to have this template that would give me a red fill for contrast when I'd
type in the textboxes. It was awful! That won't happen anymore, because PPT
2007 uses a bluish rectangle to designate your selected text. To be honest, I'm
not sure I like the new rectangle (not quite enough contrast), but I know that
people who hated the autocontrast colors will be glad to be rid of them.
37.
16:9 page size out of the
box
We
now have 16:9 and 16:10 ratios in the page setup dialog. This will be very handy
for those using widescreen. More
info here.
38.
Chart templates
OMG,
I can't believe I forgot to list this! We can finally easily save a chart as a
template and send it to someone else to use! Woohoooooo! Okay, so the chart
templates don't travel with the themes (templates), but at least they're easier
to share. What I want to know is if custom colors (see
#10 above) will travel with these chart templates or at least how they work
together. Hmm....
Update:
If you're using PPT 2007 on Vista, be sure to open the chart data source in
Excel before applying a chart template, or PPT will crash. See http://support.microsoft.com/Default.aspx?kbid=927475
for details.
39.
Paste Special has a shortcut
I'm
sure most of you know that Ctrl+V is a shortcut for Paste. In PPT 2007,
Ctrl+Alt+V is a shortcut that opens the Paste Special Window. Yippee! No more
Edit|Paste Special (which always seemed like a really long way to get there for
some reason). Of course, we can still get to Paste Special from the Paste button
on the Home ribbon (Clipboard chunk).
40.
Gradients on lines
We
can finally apply gradients to lines.
41.
Specify ALL CAPS (or even SMALL
CAPS)
in a placeholder
In
PPT 2007, we can specify ALL CAPS (or small caps) by selecting the placeholder
on the slide master and checking the ALL CAPS option in Format|Font. We couldn't
do this in previous versions because there is no ALL CAPS or SMALL
CAPS
option in Format|Font in those versions.
42.
Inspect Document
This
is really neat. It lets you find and remove the following: Comments and Ink
Notations, Document Properties and Personal Information, Custom XML Data,
Invisible On-Slide Content (objects you've hidden using the Selection and
Visibility Task Pane), Off-Slide Content, and Presentation Notes. In PPT 2007,
the document inspector can only remove these items presentation-wide. I hope in
future versions we'll be able to remove these items on a slide-by-slide basis.
43.
New display window
Click
this option to show your open presentation in an open window. Pretty cool -- we
can look at the file in, for example, Normal View and Notes Page View at the
same time now. This will make my life much easier when formatting notes pages --
I'll be able to make edits to the slide in Normal View without totally losing my
place in the notes. Sweet!
44.
Add a digital signature
I
admit it -- I know nothing about this feature other than it's there.
45.
Persistent undo and redo
We
can still undo and redo even after saving the file. Way cool! (Thanks for
pointing this out, Shawn!)
46.
Convert autoshapes to
freeforms
We
can now convert autoshapes to freeforms, which means we can easily change the
shapes using Edit Points.
47.
Add connection points to
shapes
We
can convert an autoshape to a freeform and add points (using Edit Points), then
the points all become connection points for the connector lines to attach to!
Woohoo! Finally I can put the connection points where *I* want them!
Missing
Stuff
1.
Recolor picture (the new
tool doesn't let you recolor clipart or charts)
2.
Macro recorder
3.
Ability to customize
toolbars (the ribbon)
4.
Tear-away menus
5.
Select Multiple Objects tool
(but the new selection pane is much nicer anyway!)
6.
Title case
(A true title case last existed in PPT 2000. At least now they've properly named
what we do have: Capitalize Each Word.)
7.
Underline just words, not
words and spaces. (Okay, so in PPT 97, we could underline words only. Since
then, it's been words AND spaces. I want the option to do either one.)
8.
Insert from scanner. Here's
why.
9.
Pattern fills are no more.
If you rely on pattern fills, consider creating your own pattern images (I
believe 1" x 1" is usually all you really need) and applying them
through the Texture Fills options.
10.
Animation Schemes. Gone.
11.
Summary slide. Zapped.
12.
AutoContent Wizard. Buh-Bye.
13.
AutoLayout. PPT no longer
changes the slide layout and so moves stuff around on your slide when you insert
an object onto the slide. Thank gawd!
14.
Microsoft Script Editor has
been removed from PPT. When opening a PowerPoint file containing scripts, we'll
receive a warning that says PPT no longer supports scripts. (Note: this does not
have to do with scripting in VBA. See http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa141282(office.10).aspx
for more information about the Microsoft Script Editor.)
15.
Presentation Broadcasting.
I'm so glad -- stupid thing never worked right anyway. The documentation was
circular, it was way too fiddly to set up, and it was unreliable as all get out.
It was a nice thought, but the execution was sorely lacking.
16.
Style Checker, aka
"presentation advisor." It's too bad, too. I think the problem is that
nobody used it in PPT 2003 because 1) it was turned off by default and 2) it
sucked. It was very badly implemented, to say the least. (I mean, a lightbulb
popping up outta nowhere? C'mon.) I think MS missed a prime opportunity to
really make some fundamental improvements to this feature.
(Back
in PPT 2000, I used this feature when cleaning up slides I'd received from
others. It was good for checking title case on slides and making sure
punctuation was removed from bulleted text. But it hasn't worked since PPT 2000,
anyway, and PPT 2002 screwed up title case so badly it probably wouldn't have
mattered if it did work.)
17.
Send for Review. I'm bummed
to see this go. I think it hasn't really had a chance yet.
18.
Speaker notes dialog popup
in slide show view (where you could actually type notes while giving a
presentation). Outta there.
19.
Allow Fast Saves. Gone! Bada-BING!
20.
Patterned lines. Did anyone
ever use these?
21.
Ugly
contrast colors when typing.
22.
Black and white settings for
charts. This one's gonna hurt.
23.
Ability to resize slide
thumbnails after you Send to Word. Okay, so who at Microsoft missed the point
that the reason we Send to Word in the first place is so that we can resize the
freaking slide thumbnails because we can't in PowerPoint?! Now it's either drag
a corner (and guess) or start coding, my friends.
Okay,
it's not exactly missing, but you might wanna know...
1.
PPT 2007 saves the same HTML
as PPT 2003 did. So not all of the new features in PPT 2007 are available when you save as
HTML.
2.
Organization Chart. We had
one kind of Org Chart in PPT 97 and 2000 and another in 2002 and 2003. We now
have the new SmartArt diagrams.
3.
Microsoft Producer does not
work with PPT 2007. Period.
4.
Charts are now created in
Excel. (See #14 in the "new" list.) When
you insert a chart (or click a chart placeholder) in PPT, Excel opens with dummy
data, and a sample chart appears on the slide. It's very similar to how we used
to have a sample chart appear when using MS Graph in PPT, but now we have access
to all the Excel charting tools. Coolio!
5.
Insert | Slides From File is
now Home | New Slide (bottom half of button) | Reuse Slides. Navigate to your file, and the slide
thumbnails will show up in the task pane. There's no way to add multiple slides
at once, so be prepared to click, click, click your fingers off. (Don't shoot
the messenger; I think it's ridiculous, too.) But you can insert all the
slides by right-clicking and choosing Insert All Slides.
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