Today we will take a quick look at the various views in PowerPoint 2013.  While you will spending 95% of your time editing slides in what is called Normal View, it is important to understand the other views and to know why they exist.  Along the way we will discuss how to print a text outline of your presentation, print your speakers notes under a thumbnail of your slide, how to hide/unhide and/or re-arrange your slides, the new way to preview your slideshow, and a bit about the new presenter mode. As I say, Normal View is the dominant view, so PowerPoint starts in this view.  It is the view that...

Much has remained the same between the User Interface familiar to users of PowerPoint 2010, but the 2013 edition features some not insignificant tinkering around the edges and small improvements/relocations of interface elements.  The status bar at the bottom of the screen has been reworked, dialog launchers are still with us, but are on the wane in favor of task panes anchored to the right of the screen, the tab system and ribbon are in full flower, with some notable improvements, and there is a remarkable and very welcome improvement to labeling, formatting, and filtering charts.  This post will...

If you just don’t like the new Start Screen in PowerPoint 2013, and long for the days when PowerPoint started up with a plain, blank presentation there are a couple of things you can do about it. 1.  When you start PowerPoint 2013 and see the start screen, simply press escape and normal view will appear with a blank presentation loaded, just like the old days.  (The blank presentation is based on the minimalist default theme called Office). 2.  If you are one of those people who hates extra keystrokes you can change PowerPoint’s behavior permanently by clicking the File Tab, choosing...

As mentioned yesterday, the PowerPoint 2013 Start Screen has a search box that allows users to search thousands of templates and themes at office.com.  In this post I will describe how to create presentations from templates, how to pin templates to the Start Screen for later use, how to recognize and convert presentations to the new default 16:9 screen aspect ratio, and how to delete unwanted templates from your file system and get them to disappear from your start screen (not the same thing). Themes, Layouts and Templates First, let’s review some basic PowerPoint terminology.  Templates used to...

The first time you start PowerPoint 2013 you will see the Start Screen.  The Start Screen is divided into four main areas: 1.  A Recent area with a list of the files you have opened recently. The default number of files that will appear here is 25, but may be changed in the File > Options > Advanced > Display area.  Of course, the very first time you open PowerPoint the list will be empty, but it will populate over time. 2.  Beneath the Recent area is the Open Other Presentations area. Click this link in order to search your file systems, both local and cloud-based. Note that I have two...