M
Mike Maxwell
I just had a very bad experience importing an MsWord doc into PowerPoint.
The Word doc had headers (i.e. in outline format), as well as a small amount
of text under many of the headings (formatted as 'body'), and some tables.
Only the headings came across--none of the text. So I was reduced to
manually cutting and pasting the text paragraphs into PP.
Even worse were the tables, which I had carefully laid out in Word--I
couldn't even cut and paste them across (the Edit | Paste menu is not
available). I had to reconstruct them from scratch in PP. (Aargh--now that
I am finished, I discovered the trick: you have to choose a slide
"autolayout" that allows you to put in a table. Then do _not_ double click
on the icon that says "double click to add a table", or you'll end up with
all the data of your original table in a single column in one cell of the
table. Instead use Edit | Paste to put it on the page. I'm not sure how to
get rid of that little icon. Maybe some of the other "autolayout"s allow
you to paste in tables?)
I find PP's editing facilities to be cumbersome, and I would much rather use
Word to create a talk, then import it into PP for some final editing. But
this was an exercise in futility. Of course it's possible I was just doing
s.t. wrong, but my point is that it shouldn't be this hard to figure out.
All this was with Office 2000. Is there any improvement with later versions
of Office? And why, Microsoft, are Word and PP such different products?
IMNSHO, a slide presentation should be just a different way of printing
(i.e. formatting) a Word doc. (I know, Microsoft probably isn't listening,
but it helps the soul to rant and rave once in awhile.)
Maybe I'll have a look at Star Office...
The Word doc had headers (i.e. in outline format), as well as a small amount
of text under many of the headings (formatted as 'body'), and some tables.
Only the headings came across--none of the text. So I was reduced to
manually cutting and pasting the text paragraphs into PP.
Even worse were the tables, which I had carefully laid out in Word--I
couldn't even cut and paste them across (the Edit | Paste menu is not
available). I had to reconstruct them from scratch in PP. (Aargh--now that
I am finished, I discovered the trick: you have to choose a slide
"autolayout" that allows you to put in a table. Then do _not_ double click
on the icon that says "double click to add a table", or you'll end up with
all the data of your original table in a single column in one cell of the
table. Instead use Edit | Paste to put it on the page. I'm not sure how to
get rid of that little icon. Maybe some of the other "autolayout"s allow
you to paste in tables?)
I find PP's editing facilities to be cumbersome, and I would much rather use
Word to create a talk, then import it into PP for some final editing. But
this was an exercise in futility. Of course it's possible I was just doing
s.t. wrong, but my point is that it shouldn't be this hard to figure out.
All this was with Office 2000. Is there any improvement with later versions
of Office? And why, Microsoft, are Word and PP such different products?
IMNSHO, a slide presentation should be just a different way of printing
(i.e. formatting) a Word doc. (I know, Microsoft probably isn't listening,
but it helps the soul to rant and rave once in awhile.)
Maybe I'll have a look at Star Office...