Integration of Active Slideshow and PowerPoint

Consider being able to add any slideshow produced using Active Slideshow to a PowerPoint presentation. Is this something that appeals to you? Read on!
In this tutorial I will show you how to display an Active Slideshow in a PowerPoint presentation giving you the ability to add an animated slideshow in your presentation. I will talk you through adding the slideshow to the PowerPoint slide and enable you to produce stunning PowerPoint presentation using the Active Slideshow extension.

Why use Active Slideshow in PowerPoint?

You have produced a great slideshow using the fantastic Active Slideshow extension – Why leave it at that? The slideshow is on your website, attracting visitors and interest, why not also use it in a PowerPoint presentation? Whether your slideshow includes a product range, portfolio, latest project or your company image, it could be used in a PowerPoint presentation. We all now know how easy it is to produce great slideshows for the web using Active Slideshow but wouldn’t it be great to include them in PowerPoint presentations for those all important marketing pitches. Well now you can!

FAQ

Q: My slideshow plays when viewed in the .html file but does not play in the PowerPoint presentation. Why?

A: Is your PowerPoint presentation saved in the same directory as the slideshow files? Save all the files in the same directory and then delete the slideshow from the presentation and reload it so that PowerPoint can locate the slideshow files.

Q: I cannot see the slideshow in the PowerPoint presentation even though all the files are in the same directory. How can I resolve this?

A: Did you rename the .xml file to slideshow.xml? You need to rename the file so the flash movie can read the parameters set in the .xml file and it looks for a default of slideshow.xml.

Q: I have tried the above and still the slideshow is not displayed. What shall I do now?

A: If the slideshow is still not displaying in PowerPoint, then you need to save your presentation and then reopen it, deleting the current slideshow. Reinsert the slideshow and it should now be displayed. This has happened due to the PowerPoint presentation being saved after the slideshow was added and PowerPoint uses the default location to look for the Flash file. If the presentation is saved to a particular location prior to adding the flash movie then PowerPoint then looks in the directory where the presentation is saved to locate the Flash movie.

Q: I have altered the colour of the preloader and the change is not shown in PowerPoint, why?

A: The changes made to the preloader colour and the background colour are not specified in the .xml file and PowerPoint loads the .swf file into the presentation as it is at the time of insertion and reads the .xml file for the parameters. Because the preloader colour and background colour are parameters editable from within Dreamweaver the changes are not seen in the PowerPoint presentation. The way around this is to delete the slideshow from PowerPoint and reinsert it which will then pick up the changes.