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Subject:Getting PowerPoint and Word to coexist (Longish) From:"Dan Hall" <dhall -at- san-carlos -dot- rms -dot- slb -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Wed, 13 Jun 2001 16:51:00 -0500
'lo all,
Well, the obligatory search of the archives didn't turn anything up, so a
question for the list at large:
<background>
I have about 30 pages of meeting minutes from an RF Summit held here at our
headquarters. I also have the PowerPoint slides that the various presenters
used. My audience (field technicians) doesn't have PowerPoint, but does have
Word and Acrobat Reader. They may print the final output, but more than
likely most will use their laptops to view the electronic version.
</background>
<problem>
I've been asked to create a compilation of the minutes and slides so that
those technicians who didn't make it to the conference (probably 90% of the
total) can review what was discussed/decided. They would like to have this
available by Friday.
</problem>
<solutions>
I've looked at four options, and like none of them.
1. Import the PowerPoint slides into Word (ugh!) or vise versa (ugh again).
I Word I could have the minutes and slides on the same landscape pages, and
in PowerPoint I could have the minutes as "notes". This seems dreadful. In
Word, the text minutes are all "scrunched up" (that's the technical term) on
one side of the page, and the details on some of the slides are still too
small to see. In PowerPoint, I'd have to pdf the slides with notes - which
looks like poop.
2. Interleave pages of minutes with PowerPoint slides (in Word or pdf) so
that you can read the minutes and refer to the slide on the following page.
The main problems here are (a) there are three pages of minutes for some
slides, and only a few lines for others, and (b) getting the individual
slides out of PP and into Word is a pain.
3. Create two pdfs, one from the minutes and one from the slides, and
interleave them using Acrobat. Time consuming and finicky (another technical
term) but it looks like the best choice so far.
4. Just give 'em the two dang files, and let 'em do their own thing. Not
elegant, no value added, but easiest.
</solutions>
<help!>
Is there anyone out there who has had to deal with this type of thing
before? Any suggestions other than these three? Any ideas on ways to make
this easier/quicker/better for the audience?
</help!>
TIA
Dan Hall
Sr. Technical Writer
Schlumberger DDS
All the opinions, errors, sarcasm, and wit (if any) expressed in this e-mail
are solely mine.
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