Please save my sanity from PowerPoint 2007.

June 30, 2008 10:04 AM

I do PowerPoint design for a living and -- finally, begrudgingly -- I am switching to PowerPoint 2007. So far, do not like. So, a two-part question: 1. Can anyone suggest a text or video tutorial on moving to PowerPoint 2007 for 2003 power users? 2. I've seen some "make PowerPoint 2007 work like PowerPoint 2003" add-ins. Does anyone have experience/recommendations for any of those? Thanks!
posted by SampleSize to computers & internet (7 comments total)

this one should work fine since it shows ribbon and the classic link

the basic starter edition does everything you want without paying for the extra stuff

As for the transition here are a few links

Unviersity of texas it transition help

Microsoft screencast
and
Guides for 2007 Excel, word and powerpoint

Personally I like it better than 2003 and right now am hating going back to 2003 at work but thats just a personal preference
posted by radsqd at 10:16 AM on June 30, 2008

Most of my difficulty in moving from Office 2003 to 2007 has been finding commands. I've been using this add-in from OfficeLabs - and it works an absolute treat.
posted by Blacksun at 10:53 AM on June 30, 2008

I love PP 2007. There is a learning curve but the entire program is much cleaner and the fonts are crisper so much so that I cringe every time I see '03 (or just any office drop down menu).

My suggestion is that you spend an hour just clicking all the options and making a dummy presentation. The help is much better in this version too. I used it my first week and the help results were spot on.
posted by special-k at 11:51 AM on June 30, 2008

The add-in Blacksun is helpful for when you just can't find that !@#$ing command anymore. Certainly helps with my frustration.

One of the nice things about the previous PowerPoint was that many options were available on the screen, but now you have to click through the ribbon to find them. I highly recommend trying to learn the keyboard shortcuts, as it will make you faster than you were before with the mouse. Just press Alt (don't hold it down) and all the shortcut keys will show up on screen.
posted by grouse at 11:54 AM on June 30, 2008

but now you have to click through the ribbon to find them.

You can customize the ribbon to suit your specific uses.
posted by Dark Messiah at 2:03 PM on June 30, 2008

I'm really hoping it's just because I'm new to the software, but so far I'm finding that things that used to take one step are taking many. I used to know keyboard shortcuts for just about everything. For example, Ctrl + Shift + G = group in 2003, now it's Alt + J + D + A + G + G. That doesn't seem like an improvement to me.

Another example: in 2003, if I had a solid colored shape and wanted to apply a simple gradient, I could just choose fill effects and apply. Now, if I try to apply a gradient, it changes the base color as well. If I want to keep my base color, I have to go through many steps to create a custom gradient.

I can see how this version is better for the average user to kinda poke around and come up with a nicer final product, but I need to use it to execute the image I have in mind. For that, so far, it seems much, much worse.

Sorry for the mini-rant...just feeling very frustrated with this thing.
posted by SampleSize at 4:47 PM on June 30, 2008

I'm agnostic about powerpoint versions, I don't use it enough to be a power user.
I would point out that if you are using it as your number 1 productivity tool you probably do want to move to the new version, and learn it natively (without the downgrading plug-ins).
If you don't you will find the jump to Powerpoint 2009 or whatever twice as hard, and by Powerpoint 2011 you will be scrambling to keep up.
Yeah, it sucks to be microsoft's play thing, but as an expert your customers will expect you to be 100% up to date.
posted by bystander at 4:50 AM on July 1, 2008