Slow PP Presentation Download

  • Thread starter Thread starter Guest
  • Start date Start date
G

Guest

I have a PowerPoint presentation that I am displaying on my website. This is
a very large presentation that is only suitable to be viewed using a
high-speed, broadband connection. The problem is that during the 15 to 30
seconds while the browser is downloading the slide show presentation, the
complete screen on the monitor is blank and the word "Done" is shown in the
status bar. (To see problem, go to http://www.jhbarnes.com and click on
Quick-View link 7.)
BTW, there is no hour-glass or progress meter showing that the download is
in progress.) This is very confusing to users and they frequently abort the
download before it is completed.
Is there any way of displaying a message to users informing them that the
presentation is being downloaded to the browser? (I also posted this problem
on the PP newsgroup.)
Any help will be greatly appreciated,
Jim
 
<imho>
At 8.2 mb I can see why people give up. It took "awhile" and I'm on a good DSL connection.
Anyone stuck behind a 56k dial up would be frustrated to no end.

Excuse me for being a little "direct" but:

If you're demonstrating web design features / capabilities, why do it with a PowerPoint
demo.
Why not simply create a page for each theme and let the page display a screenshot that has
been optimized with an image editor.

Then use the same navigation style in a regular page to display the theme pages in a frame
or iframe.

That way you're not forcing people to sit through an 8+mb download, and you only get a
bandwidth hit for the pages the visitor actually views.

How many people will look at 1 or 2 themes and then close the demo?? There goes 8.2mb of
bandwidth down the drain.

</imho>

--
Steve Easton
Microsoft MVP FrontPage
95isalive
This site is best viewed..................
...............................with a computer
 
Additionally.

Your home page never completely loads for some reason. The progress bar never completes
and the throbber never stops spinning.
( I think their called throbbers because some of them give you a headache )

;-)

Also, your using vml images ( word art ) which only display correctly in Internet
Explorer,
and you're using JAVA applets. JAVA ( not to be confused with javascript ) is not
installed
on new XP machines with IE 6, and it will not be a part of IE 7 and / or Windows Vista.


Sorry if I'm sounding too critical, I realize you put a lot of work into your site, but
I'm really trying to help.



--
Steve Easton
Microsoft MVP FrontPage
95isalive
This site is best viewed..................
...............................with a computer
 
Steve,
You are certainly not being to critical. I appreciate your candid remarks
and will redesign this function to elimiate PowerPoint presentations from the
site. I realized that it was large download and would require a HS connection
but PP presentations are great for things like this. BTW, This presentation
was initially developed to be shown as a slide show presentation on a laptop
and I simply published it to the web. Will not make that mistake again.
Will also take a look at the other problems you noted.
Thanks again.

Jim
 
Now I understand why you wanted to try using the PowerPoint demo. ( that name doesn't
abbreviate very well does it )

I sometimes use word art to create graphics, but I then take a screenshot and convert it
to a gif or jpg ( depending upon the color depth ) and then use the image on the page.


hth


--
Steve Easton
Microsoft MVP FrontPage
95isalive
This site is best viewed..................
...............................with a computer
 
I'm curious as to why you would bother creating an 8 mg ppt of themes that
are readily available in FrontPage...whats the point when you can just open
Frontpage and check them out?
 
IMHO
- making it a .mht (single page PPT) shows total lack of knowledge of PPT and web technology

Agree there is no value in the PPT at all
(which just shows FP std themes out of the box)

--




| Steve,
| You are certainly not being to critical. I appreciate your candid remarks
| and will redesign this function to elimiate PowerPoint presentations from the
| site. I realized that it was large download and would require a HS connection
| but PP presentations are great for things like this. BTW, This presentation
| was initially developed to be shown as a slide show presentation on a laptop
| and I simply published it to the web. Will not make that mistake again.
| Will also take a look at the other problems you noted.
| Thanks again.
|
| Jim
| "Steve Easton" wrote:
|
| > Additionally.
| >
| > Your home page never completely loads for some reason. The progress bar never completes
| > and the throbber never stops spinning.
| > ( I think their called throbbers because some of them give you a headache )
| >
| > ;-)
| >
| > Also, your using vml images ( word art ) which only display correctly in Internet
| > Explorer,
| > and you're using JAVA applets. JAVA ( not to be confused with javascript ) is not
| > installed
| > on new XP machines with IE 6, and it will not be a part of IE 7 and / or Windows Vista.
| >
| >
| > Sorry if I'm sounding too critical, I realize you put a lot of work into your site, but
| > I'm really trying to help.
| >
| >
| >
| > --
| > Steve Easton
| > Microsoft MVP FrontPage
| > 95isalive
| > This site is best viewed..................
| > ...............................with a computer
| >
| > | > > I have a PowerPoint presentation that I am displaying on my website. This is
| > > a very large presentation that is only suitable to be viewed using a
| > > high-speed, broadband connection. The problem is that during the 15 to 30
| > > seconds while the browser is downloading the slide show presentation, the
| > > complete screen on the monitor is blank and the word "Done" is shown in the
| > > status bar. (To see problem, go to http://www.jhbarnes.com and click on
| > > Quick-View link 7.)
| > > BTW, there is no hour-glass or progress meter showing that the download is
| > > in progress.) This is very confusing to users and they frequently abort the
| > > download before it is completed.
| > > Is there any way of displaying a message to users informing them that the
| > > presentation is being downloaded to the browser? (I also posted this problem
| > > on the PP newsgroup.)
| > > Any help will be greatly appreciated,
| > > Jim
| > >
| >
| >
| >
 
In hindsight, I absolutely agree that PowerPoint was a poor, ill-advised
choice for this application but the reason that it was used was because it
was already being used as an actual slide show presentation that was shown to
prospective customers during face-to-face meetings, and the original intent
was to have a single presentation that could either be shown in-person or
over the web. (BTW. if you revisit the website in question, you will see that
while the themes presentation is still there but PP is no longer used.)
However, I strongly disagree that showing these “so called†out of the box
themes to customer and prospective customers has no merit. I have used every
version of FrontPage since Microsoft originally purchased it from the Vermeer
Corporation in 1996, and I still do not comprehend the total capabilities
and/or extensibilities of FP themes. Clearly, if a tech-savvy customer has a
version of FrontPage installed, it is a simple (though cumbersome) process to
browse the thumbnails of the 80+ themes. Unfortunately, this is rarely the
case and the first time that most customers see any of these “out of the boxâ€
themes is when one is actually applied to his or her website.
My objective of showing these themes in this manner were, (1) to allow a
prospective customer to get general idea of the value of themes, and (2) to
describe these “out of the box†themes can be modified/customized to their
exacting specifications. This presentation enables the customer to select one
or more themes as candidates for their website. Once this is done, a
prototype can be developed and shown to the customer in a matter of minutes.
This can sometime save hours (or days) during the design phase of a web
development project.
 
Back
Top