| Creating action settings and hyperlinks provides many advantages to you as a presenter. But perhaps none is so compelling as the ability to create a nonlinear presentation. If you're presenting anything that might invite input, feedback, questions and answers, or diverging paths of discussion, you don't want to be locked into a strictly sequential slide show. Nor do you want to fumble around trying to find the slide that illustrates the current point of discussion. Hyperlinks can help you build a nonlinear slide show, one in which you can jump from topic to topic as needed, jump to hidden slides that you use only if required, and quickly find your way around the complete corpus of slides. These are the steps and considerations I try to follow when creating a nonlinear slide show: Create a relatively linear slide show first, using the outlining tools. Determine the segments or modules of the presentation. Ask yourself what parts can stand alone. Create supplemental segments or slides that might come in handy but that you won't necessarily use. Create a menu slide. I like to create a normal title or opening slide, followed by a menu slide with a list of major segments of the presentation. Create an invisible link from each item on the menu slide to the beginning slide of the section of slides that relates to that item. Go to the last slide of the first section of slides and create an action button that returns you to the menu slide. Size and format the button exactly the way you want it to look and position it unobtrusively in a corner of the slide. Select the button and copy it. Go to the last slide of each section of slides or to hidden slides and paste the button. PowerPoint places the button along with its action setting at the same location on the slide each time you paste it. If needed, create submenu slides with links to subtopics or peripheral information and then create return links to the submenu and/or the main menu slides. Include links to hidden slides where appropriate.
Linear slide shows are easy to present. Just advance the slide and talk about whatever comes up next. But don't count on making a very flexible presentation this way. Nonlinear presentations are much more difficult to prepare. They require a great deal of rehearsal so you know exactly where the links are and what will happen when you click them. However, a well-planned and well-rehearsed presentation of this type can be highly effective, appearing natural and spontaneous.  For more information on rehearsing a presentation, see p. 263.
Tip  | Creating a nonlinear presentation requires careful planning. It often helps to sketch out on paper, like a flowchart, what the various parts of the presentation are and how you might get from one part to another. Then create links in PowerPoint to match the flowchart. |
The Absolute Minimum PowerPoint has huge advantages over a traditional slide show in that it can jump directly to any place in a slide show, or it can link to information and programs outside the slide show itself. In this chapter, you did the following: You found out how to use action settings to create a dynamic presentation. You learned how to add action settings to nearly any PowerPoint object. You explored the use of action buttons. You learned how to create links, including invisible links, to text elements. You discovered that it's possible to avoid creating a purely sequential, or linear, slide show.
Chapter 13, "Preparing a Slide Show for Presentation," discusses getting a slide show ready for presentation. |
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