What is MS PowerPoint?

You might have heard the name Microsoft PowerPoint in various environments. It is a common term in every place, be it a school, office or a home. In this article, we will deep dive into Microsoft PowerPoint and learn what it is thoroughly.

What is PowerPoint?

Microsoft PowerPoint is an application that comes as part of the Microsoft Office package. You can create both personal and professional presentations using PowerPoint.

The following are some key points to remember about the creation and introduction of Microsoft PowerPoint:

1. Robert Gaskins and Dennis Austin designed the application at Forethought, Inc., a software business.

2. It was first released on April 20, 1987, and Microsoft purchased it three months later.

3. MS PowerPoint 2.0 was the initial version of this programme released by Microsoft (1990).

4. It’s a presentation-based programme that incorporates graphics, videos, and other multimedia elements to make a presentation more interactive and engaging.

5. A saved Powerpoint presentation’s file extension is “.ppt.”

6. PPT stands for PowerPoint presentation, which includes slides and other elements.

Users can use PowerPoint to build multimedia-rich presentations made up of a sequence of slides. Because it’s fully connected with the rest of the Microsoft Office suite, users may import content from Excel or Word, as well as other media like photographs, audio, and video clips, into PowerPoint.

A set of templates are present to generate slides, providing the user with predefined layouts for various purposes. A user can sort that slide as “master slide” once the presentation’s theme is defined by defining a standard font, background colour, and layout. The user has the option of changing each subsequent slide individually or editing the master slide to affect all subsequent slides.

Throughout a PowerPoint presentation, the speaker can manage the speed by manually regulating the flow or by having the slides switch at predetermined intervals, which can vary from slide to slide. Individual items on a slide, such as bullet points or movies, may also appear with the help of a command.

In PowerPoint 97, there was a big alteration, with the addition of predefined transition effects and the ability to schedule them suitably so that presentations transitioned automatically. This allowed a presenter to stick to a predetermined path and continue the presentation without stopping to rearrange or read the slides.

PowerPoint 2007 brought in the new “ribbon” design, indicating a significant departure from the previous interface style.

Presentations in prior versions of PowerPoint could only be saved in the standard.pptx format. Later versions since 2013 and 2016 enable users to save slideshows in a variety of basic formats, including photos (JPEG, GIF, PNG, and so on), videos (WMV or MPEG-4), and text (PDF).

What can you do with PowerPoint?

You can do the following on your PC, Mac, or mobile device, using Microsoft PowerPoint:

1. Create a presentation from the ground up or from a template.

2. Text, photos, art, and videos can all be included.

3. With PowerPoint Designer, you may choose a professional design.

4. Transitions, animations, and cinematic motion can all be included.

5. Save your presentations to OneDrive so you can access them from your computer, tablet, or phone.

6. Share your work and collaborate with others, regardless of where they are.

How to open Microsoft PowerPoint?

PowerPoint can be found on the Start menu if you have Microsoft PowerPoint or the whole Microsoft Office package installed in Microsoft Windows.

Bear in mind that PowerPoint does not come installed on new machines. Before you can use it on your computer, you must first purchase and install it.

If you have PowerPoint installed but can’t find it on your Start menu, you can manually open it by following the steps below:

1. Launch My Computer.

2. Choose the C: drive by clicking or selecting it. If you have Microsoft Office installed on a drive other than C:, choose that drive instead.

3. Go to the Microsoft Office folder in the Program Files (x86) folder.

4. If there is a root folder in the Microsoft Office folder, open it. Then open the OfficeXX folder, where XX denotes the Office version (e.g., Office16 for Microsoft Office 2016). If there isn’t a root folder, look for and open a folder called “Office.”

5. Double-click a file named POWERPNT.EXE to start the program.

What does PowerPoint look like?

As soon as you open Microsoft PowerPoint, this is what you will see. This is a new blank presentation into which a user can add content as per their needs.

PowerPoint slides can be text-only or feature photos, videos, or animated text and graphics. Text can be formatted in the same way as Microsoft Word allows, with custom colour, size, and font type options.

What are the advantages of Microsoft PowerPoint?

Users can take advantage of a variety of features in PowerPoint, including:

1. It is extensively used and regarded as the “gold standard” in the field of presentation software. It is far more likely that if you make a PowerPoint presentation, it’ll be simpler for others to access and view.

2. Slide transitions, animations, layouts, templates, and other presentation components are all available as options.

3. It lets you export your presentations to GIF and JPG photos, MPEG-4 video, PDF, RTF (rich text format), WMV (Windows Media Video), and PowerPoint XML, among other formats.

Uses of PowerPoint

Presentations in PowerPoint are valuable for both personal and business purposes. Here are a couple of the important fields where PPT is particularly beneficial:

1. PowerPoint presentations can help make education more dynamic and draw students to the modified version of studying, which is becoming more popular as e-learning and smart classes become more popular.

2. PowerPoint presentations can be incredibly useful in the realm of marketing. Numbers can be displayed more clearly and prominently using graphs and charts, which may be overlooked by the spectator if read aloud.

3. MS PowerPoint can be used in business to welcome investors or to illustrate an increase or drop in profitability.

4. Creating Resumes – One may use Microsoft PowerPoint to create digital resumes. The user can add various patterns, photographs, and other elements to their CV.

5. PPT makes it easier to represent the progress of a corporation, business, student’s grades, and other entities by allowing the use of both graphics and text in a presentation.

Summary

As explored in this article, PowerPoint is a great tool that anyone who wants to make a presentation can use without hassle. In the following series of articles, we will be learning about each and every feature in PowerPoint.