Can a powerpoint created on a PC with "Insert Video" links be made to run on a MAC?

[Bill Walter]

I have little experience with MAC and I have to visit one of the schools to
try anything.

I have a number of PowerPoint presentations created using Office 2003 that
contain PowerPoint slides and inserted links to video.If I take the
presentation and do a Pack for CD I can take the CD to a MAC and if Office
and PowerPoint are already installed on the MAC I can click on the
PowerPoint presentation and get it to play and the video will play also.

On the PC the presentation automatically starts a menu and used the
PowerPoint Player if the target machine does not already have a copy of
PowerPoint installed.

On the MAC it does not autostart and even if I install the MAC PowerPoint
player
the video content will not play. If the full PowerPoint is installed is
still does not auto-start but the video content does play.

I tried one MAC that had Microsoft office installed and if I inserted the CD
and clicked on the PowerPoint presentation the presentation would show and
when I got to a slide that had a inserted video the video would play when
the video picture was clicked.

On that same machine I downloaded the Microsoft
PowerPoint player for MAC. The click was still associated with the full
PowerPoint so I opened the PowerPoint player and selected the PowerPoint
presentation and it displayed but when I go to a slide with an inserted
video it would not play. Does that mean that the PowerPoint viewer cannot
play some videos that the full PowerPoint for MAC can play or am I still
doing something wrong?

The videos themselves will play if I click on them on the MAC so it must
have some program to allow the video to play. I am using AVI files because
that seemed to be one of the only formats that was shown to be available in
PowerPoint on both the MAC and PC. I tried MOV and although it played fine
on the PC outside of PowerPoint it would not start from PowerPoint. I did
not try it on the MAC because I am doing the presentation creation on the PC
and I cannot test it on the PC with MOV files. I have not tried MPG yet.
What specific version and parameters will insure that a MPG will play on
both a MAC and PC from a PowerPoint slide show?

I am trying to make some educational content for a school district that has
some schools using MAC and other schools using PC.

1. Can I modify the CD so that it will autostart on either PC or MAC?
2. Can the MAC PowerPoint player play video that the full version of MAC
PowerPoint will play?
3. Are there any books or articles on interchangeability of PowerPoint
content between MAC and PC?
4. On the PC I have a monitor and a TV connected to the video card. When the
presentation plays the video plays imbedded in the slide on the Monitor, but
on the TV it switches from showing a copy of the slide to a full screen
version of the video. Can the MAC be set to go to full screen for the video
portion?

Bill Walter


I tried one MAC that had Microsoft office installed and if I inserted the CD
and clicked on the PowerPoint presentation the presentation would show and
when I got to a slide that had a inserted video the video would play when
the insert was clicked. On that same machine I downloaded the Microsoft
PowerPoint player for MAC. The click was still associated with the full
PowerPoint so I opened the PowerPoint player and selected the PowerPoint
presentation and it displayed but when I go to a slide with an inserted
video it would not play. Does that mean that the PowerPoint viewer cannot
play some videos that the full PowerPoint for MAC can play or am I still
doing something wrong?

The videos themselves will play if I click on them on the MAC so it must
have some program to allow the video to play. I am using AVI files because
that seemed to be one of the only formats that was shown to be available in
PowerPoint on both the MAC and PC. I tried MOV and although it played fine
on the PC outside of PowerPoint it would not start from PowerPoint. I did
not try it on the MAC because I am doing the presentation creation on the PC
and I cannot test it on the PC with MOV files. I have not tried MPG yet.
What specific version and parameters will insure that a MPG will play on
both a MAC and PC from a PowerPoint slide show?

Bill Walter

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

I probably won't be able to answer your questions, but whoever will is
going to want to know what versions of PowerPoint, what versions of the
PowerPoint Viewer, and what versions of the Mac and Windows OS you are
using.
--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.loyola.edu/education/PowerfulPowerPoint/

 

[Bill Walter]

The original creation was done with Office 2003 PowerPoint with all the
latest updates. The target machines will be all over the map. In our school
district a lot of the equipment is donated, purchased by PTA groups,
obtained through various grants at different times. I am trying as much as
possible to do something like the Package for CD from PowerPoint for PC that
puts the viewer and everything on the CD so it is as independent as possible
of the target machines. I just donate some free time in the school district
helping repair and configure the odd systems they have collected. Up to now
I have stayed away for the schools with the Mac systems. One of the teachers
has put together an excellent set of training aids going over many of the
basic skill for the year using PowerPoint 2003 for PC and videos the school
district has licensed from United Streaming. The teachers in the Mac
oriented schools have asked if the materials can be made to work on their
machines and I happened to be removing spyware and updating virus definition
files on the PCs in the room where they were having the meeting to discuss
the project and got sucked into the project.

Bill Walter

 

[David M. Marcovitz]

Thanks for the details and thanks for helping out in the schools. Videos
are one of the toughest areas for compatibility (even between PCs let
alone from PC to Mac). When videos don't play, I have had more success
linking to them rather than inserting them because then they play in
whatever program on the machine can play them and don't rely on
PowerPoint. But I don't have a lot of experience with that.

If you are dealing with a variety of Macs, you probably have some OS X
Macs and some OS 9 Macs. This will be a problem as to what version of the
Viewer you run. In fact, some OS X Macs that don't include the Classic
environment can't even run the old Viewer. You might have to include
multiple viewers, but your chance of successfully auto-running one disk
on a wide range of Macs would be very slim.

I hope someone with more experience with this chimes in soon.

--David

--
David M. Marcovitz
Director of Graduate Programs in Educational Technology
Loyola College in Maryland
Author of _Powerful PowerPoint for Educators_
http://www.loyola.edu/education/PowerfulPowerPoint/

 

[Steve Rindsberg]

It doesn't sound as if you're doing anything wrong.

Mac doesn't support AutoRun in the same way Windows does; it won't run a
Windows-created AutoRun CD.

The free PPT viewer for Mac is really a PowerPoint 98 compatible viewer, as I
recall; it doesn't support all the features of newer PowerPoint versions (on
the Mac, we've been through 2001, X and now 2004 since 98). I suspect this may
account for the inability to play back videos as well, though I'm not certain.
It'd run in Classic mode and Classic may not have system level support for the
video type you're using where OS/X (via QuickTime) does.

I have little experience with MAC and I have to visit one of the schools to
try anything.

I have a number of PowerPoint presentations created using Office 2003 that
contain PowerPoint slides and inserted links to video.If I take the
presentation and do a Pack for CD I can take the CD to a MAC and if Office
and PowerPoint are already installed on the MAC I can click on the
PowerPoint presentation and get it to play and the video will play also.

On the PC the presentation automatically starts a menu and used the
PowerPoint Player if the target machine does not already have a copy of
PowerPoint installed.

On the MAC it does not autostart and even if I install the MAC PowerPoint
player
the video content will not play. If the full PowerPoint is installed is
still does not auto-start but the video content does play.

I tried one MAC that had Microsoft office installed and if I inserted the CD
and clicked on the PowerPoint presentation the presentation would show and
when I got to a slide that had a inserted video the video would play when
the video picture was clicked.

On that same machine I downloaded the Microsoft
PowerPoint player for MAC. The click was still associated with the full
PowerPoint so I opened the PowerPoint player and selected the PowerPoint
presentation and it displayed but when I go to a slide with an inserted
video it would not play. Does that mean that the PowerPoint viewer cannot
play some videos that the full PowerPoint for MAC can play or am I still
doing something wrong?

The videos themselves will play if I click on them on the MAC so it must
have some program to allow the video to play. I am using AVI files because
that seemed to be one of the only formats that was shown to be available in
PowerPoint on both the MAC and PC. I tried MOV and although it played fine
on the PC outside of PowerPoint it would not start from PowerPoint. I did
not try it on the MAC because I am doing the presentation creation on the PC
and I cannot test it on the PC with MOV files. I have not tried MPG yet.
What specific version and parameters will insure that a MPG will play on
both a MAC and PC from a PowerPoint slide show?

I am trying to make some educational content for a school district that has
some schools using MAC and other schools using PC.

1. Can I modify the CD so that it will autostart on either PC or MAC?
2. Can the MAC PowerPoint player play video that the full version of MAC
PowerPoint will play?
3. Are there any books or articles on interchangeability of PowerPoint
content between MAC and PC?
4. On the PC I have a monitor and a TV connected to the video card. When the
presentation plays the video plays imbedded in the slide on the Monitor, but
on the TV it switches from showing a copy of the slide to a full screen
version of the video. Can the MAC be set to go to full screen for the video
portion?

Bill Walter

I tried one MAC that had Microsoft office installed and if I inserted the CD
and clicked on the PowerPoint presentation the presentation would show and
when I got to a slide that had a inserted video the video would play when
the insert was clicked. On that same machine I downloaded the Microsoft
PowerPoint player for MAC. The click was still associated with the full
PowerPoint so I opened the PowerPoint player and selected the PowerPoint
presentation and it displayed but when I go to a slide with an inserted
video it would not play. Does that mean that the PowerPoint viewer cannot
play some videos that the full PowerPoint for MAC can play or am I still
doing something wrong?

The videos themselves will play if I click on them on the MAC so it must
have some program to allow the video to play. I am using AVI files because
that seemed to be one of the only formats that was shown to be available in
PowerPoint on both the MAC and PC. I tried MOV and although it played fine
on the PC outside of PowerPoint it would not start from PowerPoint. I did
not try it on the MAC because I am doing the presentation creation on the PC
and I cannot test it on the PC with MOV files. I have not tried MPG yet.
What specific version and parameters will insure that a MPG will play on
both a MAC and PC from a PowerPoint slide show?

Bill Walter

================================================
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
================================================

 

[Jim Gordon MVP]

Hi Bill,

Your CD burning software may allow you to select a file to use as an
autostart on Mac OS 9 and earlier and on Windows. It's my understanding
that in OSX this feature has been removed because it is a security risk
to allow programs to run simply by putting a disk into the drive. So
even if you chose to have an autostart file when you burned the disk OSX
will ignore the setting. Autostart is a function of the OS and the file
system, not PowerPoint.

The Mac PowerPoint player is quite old. I think the latest one is for
PowerPoint 98. It is quite possible that the player was not designed to
handle all movies, particularly any that were inserted in newer versions
of PowerPoint or use codecs that it does not have. A workaround that is
sometimes OK is to use PowerPoint 2004 to save the presentation as a
QuickTime movie and play the movie instead of the PowerPoint file.

AVI is a good choice as a common file format for video when you need to
use both Mac and Windows. PowerPoint itself does not play movies. On
MacOS it relies upon QuickTime. On Windows it uses a different player.
The AVI format is the one that works best as far as I know. If you find
an mpeg format that both QuickTime and the Windows player likes then go
ahead and use it, but I've had best results with AVI.

-Jim