Formatting problems

[Stacy P.]

I will save a presentation in powerpoint, and the next time i open the
presentation, the formatting is all screwed up. There are 5 masters for the
presentation, and sometimes if i apply a master to a page, all the other
pages hooked up to that master will change into a weird format. It is only
half the presentation, but this is the 4th time i have had to change the
presentation back to the correct format. It is nothing big, it just knocks
out the bullets and changes the color of text, but it is a presentation that
is constantly having info added to it. I don't want to have to change the
text on every page every time i change the presentation. Please help.

 

[Rick Altman]

Stacy, there might be more going on here than a first impression conveys,
but I will start by pointing out an annoying aspect of the slide master
engine:

The standard maneuver that you would expect to perform to apply a master to
a slide actually ends up applying that master to EVERY slide.

I find this to be an example of very poor program design, but be that as it
may, it is important for us users to remember that if we want to apply a
master to a particular slide, when we see the desired master in the task
pane, we must right-click (or click the downward-pointing arrow) and then
find Apply to Selected Slide on the drop-down. The default choice (the top
one on this menu) is Apply to All.

If there is more to your issue, please write back and share the pain...




--
Rick Altman

Author
Why Most PowerPoint Presentations Suck...and how you can make them better
www.betterppt.com

Host
The PowerPoint Live User Conference
Oct 28-31 | The French Quarter of New Orleans
www.powerpointlive.com

 

[Stacy P.]

Thanks Rick. I have applied certain masters to different slides, but
sometimes i will open the presentation to see that certain slides are changed
back to the way they originally were, when i first made the presentation. I
have password protected it to make sure that nobody else is messing with it,
but i honestly think there is a default option on or something. It is not
the entire presentation that is changing, only some slides. I have 5 master
slides and i have every slide allocated to a master layout, and for some
reason, every time i open the presentation, only some slides from one master
are changed back to the original format. I think my computer is possessed!!
Thanks for the help though.

 

[Kathy Jacobs]

Stacy,
Is this in 2003, by chance? If so, it could be a known bug about the order
of the masters.

Echo- You out there today? You are the expert on this....

--
Kathy Jacobs, Microsoft MVP OneNote and PowerPoint
Author of Kathy Jacobs on PowerPoint
Get PowerPoint and OneNote information at www.onppt.com

I believe life is meant to be lived. But:
if we live without making a difference, it makes no difference that we lived

 

[Stacy P.]

Thanks for the help. Whatever the problem is, it is getting really annoying.
This isn't a presentation that i can change constanly. I just opened it
again, and this time, like 30 pages are screwed up. What a waste of time.

 

[Rick Altman]

Stacy, I invite you to send me that presentation file, which you can do at

http://www.altman.com/upload


When you can screw up 30 pages of a presentation file just by opening,
something is whacked, and I'd like to know what!





--
Rick Altman

Author
Why Most PowerPoint Presentations Suck...and how you can make them better
www.betterppt.com

Host
The PowerPoint Live User Conference
Oct 28-31 | The French Quarter of New Orleans
www.powerpointlive.com