Bored of Google Presentations already? If you're looking for something with a little more pizazz, there's Prezentit, a Web-based presentation maker. Like Google, Vyew, and others, Prezentit lets you build, and work on a presentation with several collaborators at once, all in your browser. You can send out the finished product as a URL, or even download it in the form of an HTML file that will run on any computer with a browser installed. These are handy features, but how does it stack up on features? The answer, unfortunately, is not well.
As far as presentation makers go, Prezentit is pretty bare-bones. You can only add text and images, and there are no slide templates like you'll find on PowerPoint. To add content, you can upload image files from your hard drive, which get stored in a free storage locker that holds up to 250MB. There's also a gallery of background art, although you're limited to less than 20 sample shots. Unfortunately, there's also no way to upload a PowerPoint file and have it convert to the editor, which is where these services can be incredibly useful, especially for creating a highly searchable index.
So what sets Prezentit apart from the pack? Despite its lack of features, its interface is wonderfully easy to use. If you're familiar with Microsoft Office 2007's "Ribbon" UI, the idea isn't too far off. There's also a slew of genuinely good-looking transitions, many of which are smooth, and low on the cheese factor (read: there are no glitter graphics or explosions.) While there's no built-in chat client, there are hosting pages for each presentation that double as a place to let others add their two cents about what could be better. The service is also adding an "explore" section soon for publicly shared presentations.
I wouldn't recommend using Prezentit over some of the other Web-based presentations out there simply due to a dearth of features I think are pretty essential to a good presentation app, but the service is young, and there's definitely room for growth. We've got more screenshots after the break.
Put together simple, good-looking presentations with PreZentit. You can even upload your own images, although file sizes are capped off at 1MB a pop.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Some digital publishers are complaining that the new Microsoft Outlook rolls back design standards by half a decade. The 2007 edition of Outlook, the most popular e-mail client for big businesses, ditches Internet Explorer's technology for that of Word 2007 to display HTML messages.
Same message, different Outlook
(Credit: Campaign Monitor)The result? In your Outlook 2007 in-box, background images may not appear within dressed-up HTML messages. Forget about filling out certain forms. Animated GIF images won't play, and a red X will mark the spot where a Flash movie would be. ALT tags, which describe pictures and help blind people to "see" them, won't work either. And there's more.
I hadn't noticed funky-looking messages during my beta tests of Outlook 2007, probably because I shun HTML newsletters in favor of plain old text. But if you like to get news and views from various sources via e-mail, those messages might look lopsided and incomplete in Outlook 2007. In that case, a Web-based e-mail program would be a better choice for your subscriptions.
Microsoft has attempted to improve HTML support within Word 2007, which even offers a blog-editing interface. HTML files within earlier versions of Word were a nightmare of sloppy code. Web content created in Word 2007 looks more elegant on the surface. But when I used Word 2007's blogging layout to create a document containing no more than a photograph and a three-word headline, the resulting HTML file contained a whopping 32,417 characters of code, about the length of a 2,000-word essay. By hand-coding in basic HTML, I cobbled together a nearly identical Web page with a mere 200 characters.
Why would Microsoft rely upon its word processor's technology rather than its nearly ubiquitous Web browser to display e-mail messages? Ostensibly, it's for the sake of security. Microsoft touts Internet Explorer 7 as its safest browser yet. So why aren't IE7's standards strong enough for your in-box?
(via Sitepoint Tech Times)
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