Digital Workshop

Particularly for Mack:

18 months ago you helped me work out how to launch a .pps file from Opus, allowing for some people having Office, some just having the viewer, some on Vista, and some on XP.

The file has a specific filename, and is always in c:/temp.

We ended up with the attached.

Now I also have Windows 7 users - can you tell me how to build Windows 7 into this?

Many thanks, Linda

If it ain't broke - don't fix it.

Windows 7 will work fine under the original script.

Mack

Thanks - I've got a win7 laptop, but it refuses to play powerpoint at all, so I can't test.

Also, when I run an Opus pub on win7, I get a warning message that it's changing from aero. Is this standard - or have you found a way round it?

I'll do a screen grab of the message if what I mean isn't obvious.

Thanks, Linda

Hi Linda,

It worked here under W7. What version of PP Viewer are you trying to use?

As for the switch from aero, yes it's been an on-going glitch. You can turn of DirectX in the publication - but check that there are no adverse effects.

Alternatively Opus7 is due some time soon and this might fix the problem.

Regards,

Mack

I downloaded PP viewer 2007. It was 2am though - perhaps it was my first stupid mistake of today!

Plenty of coffee required that time of day.

PP Viewer 07 (MD5 - C6A24D8FEFBA44ECAE8D2F02E18866BE) works fine using that script.

But Office is installed so that might affect the result.

Have you simply run the viewer and or standard 'run' from Windows to check that it's not the OS.

The other issue, but I doubt it, is that it's an Opus 6 issue - but that seems unlikely if it's running under Vista.

Regards,

Mack

Mac, can you help a bit more on this?

You wrote this bit of script for me, ages ago, to launch a powerpoint from c:/temp.

Now the customer wants it to launch from the publication directory, in a folder called powerpoint.

To fix the script below, would I replace

"c:\\temp\\gmi01.pps"

with

"<SYSTEM_PUBLICATION_DIR>\\powerpoint\\gmi01.pps"

Apologies, I don't have a Vista machine handy to test on.

Many thanks, Linda



{
if (FileExists("C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office11\\PPTVIEW.EXE"))
{
LaunchFile("C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office11\\PPTVIEW.EXE","c:\\temp\\gmi01.pps")
} else if (FileExists("C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office12\\PPTVIEW.EXE"))
{
LaunchFile("C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Office12\\PPTVIEW.EXE","c:\\temp\\gmi01.pps")
} else
{
Debug.trace('Viewer Not Found')
}


}

In the great tradition of talking to myself....

This seems to work in Vista and XP.

My Win7 pc doesn't like powerpoints, so I can't test it there.

Anyone confirm that it'd work?

Thanks, Linda

I'm running 7x64 so my paths are different but yes, it does / will work using:



As does PowerPoint.

Regards,

Mack

Mack, Sorry looking at the code again I only told you half the story:

There's a button that launches a pps file.

It says:

If (SYSTEM_OPERATING_SYS=VISTA) then
script (which I sent before)

else

Launch gmi01.pps
The file will be found at this location
<SYSTEM_PUBLICATION_DIR>\powerpoint\

...

Mack, Do I cover everyone this way? I've got a difficult client, and the balance payment hangs on this one point!!!

Not sure what you want to do, but I think you mean:



Although this will cause the script to run only if the Operating System is Vista. Why would you need to do this. The PP Viewer is in the same location for XP-W7 unless your client uses 64bit systems?

Also <SYSTEM_PUBLICATION_DIR>\powerpoint\ should read:



else you might get an error.

Regards,

Mack

Mack,

I appreciate your help. Can I keep trying?

Let me start again, as I suspect I'm dragging along legacy code that might be making all this too complicated.

I need a launch button that will launch a .pps file from the system publication/powerpoint directory.

It's got to run in everything from XP to win7.

Maybe I don't even need that script any more... perhaps just the launch button works, like the attached.

Can you solve this for me?

Many thanks, Linda

Not a problem. If memory serves, the purpose of the script was because clients had different versions of Office. If you know where the PP Viewer is going to be, then the script isn't necessary.

The OS doesn't make a difference unless it's 64bit.

The only thing I'd change from the original script would be the location of your *.pps file and the rest should be fine.

Mack

No, I don't know where the viewer is, or if they've got office, or a viewer.

The idea is that this could be sent to anyone, and as long as they can view powerpoints, then can launch this.

Linda

ps: should the script still be specifically for Vista people?

Hi Linda,

Then you need a script to check the location of the viewer.

I modified the one above but hit a snag, that it cannot find the file if it's in the subdirectory. I checked on XP and it works as expected so this is either a x64 or W7 (or Machine) problem .

This is a new machine and I've not transferred my Virtual Testing Machines yet, so I cannot check it out, but I'll have a go tomorrow.

Mack