PowerPoint should use multiple windows for multiple presentations

[Weglian]

I use two monitors, and I like to show two PowerPoint presentations at the
same time, especially if I am copying items from one into the other, or
comparing them. I find it a pain to click on the taskbar to switch from one
presentation to the other. I could do it on a Mac, but not in PowerPoint
2003 for the PC.

The same holds for Excel. I often work on multiple Excel spreadsheets at
the same time. Word documents open in separate windows, why not Excel and
PowerPoint?

In case this goes to the Project discussion group, again, I swear it's not
my fault - I have "PowerPoint General Questions" selected for the Discussion
Group.

-John Weglian

----------------
This post is a suggestion for Microsoft, and Microsoft responds to the
suggestions with the most votes. To vote for this suggestion, click the "I
Agree" button in the message pane. If you do not see the button, follow this
link to open the suggestion in the Microsoft Web-based Newsreader and then
click "I Agree" in the message pane.

http://www.microsoft.com/office/community/en-us/default.mspx?mid=61d9dbe3-838b-41c1-92ff-e469e4b7be67&dg=microsoft.public.powerpoint

[John Wilson]

You can do this using the powershow addin

"Weglian" wrote:

> I'm replying to my own post, but I found the solution for Excel, but it
> doesn't work for PowerPoint.
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------
> From oat...@myway.com:
>
> The answer involves changing the file association stuff in windows. Go
> to explorer, choose tools, then folder options. Click the File Types
> tab. Scroll down to the XLS extension. Click the Advanced button.
> Choose "open", then click the edit button.
>
> At the end of the "Application used" entry, you'll probably see: /e
> After this, add: "%1" (be sure to include the quotes [and a space
> between the e and the first "].)
>
> Then uncheck the "Use DDE" checkbox. Then click OK. (Windows re-checks
> it at some point for some reason, but it still works)
>
> OK your way out of the file types dialog.
>
> Now when you double-click a spreadsheet, it will open it in a new
> instance of Excel.
>
> Hope it helps!
> -------------------------------------------------------
>
> When I look at the Open dialog for PowerPoint, it already has a "%1" at the
> end. Every way I can think of to start a new instance of PowerPoint puts the
> new presentation in the same window as the one that's already open.
>
> -John Weglian

[bwilkes8]

Forgive my ignorance, how and where do I find Powershow addin?

Bielo

[Weglian]

It's not a free add-in that comes with PowerPoint. You can buy it at:
http://officeone.mvps.org/powershow/powershow.html You can get a trial
version for 10 days. After that, it costs $99.95 for a single license.

Instead of buying that, when I need to see both presentations at once, I
drag my PowerPoint window so that it fills both screens, and then tile the
presentations so that one is in each screen. It's not my prefered method,
but I don't have to pay for it.

-John