The iPad and Power Point Presentations

After purchasing an iPad2 the day after Christmas, I wanted to learn how to use it at its full potential.  I'm not there yet but certainly am getting there.

One day when speaking with our daughter Sarah I told her how
I  l-o-v-e my iPad but wished I could use it for Power Point Presentations.  She said I could as someone at work had done so about a week or two earlier.  The search began to find out just how this could be done.

At first I found SlideShark, a free app, that looked like it could do the job.  I gave it a try.  While it seemed to work well I did not like that in converting my presentation it changed some things - I won't go into that here since that really isn't the focus I want to share at this time.

The same afternoon, my friend Gerry Savard posted a message on Facebook that I should try the *Keynote* App.  I did a search and everything I read about it sounded good.  What I especially liked was the fact that I could also download the *Keynote Remote* to my iPod Touch and use it as a remote control during my presentations.  I learned all that I could about it online especially at apple.com. Everyone seemed quite happy with these two apps.

Having done my homework, I decided that before I purchased *Keynote* app for $9.99 and  *Keynote Remote* for 99 cents that I should go to the Apple store to confirm that this would work very well and satisfy my needs when setting up and when presenting a Power Point presentation.  So armed with what I had learned in those few hours, I packed up my iPad2 and my iPod Touch and headed to the Apple store.

When I arrived at the store I checked in, I explained why I was there and that I wanted someone to show me how this would all work with the iPad and iPod Touch. (This is what you do when going to the Apple store for help.)  I was put on the list and about ten minutes later someone was available to consult with me.

He told me how great  the *Keynote* app is but said *Keynote Remote* did not work with the iPad.  Ah ha!.. and this is why it pays to do your homework.  I told him I had done my homework and that the Apple site said it did work with the iPad.  He pulled up the Apple site and was so excited by this news that he immediately loaded the app to his iPhone.  After his excitement he showed me exactly how it all worked.  I then went to the App store with my iPad and purchased *Keynote* for my iPad and *Keynote Remote* for my iPod Touch.  He then watched me as I duplicated what I had seen him do on the store iPad, etc.  I didn't want to have any doubt about how this worked after leaving the store.   [*Keynote Remote* app works with the iPad, iPod Touch and iPhone].

In order to do Ppt presentations with the iPad on a projector, it is necessary to buy a VGA adapter at the Apple store ($39.99). Loading one of my presentations to *Keynote* was easy and the conversion kept my presentation intact and made no changes as it had on SlideShark.

After playing with all of this for a few weeks I still had not tried this with a computer projector and thought I should give this a try before doing a presentation in real time.  I contacted Gerry who is president of ACGS and asked him if it would be possible to try it with the society's projector.  He was happy to accommodate and a couple of other interested people/members came along.

What I immediately realized is that I should purchase a VGA extension cord like the one on the projector.  I had wondered where I would be able to place my iPad given that the VGA adapter is short.  This is a great solution. With the extension cord you can have the iPad in front of you in a safe place.

iPad connected to the projector and presentation up on the wall/screen next we wanted to see how well my iPod Touch would work as a remote.  It was *perfect*.  The presentation shows up on the iPod Touch (or iPhone) either one or two slides at a time depending on whether you choose portrait or landscape mode.  It works so well that I was able to go out in the hall and change slides - nice!  This meant there was plenty of range.  Too, the room we were in is a conference room and quite large.

We did this using WiFi.  Next Gerry put settings on both devices on Bluetooth.  As he said, everywhere I go will not have WiFi.  This is where we ran into a problem.  My devices would not connect and they should have.  We put everything away and Gerry did a search on the Internet and found that IOS5 had some kind of "bug" that caused the devices to not always connect with Bluetooth. In my case they would not connect at all.  He found an app called Bluetooth Photo Image that I downloaded (free app).  It worked well at ACGS but then would not work quite as well when I got home.  Dilemma and chagrin!

The new iPad had been unveiled earlier in the day so I decided to go take a look at that all while charging my iPod with my PC.  As soon as iTunes opened there was a message that the IOS5 was going to be upgraded to IOS5.1 - I did a search and the upgrade was to correct certain "bugs" in 5.  As soon as the iPod was upgraded I connected the iPad to upgrade the IOS.  I then tried connecting using Bluetooth and I am very happy to say they connect!  Tried it a few times last evening and again this morning and the connection works just fine.  Dilemma and chagrin all gone!

To do Power Point presentations with your iPad (all models) you need to do the following - click into the App store and purchase

1. Keynote App for your iPad

2. Get Keynote Remote for the iPhone or iPod Touch (won't work with earlier models of iPod).

2. Go to the Apple Store and purchase the VGA adapter.

I highly recommend you purchase your own VGA extension cord - under $10 for a Belkin on Amazon.

I'm enthralled with the idea that I can travel to do presentations without lugging around my laptop and its accessories.  Nice to travel light.

I've not spoken yet where there is no WiFi and I always ask when being booked for a talk.  When there is, I have duplicates of my presentation in DropBox and another on my PC at home.

Using SplashTop on my iPad (about $4.99) and SplashTop Streamer on my PC, I can access my home computer from anywhere.  I would never go out to speak without a back up plan for my presentations.

When  there is no WiFi connection available, I will work out a back-up plan when the time comes.

As Gerry mentioned in his comment below - something I forgot to say - is that another reason you would want your iPad close to you is that you can user  your finger as a laser pointer if you place it where you want to point on your presentation.  So when I want to point out a particular spot on a document, I just place my finger on that spot and it shows up as a pointer on the presentation.

That's the scoop - it was fun to try this out and now I am eager to do it in real time.  I recommend this to anyone doing presentations.  Be daring and give it a whirl - get the most out of that iPad, iPod Touch and/or iPhone.

My thanks to Gerry for all his help.  If you have any questions, don't hesitate to ask.

I love technology and as everybody knows *I  L-O-V-E  MY iPAD*!!!!

Soon I will put together a workshop entitled "Technology, Genealogy and You". Stay tuned

MARCH 17, 2014 UPDATE:

1.  Apple updated its KEYNOTE app so that remote is built in so that it is no longer necessary to purchase Keynote Remote.  That said, I have no plan to purchase a newer iPod Touch that I presently use for my remote and the new Keynote cannot be loaded to it as it is not the latest iOS.  Nonetheless, the remote should continue working as it has always.  Because Apple is discontinuing its use does not mean it will not work if you already have it.

2.  I have no plan to ever own a Smartphone so I have purchased an iPad Mini with cellular.  That will solve the problem if ever I need to retrieve data and there is no WiFi where I am speaking.  You must tremember to turn off cellular when doing your presentation unless you need it during your talk.

3.  When purchasing an extension cord, I got a 10 foot but should have a 20 foot cord. You never know how far you will be from the projector.  That said though, when using a remote for your presentation, you can change slides from anywhere in the room so it depends on where you want to be during your talk.

4.  I did put together a workshop entitled  "Technology, Genealogy and You".  It is a beginner's workshop so anyone with a vast techie knowlede might not be interested.

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Lucie's Legacy

Lucie LeBlanc Consentino