Slide Show Plugin

This Plugin converts a topic with headings into a slide show.

Introduction

There is already a defacto standard for presentations, why this Plugin? This Plugin makes sense for organizations that do already have lots of content in TWiki: It is easy to create a web based presentation that contains many links to related content. The Plugin does not try to compete with the bells and whistles of the other presentation program, but the markup of TWiki and other Plugins like TWiki:Plugins/ChartPlugin, TWiki:Plugins/GaugePlugin, TWiki:Plugins/SpreadSheetPlugin, TWiki:Plugins/TWikiDrawPlugin can be used to create an appealing presentation.

Any topic with headings can be converted into a slide show. Each slide starts with a "---++" heading. There are two modes to view a topic:

• Normal topic view mode: Headings and text is shown in the usual TWiki rendering, representing the outline of the slide show. This mode is useful to print handouts.
• Presentation mode: Each heading with text is shown as a slide; the format is based on a slide template. Navigation buttons are added to go to the "First", "Previous", and "Next" slide. Slide navigation is quick because it is done with anchor jumps to the same page.

You can start the presentation by clicking on the "Start presentation" button.

Syntax Rules

How to Create a Slide Show

• Start with %SLIDESHOWSTART%
  • Use the optional template parameter to specify your own slide template topic, e.g. %SLIDESHOWSTART{ template="MyOwnSlideTemplate" }%
• Create the slides. Start each slide with a "---++" heading and add text like paragraphs, bullets, tables and images.
  • Hint: Make sure to keep each slide short enough so that you do not need to scroll to see all text of a slide during the presentation.
  • Note: You can use any heading level you like, but use the same for all slides.
• End your slide show with %SLIDESHOWEND%

How to Create Your own Slide Template

To create your own template topic, copy the "Default Slide Template" section below into your own slide template topic and customize it to your needs. It can be activated as the default template in the Plugin's TEMPLATE setting, or per slide show with the %SLIDESHOWSTART{ template="MyOwnSlideTemplate" }% setting.

• Use an HTML table that defines a slide. For example, create one row for the slide title, another one for the slide text.
• These keywords can be used:

  Keyword	What it means
  %SLIDETEXT%	The text of the slide
  %SLIDENAVALL%	The navigation buttons for "First", "Previous", "Next", "Last" slide
  %SLIDENAV%	The navigation buttons for "First", "Previous", "Next" slide
  %SLIDENAVPREV%	The navigation button for "Previous slide"
  %SLIDENAVNEXT%	The navigation button for "Next slide"
  %SLIDENAVLAST%	The navigation button for "Last slide"
  %SLIDENAVFIRST%	The navigation button for "First slide"
  %SLIDEMAX%	The last slide number
  %SLIDETITLE%	The heading of the slide
  %SLIDENUM%	The current slide number

• Only text between %STARTINCLUDE% and %STOPINCLUDE% is used for the template.

Example

This is a short example of a slide show. You should see a "Start presentation" button if this Plugin is installed:

Slide 1: Silly Sample Slide Show

Slide 2: Agenda

• Silly Introduction
• Silly Feature
• Silly Conclusion

Slide 3: Silly Introduction

• why foo bar
• blah blah

Comments

• This text is not shown in the slide if HIDECOMMENTS is set to on.

Slide 4: Silly Feature

• it's foo bar
• more foo bar

Slide 5: Silly Conclusion

• foo is bar
• bar is foo

This text is not part of the slide show

SlideShowPlugin Global Settings

Plugin settings are stored as preferences variables. To reference a plugin setting write %<plugin>_<setting>%, i.e. %SLIDESHOWPLUGIN_SHORTDESCRIPTION%

• One line description, is shown in the TextFormattingRules topic:
  • Set SHORTDESCRIPTION = Create web based presentations based on topics with headings.

• Debug plugin: (See output in data/debug.txt)
  • Set DEBUG = 0

• Default template for slides:
  • Set TEMPLATE = SlideShowPlugin

• Hide text starting with a ---+++ Comments heading:
  • Set HIDECOMMENTS = on

Default Slide Template

The part between the rulers defines the default format of a slide:

%SLIDETITLE%

%SLIDENAVNEXT%

%SLIDETEXT%

Plugin Installation Instructions

Note: You do not need to install anything on the browser to use this plugin. The following instructions are for the administrator who installs the plugin on the server where TWiki is running.

• Download the ZIP file from the Plugin web (see below)
• Unzip SlideShowPlugin.zip in your twiki installation directory. Content:

  File:	Description:
  data/TWiki/SlideShowPlugin.txt	Plugin topic
  data/TWiki/SlideShowPlugin.txt,v	Plugin topic repository
  lib/TWiki/Plugins/SlideShowPlugin.pm	Plugin Perl module
  pub/TWiki/*.gif	Various button image files

• Test above example if the installation was successful.

Plugin Info

Related Topics: TWikiPreferences, TWikiPlugins

-- PeterThoeny - 14 Dec 2002