Plan G (Google!) from Burnley

• Posted by Phil Stirpe
• on 16 January 2012

Yesterday I admitted to using my friend Google for help with a Powerpoint problem. For what I needed, Plan G worked fine. i.e. from past experience, I knew that in order to get an animation to work in Powerpoint then it had to have a feature somewhat like triggers in Silverlight and WPF. In other words, I pretty much knew what I wanted and how it would work, I just wanted to know if [A] Powerpoint used Triggers and [B] Where could I find them.

I'm having a Plan 9 from Outer Space moment. Just bear with me.

Burnley is not quite out of space but there are moments like just as it is going dark on a Friday or Saturday night that I dread driving into the town centre. So I don't.

Then again, Plan 9 has more to do with aliens bringing the dead back to life. Kind of like "The Living Dead".

Come to think of it, that would be Burnley town centre on a Saturday and Sunday morning.

So back to Plan G.

Google works best when you know the answer but have gone blank such as the time that I was trying to recall the name of a brilliant (and I do mean brilliant) film that I saw one night on television a couple of years ago. I described it to several of my friends and drew a blank. I then described it to my friend Mr G and what do you know?

Try this "British film about soldier who comes home from the army to avenge the bullying of his younger brother". Bet you get the answer as the first result !

It is also useful for finding the meaning of an obscure error message and if you are lucky, the solution. The problem with this scenario is that you almost certainly end up on a forum such as Stackoverflow which whilst a great source of information and ideas, is populated by many pedantic, irritating, childish and argumentative people. Most of whom probably wear a Red Dwarf tee-shirt.

You know what I'm saying and you know that I am right !

Without fail, I will hit upon a thread that might have an answer to my problem but will probably have descended into a bun fight before the bottom of the first page.

So Plan G is fine if you are after an answer, a piece of information or a fact and can cope with a few tantrums.

However if you want to "learn" something then you'll be needing Plan L.

You have Powerpoint and you know it's for slideshows and you can have text and images and your choice of background but you want to really make an impression when you go to that meeting. You have seen other speakers deliver presentations and when they clicked a button some content "wooshed" into the screen and some people in the room actually went "Ooh!".

So what was that? You can bet it wasn't called the Woosh button.

The fact is, if you don't know about a feature and how it works then you are missing an opportunity and you are certainly not utilising your software.

Go on. Try Googling "Powerpoint woosh". I dare you.

Would I be going too far if I threw in that you wouldn't be seeing a Return on Investment - ROI for your Powerpoint software?

Probably.

Go on. Treat yourself to a Powerpoint course. You will "learn" about all manner of features that you never knew existed and how best to use them. Did you know you can add multimedia to your presentations? Can you imagine?

I must share one more thing.

I know a man. I cannot disclose the organisation that he works for, for reasons that will become apparent. For over a year, he has wanted to create a spreadsheet in Excel to help him with his job. In the beginning, I advised him to go on an Excel course "Microsoft Excel 2007 Level 1" £245 Ex VAT. He replied with the Churchill the dog expression of "Ooh No No No". He was going to work it out himself.

Yeah, right!

He has spent every (no really!) Friday afternoon for over a year working on his spreadsheet. Something that he would have been able to create "within an hour" if he had just attended that one day course.

Just so we are clear, he is still tinkering with it (I refuse to help) but he still has Plan G. His company know that he is working on something related to his job and seem willing to let him get on with it. Let's round it down to perhaps 50 afternoons working on this spreadsheet. How much will this spreadsheet have cost when he's finished?

So if you want an answer: Plan G

If you want to learn: Plan L

We at QA do Plan L very well.

I should put that on a tee-shirt!

If you want to learn more about Powerpoint and what it can do for you, QA offer these courses.

And for that man I know... this excel one too.

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