If you are a Unix geek you probably know all about this, but since I am a Windows guy, I find this stuff valuable. My favorite Unix command the “tail” comman which allows you to see the last few lines of a text file. This may not seem very useful at first, but if you turn on a particular switch (“-f” for “follow”) it will tail the last portion of a file even it is updated. This is particularly useful for watching log files (such as the app server log or an error log). The full command might look like this:
C:appservLOGS>tail -f -10 appsrv_0614.log
This command will tail the last 10 lines of the specified log file – allowing you to view it dynamically as it is updated. This is useful when you have debugging turned up – this way you can see what is going on with the application in real time.
Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Applications, Learning, Software Tips
Concise listing of some useful PowerPoint shortcuts:
PowerPoint has a bunch of shortcut keys you can use while presenting in slideshow mode. A few of my favorites:
- B blacks out the screen and W turns the screen white. Hit the key again to go back to your slides. I find this useful for hiding slides during breaks in the middle of a presentation.
- Type a number then hit Enter to jump to a particular slide. For example, typing 5 and Enter jumps to slide number 5. Or, if you’re not so secretive, hit Ctrl-S to display a dialog that lets you jump to any slide.
- Ctrl-A makes the cursor visible so you can use the mouse to point to something.
- Hold both mouse buttons down for 2 seconds and you’ll jump back to the first slide.
Hit F1 while you’re in slideshow to see a more complete list.
[Via Microsoft WebBlogs]
Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Applications, Demo Skills, PowerPoint
It is surprising how often that Word versions of White Papers and other marketing documents may have hidden information (that may range from everyone who worked on the document to all of the changes they have made) so it is always best to send the PDF versions to customers (not to mention they can’t edit PDF’s). There is a way to remove that tracking information from Word docs that you plan on sending out – go to Tools>Options>Security and select both “Warn before printing, saving or sending a file that contains tracking changes or comments” and “Remove personal information from this file on save”.
There is also a Microsoft addin for Office XP or 2003 that can strip even more personal data (just what you need, something else to slow down your machine).
Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Applications, Collateral
Okay, so this is ridiculously obscure, but if you use Snagit to capture stuff in web application it might come in handy.Tooltips…
..are notoriously difficult to capture – if you use the “print screen” function key it will often keep the tooltip but drop the cursor. If you use the Snagit hot key it will drop both the tooltip and the cursor – even if you set the profile to include the cursor. So if you want to capture a tooltip you need to set a delay in Snagit to give yourself a second or two to make the tooltip appear before it captures. I said it was ridiculously obsure.
Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Applications demo, snagit
Here is a program that will enhance any demo (and your general productivity): ActiveWords. The application is a little thing that runs on top of your OS and can fire off commands based on words you type. For example, you can launch an application by entering a keyword (which you define) and hitting F8 (or another function key you define) it can launch that app. It can also got to a URL, open a folder or even execute full scripts. Here are some examples of what I am already using this for:
- Launch apps: ot = outlook, psp = Photoshop, xl = Excel etc…
- Open specific URLS: app = local install, blog = blog view, remote = remote server etc…
- Open Specific files: tech = Standard Tech PPT, vb = vb code for .NET demo etc…
I am going to work on the scripting aspects of the application – might make some of the more rote tasks much simpler. You can script long sequences (it’s not terribly technical) that you fire off with a single word. A great example of how this is useful in a demo is to fire off background processes by typing a single word (even batch files or other funky technical stuff).
The only downside I have found with Activewords is that it uses up some CPU, and, like any other system level program there is the potential of conflicts. But my experience with it has been very positive and it can make for a very slick demo experience if used wisely.
Dave Sohigian - TechDemoGuy Applications, Demo Tips
