Setting Presentation Properties
As you create and modify your presentation, you automatically change many of the presentation's properties. You can view these properties and also change or add other properties to the document by choosing File, Properties. PowerPoint displays a dialog box with the name of your presentation. This dialog box includes the following tabs:
General Specifies the type, size, and location of the file; the dates it was created, last modified, and last accessed; as well as any attributes it carries.
Summary Enables you to enter custom information about your presentation (see Figure 21.35).
This information is useful when you have to find the file because you can use keywords, for example, even if you can't remember the name of the file.
To customize the presentation's summary, simply fill in the information you think is important. Assuming you created the document and that you supplied your name when you installed PowerPoint, the author's name appears automatically. The title is taken from the first slide of the presentation, but you can change that if desired.
The Save Preview Picture option simply enables you to see a preview of the first slide when you browse the file. If you deselect this option, you cannot preview the file in the Open dialog box.
Figure 21.35. Presentation properties add information to your file that can be used for finding and organizing your presentations.
Note
Using the Save Preview Picture option also increases the size of the saved file. To decrease the size of the file, deselect this option.
Statistics Displays detailed statistics about the presentation, including the number of words it contains, how many times it has been revised, total editing time, and more. Figure 21.36 illustrates this tab.
Contents Displays other basic information about your presentation, including which fonts you've used, the design template you applied, and so on.
Custom Enables you to create a series of customized properties that further categorize your document (see Figure 21.37). Unless you have a great number of presentations that need a high degree of organization, you'll probably never use this option. If you do, refer to PowerPoint's online help for information about creating a custom property.
Figure 21.36. Go to the Statistics tab to learn how much time you've spent working on your presentation.
Figure 21.37. Custom properties help you find presentations by searching for unique characteristics you define.
