How to make PowerPoint presentations play / download ppts automatically?
I was wondering how I can make a Powerpoint file to load a script, auto advance the slides and put it full screen. Is there a way to make windows? Can I just download powerpoint.exe and maybe use some kind of API / Pipe for commands from another script.
To make a case: I create a script that automatically scans the folder in windows (using python) and loads the PowerPoint presentations and continues to play them in order.
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One solution for you would be to use PowerPoint Viewer. PPT Viewer is installed to open PowerPoint file directly in presentation mode.
Alternatively, you can use the / s argument to launch Powerpoint.
"powerpoint.exe /s <filename>.ppt"
This is the equivalent of PowerPoint opening immediately in Presentation mode.
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As stated earlier, this is more StackOverflow oriented, but can easily be achieved with Python and AutoHotkey .
On the Python side, as a general idea on how to do this (I'm kind of rusty, beware!):
- Find files with
os.walk()
- Add the list to the list, then iterate over the list, opening each with
os.system("powerpoint.exe /s filename")
. The next one should not open until the previous one closes.
AutoHotkey wise:
- Once opened, use # IfWinActive to detect an open Powerpoint window and send mouse clicks to change slides at a given interval
I don't know what you mean by "order", you will have to define that in your Python script. If you want them to be in alphabetical order, sort the list alphabetically and then go. If you want them to be sorted by date created, then sort by date and iteration, etc.
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If you want more control over PowerPoint slide, you can write something in VB.Net (or other .Net languages) according to this MS support article .
If you want direct control from Python, perhaps you can use pywin32 or comtypes to call directly the same interfaces described in the MS article. I guess this is the most powerful solution and will probably provide the smoothest transitions between presentations, but it is probably much more than using a subprocess to invoke in PowerPoint.
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