DC member JavaJones says:

"I'm currently having to edit a bunch of Powerpoints for the school I work for because they were created by people who don't know how to make Powerpoints properly. I'm dealing with things like lack of master slide use, inconsistent font types and formatting, horrible color use, photos thrown around randomly on slides, and (not Powerpoint's fault) rampant copyright issues.

My question is twofold..

DC, please offer any advice you have on this subject:

I need to create an instruction manual document at work.  Everything I have is in MS Word right now.  There are several files (for each section), but it's really one document that will combine all the sections.  I am the one who is handling all the files.  Meaning, it's not some collaborated effort or anything, so I don't need some kind of software that will allow real-time simultaneous editing with a bunch of people.  However, I would like to keep track of the changes that are made (I don't plan on using anything other than MS Word's tracking tools).

People (supervisors, other people) will want to see the files every once in a while, so I don't want to do it in anything other than Word, since that would complicate things with the mostly non-poweruser crowd here.

So, my question is, what is the best way to handle this situation?

1. Newsletter Editorial

Hi all, and welcome to another edition of the DonationCoder.com newsletter.  It's been less than 30 days since the last newsletter, and I'm trying to work my way back to doing them every 2 weeks, instead of the 4 week gaps that have become common.

I've updated half a dozen of my larger programs in the last week, and this newsletter marks their shift from beta to release status.  You'll find links below -- the biggest update is to Screenshot Captor, which now boasts some of the best capturing of Windows 7 and Vista semi-transparent (Aero Glass) windows you can find.

Skrommel, the legendary coding snacks coder finally gave in and has recompiled his huge collection of utilities hosted on DonationCoder, but we are still waiting for the new versions to be uploaded on his page -- I think this may be a case where we all need to nag him on the forum to show him how much we appreciate his work.  If you haven't visited it in a while, stop by his section and take a look, and send him a message telling him to update the files already!

Markham has released a new update to CircleDock, the insanely popular circular launch dock that got it's start on DC (originally coded by Eric Wong).  And DC member and programming legend Ecaradec, has posted about his latest creation, Swiffout, a browser extension that can take an in-browser flash game and let you play it full screen.

Lastly, let me mention here that I'm putting out an open invitation for anyone who wants to come over on May 22nd (Saturday) to my place in Champaign IL, for food and to play board games.  See the thread below for more details.  Social outcasts and shy non-talkers are welcome.

ComicPress is an excellent set of themes and scripts to aid web comic authors in presenting their web comics using the WordPress blog system.  It's donationware.

ComicPress provides you a WordPress theme with the necessary comic display, navigation and archiving features built in as well as seemlessly presenting your comic and blog posts yet handling them accordingly. It's clean neutral style is designed to be used right out of the box, but with a little CSS knowledge you can style it as custom as you can imagine. There is always much discussion and assistance in the forum for modifications.

My favorite web comic, Head in the Clouds, created by DC members Nudone and Timns, is hosted using a modified version of ComicPress.

http://comicpress.org/download/

DC Member (and programming legend) Ecaradec writes:

"This is about my new project. My new pet projet allows to play flash games fullscreen. It is better than others extensions because it adapt the resolution of the screen for a resolution that suit the flash best - this help keeping more cpu. It hide and stop all ads and avoid menus to popup when playing. It also works with ie, firefox and chrome. The aim is make browser game really look desktop game.

The bad news is : this is a commercial project. Two reasons there : I'd like to try payment systems, and use tools that I don't usually use like google analytics, servers configuration, webtools, draw graphisms. I would also build more support, faq, blog...  Second reason is, if it ever goes wonderfully well, I'd like to get a day off my day job from times to times to get more time, play with the kids and have a little more time."

---

This project is swiffout. That means 'get the swf out of the browser'. swf is the name of the filetype of flash games.

You can find it here : http://grownsoftware.com/swiffout

Thought i would take the liberty of posting that I released a bunch of updates to my larger software programs on the site today, including some major new features (like completely re-written functions for capturing Vista/Win7 Aero transparency effect by Screenshot Captor).

The program web pages have links not only to the downloads but also to full online help files and links to the forum discussion sections for each one.  Always happy to have feedback and feature requests!

• LaunchBar Commander 1.112 - major new features
• Find and Run Robot 2.87.03 - major new features
• Clipboard Help+Spell 1.30.01 - bugfix update
• URL Snooper v2.28.01 - minor new features
• Screenshot Captor v2.81.01 - major new features and win7 update
• MiniCap v1.20.01 - major new features and win7 update
• Multi Photo Quotes 1.30.03 - minor features