As discussed in Methods to Put Online, there are six methods for putting a PowerPoint presentation online. Although the "Make Webpage Method" is recommended to achieve an accessible PowerPoint presentation, another option is to use the "Save as Webpage" in the PowerPoint program to convert an existing PowerPoint to a web-based presentation.

There are two ways to Save a PowerPoint presentation as a webpage:

Most webpages are written in HTML, as recognized by the .htm or .html extension code that follows the filename. HTML stands for Hypertext Markup Language. The resulting web-based presentation created through the PowerPoint program will be an HTML file. This is not a single HTML file but rather a link to several files and images that can be found in the folder whose name ends with _files (this folder is automatically created along with the HTML file that you save).

Note: For more information on web accessibility, read Module 9 in this tutorial Making HTML Files Accessible.

Drawbacks of the "Save as HTML" Method

Although the process is mostly automated through the PowerPoint program, there are several drawbacks to using "Save as HTML" to convert a PowerPoint to a web-based presentation.

To convert a PowerPoint into a web-based presentation with "Save as Single File":


Description ofImage 44: Select "Save as Web Page" in PowerPoint program


Description ofImage 45: "Save As" dialog box in PowerPoint program

  1. Open the PowerPoint presentation that you wish to save as a Single File (.mht) in the PowerPoint program.
  2. Go to the "File" menu and select "Save as Web Page ..." (see Image 44). If the "Save as Web Page ..." option does not appear, you may need to select the "down arrows" to fully expand the "File" menu.
  3. A "Save As" dialog box appears; Choose the location where you wish to save the file and click the “Save” button. (see Image 45).

To convert a PowerPoint into a web-based presentation with "Save as HTML":

  1. Create folders to organize the files.
  2. Use the "Save as HTML" in PowerPoint.
  3. View the resulting web-based presentation .

Create Folders to Organize Files

It is recommended that you create one common folder, also known as a directory into which you place all the files associated with the PowerPoint presentation.

To create a folder:

  1. Go to the location on your computer where you want to create the folder. For this example, go to the desktop of your computer and select "My Documents."
     
  2. A new window called "My Documents" is displayed. Select "File" then "New" and then "Folder."
     
  3. A folder called "New Folder" is created; rename the folder with a descriptive name. For this example, name the folder "Mod3_PPT_SaveHtml."

    Tip: File names containing spaces are not supported by many browsers. If a file name contains more than one word, use an underscore ( _ ) in place of the space or put the words together, capitalizing only the first letter of each additional word (even if the word is an acronym).


  4. Into the folder you created, copy the PowerPoint presentation that you want to convert using "Save as HTML." For this example, download the PowerPoint sample presentation ( HCI.ppt, 184 KB) into the folder, "Mod3_PPT_SaveHtml."

A PowerPoint presentation may be associated with other files, such as images or audio. To provide further organization, files of the same type should be grouped into their own folder within the common folder; this is called a subfolder, also known as a subdirectory.

To create a sub-folder:

  1. Select the folder where you want to place the sub-folder. For this example, go to the desktop of your computer, select "My Documents" then "Mod3_PPT_SaveHtml."
     
  2. A new window called "Mod3_PPT_SaveHtml" is displayed. Select "File" then "New" and then "Folder."
     
  3. A subfolder called "New Folder" is created; rename the subfolder with a descriptive name. For this example, no subfolder is needed; select "Cancel."
     

Use the "Save as HTML" in PowerPoint

The PowerPoint program has a "Save as HTML" option for converting a PowerPoint into a web-based presentation.

To use the "Save as HTML" in PowerPoint:


Description ofImage 44: Select "Save as Web Page" in PowerPoint program


Description ofImage 45: "Save As" dialog box in PowerPoint program


Description ofImage 46: "Publish as Webpage" dialog box in PowerPoint program


Description ofImage 47: Selecting target screen size in "Web Options" dialog box of PowerPoint program */?>
  1. Open your PowerPoint program.
     
  2. Go to the "File" menu and select "Open."
     
  3. An "Open" dialog box appears; browse to the location of the PowerPoint presentation that you want to convert. For this example, open the sample presentation (HCI.ppt) within the "Mod3_PPT_saveHtml" folder of "My Documents."
     
  4. Select "Open" to close the dialog box and load the selected PowerPoint presentation.
     
  5. Go to the "File" menu and select "Save as Web Page ..." (see Image 44). If the "Save as Web Page ..." option does not appear, you may need to select the "down arrows" to fully expand the "File" menu.
  6. A "Save As" dialog box appears; select "Publish .." (see Image 45).
  7. A "Publish as Webpage" dialog box appears. Be sure to select the options: "Display speaker notes" and "All browsers listed above (creates larger files)" before selecting the "Web Options ..." button (see Image 46).
  8. A "Web Options" dialog box appears and contains four tabs of information; Select the "Pictures" tab (see Image 47).
  9. In the "Screen size" dropdown box, select the resolution of the screen for your target audience. As many people use 800x600 but some still use 640x480, it is best to select the lower resolution of 640x480 to ensure the information will be conveyed.

    Tip: An added benefit of selecting a lower resolution is that the generated files will be smaller in size, reducing the download time of the presentation.


  10. Select "OK" and then "Publish" to complete the export of the presentation in the "Save as HTML" process.

View the Resulting Web-based Presentation

To effectively access the web-based presentation created using "Save as HTML" to convert a PowerPoint, it is best to use the web browser, Internet Explorer (see Drawbacks of the "Save as HTML" Method). The resulting presentation will have five frames.

For this example, view the file (index.html) in the "Mod3_PPT_SaveHtml" folder of "My Documents" (see Image 48) or the example of a PowerPoint converted using "Save as HTML" in the PowerPoint program (, 2.8 KB) .

The web browser view of the resulting consists of five frames. presentationtemplate file(see Image 48). The presentation's navigation is on the left, showing which slide is currently shown relative to the other slides. There is navigation on the bottom of the screen with "previous" and "next" buttons. Any notes associated with the slide in the original PowerPoint preentation are displayed below the slide image in another frame

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Description ofImage 48: PowerPoint Document Saved as Web Page

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Description ofImage 48: Web-based PowerPoint presentation created from "Save as HTML" has five frames

The "save as Web page" version of the presentation consists of five frames (see Image 50 ).


Description ofImage 50: PowerPoint Document Saved as Web Page (opens in a new window)

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Five Frames in the "Save as HTML" presentation

In the end, the "Save as HTML" Method may not be the best solution for making a PowerPoint accessible


The next page will discuss using "Save As RTF" (rich text format) in the PowerPoint program to convert an existing PowerPoint presentation.