Microsoft today released a beta version of its latest Producer application, used for combining PowerPoint presentations with audio and video into a single streamed presentation. This latest version works with the Office 2003 beta as well as Office XP. Highlights for the new version of Producer include support for Windows Media 9 series, integration with PowerPoint 2003 and support for Netscape and Macintosh playback.
Two things are cool about the support for Windows Media 9 Series. First, presentation viewers can take advantage of Windows Media Player 9’s ability to speed up or slow down a presentation. Great for those that want to speed through a dull set of slides. Second, Producer supports all the Windows Media 9 codecs, including the voice codec, which can help squeeze down file sizes while maintaining a quality sound. What’s nice about the PowerPoint 2003 integration? The new PowerPoint, I am told, contains a feature that will automatically record slide timings, including if you flip back and forth between a set of slides. This information can be imported into Producer, making the process of synchronizing slides to audio and bit easier. On the playback side, I didn’t realize that Mac and Netscape users were unable to view presentations created in the current version of Producer. Netscape users still have to be on Windows, so Linux and Unix users are out of luck. Not sure how Microsoft’s recent decision to discontinue IE development for the Mac impacts this feature going forward.
A couple of minor new features that I liked: If you’re using an already encoded Windows Media video file (.wmv), Producer will not take the time to re-encode what’s already been done. A nice time saver. Also, Microsoft’s added the ability to publish to Windows SharePoint services, making it easier for the average information worker (the target audience for this tool) to get their content online quicker. (One of the gripes I had about the current version of the product is it can be a pain to manually FTP all the files that comprise a single presentation. Producer outputs a ton of files.) Download the new Producer beta here, if you want to give it a try.
