I am trying to create an add-in that brings the SlideMagic 2.0 template store right into PowerPoint: search for slides, “click”, and the layout appears in your document. I thought that new Office APIs would make this really easy. I have a web server already up and running, the only thing is to move to the task pane at the right of the PowerPoint screen.
Googling around, the tricky bit seems to be the final step: inserting the slide template into the user’s presentation. The PowerPoint version of the Office API seems to be really limited. The furthest I can push it is to open a brand new presentation inside PowerPoint with the selected template(s) in it, the user then needs to copy them across as a final step.
Maybe one of my readers can point me to a solution? (Or maybe encourage Microsoft to expose this feature in their API, it will open up a whole raft of possibly very useful PowerPoint plug ins I think).
Obviously, I can dive into the world of hardcore manipulating of XML/PPTX files, but I am not sure whether that investment in time and effort is worth it.
Photo by Randy Laybourne on Unsplash