Value Added | daily

Class Schedule

Basics | sessions 01-03
  1. 13 Aug intro and clients | lecture | labs
  2. 20 Aug servers and command line | lecture | labs
  3. 27 Aug networks and protocols | lecture | labs
Web Development | sessions 04-07

  1. 03 Sep structural layer | lecture | labs
  2. 10 Sep presentational layer | lecture | labs
  3. 17 Sep using a structure | lecture | labs
  4. 24 Sep behavioral layer | lecture | labs
Dealing with Markup | sessions 08-09
  1. 01 Oct control objects and display | lecture | labs
  2. 08 Oct tools that read markup | lecture | labs
Working with Data | sessions 10-13
  1. 15 Oct formulas, functions, vectors | lecture | labs
  2. 22 Oct data display | lecture | labs
  3. 29 Oct manipulate data sets | lecture | labs
  4. 05 Nov relational data bases | lecture | labs
Presentation | session 14
  1. 12 Nov designing and delivering a presentation | lecture | labs


Creating a professional, polished, productive presentation requires knowing the audience and knowing how to use the tools effectively.

Look over:

commentary on bad PowerPoint

PowerPoint: anathema or boon? by Juan Dürsteler, 10 Nov 2003

... my experience is that whenever one interacts with the audience,
asking for or showing them examples close to their experience,
the presentation is more lively and the message reaches them better.
In the end, our answer to the question which we began this article with,
is that PowerPoint is neither anathema nor boon,
it’s just a tool with which it’s easy to give bad presentations,
but when properly used, can help us to get a message across.
Doing it well or badly is something that depends on us.

things hadn't improved by the time of the 9th International Conference on Information Visualisation in 2005. Note especially his comments on the use of PowerPoint.

More than half of the presentations I have attended had slides that abused PowerPoint in its more inefficient and less visual way:
lots of bullet points almost literally read by the presenter.
It's clear that while you read the slides you barely pay attention to what the speaker is saying,
and if you listen to the speaker, reading is out of the question (what is then the need for a slide?).
This is a mortal sin in a conference like this,
where we have seen certainly other excellent presentations
centered on the visual contents of what the speaker was saying.

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Two viewpoints

  1. PowerPoint Is Evil: Power Corrupts. PowerPoint Corrupts Absolutely. By Edward Tufte, September 2003
  2. In Defense of PowerPoint, by Don Norman

Look over these about delivery

  1. Big Dog's Leadership Page - Presentation Skills
  2. PowerPoint Tips & Tricks
  3. PowerPoint and Presentation Tips by Chris Campbell, 15 November 2005
    • look at it to stimulate your thinking
    • you may also find the linked Notebook to be of use - if not for this task, perhaps for other things

Other resources

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Other items relevant to today's class

  1. articles about presentations
  2. articles about PowerPoint

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