Question

I have a client of my web based application who heavily uses the data from our system for powerpoint presentations.

We currently allow data to export in more traditional file types…PDF, CSV, HTML, and a few others. Powerpoint doesn’t seem to be really automated.

Is there a way, on the ASP.NET server side, to automate the creation and on-demand download of a powerpoint file format for a report from a system?

Answer 1

In this article, Steve suggests using Aspose’s Slide application.

He also explains step by step on how to generate the PowerPoint file.

Here are some code excerpts (in VB):

Opening an existing PowerPoint file:

 Dim fs As  System.IO.FileStream = _     New System.IO.FileStream('c:\mypath\myfile.ppt', _     System.IO.FileMode.Open, System.IO.FileAccess.Read)  Dim MyPres As Presentation = New Presentation(fs)  fs.Close()  

Looping the slides and outputting their template formats:

Dim slides  As Slides = MyPres.Slides  For i As Integer = 0 To slides.Count - 1     Response.Write(MyPres.Slides(i).Layout.ToString + '<br>')  Next 

In his article, he describes more in detail on how to do it.