Linking to the Switchboard--Overview

Creating a link from the celebrity pictures to their respective slides, as was done on the previous page, is relatively straight forward. However, linking from the quote slides back to the switchboard is a bit trickier. We'll use a handy method to make the process easier and more effective. This method should be well remembered because it is a very important tool for relational presentation designers, in numerous contexts.

Here's the dilemma. We want the presenter to be able to click anywhere on a quote slide to activate its link back to the switchboard. The problem is that in PowerPoint it is IMPOSSIBLE to link a slide to another slide. Instead, we must link SOMETHING ON THE SLIDE to another slide. Can you see the problem? The only objects on the quote slides are the three text boxes. The remaining area is blank; remember, the background picture is on the Slide Master and, therefore, not available here for linking.

In theory, we could go through the laborious process of putting a link on all three text boxes, on all 21 slides and, yes, clicking in those areas would take us back to Slide 1. Yet even then all of the area outside the text boxes would remain unlinked. This is an unacceptable situation. We cannot take the chance that an already nervous presenter might accidentally click a nonlinked area and be confused as to why the link back to the switchboard didn't work.

The Trick

So here's the trick, the way we can quickly and easily link the entire slide area back to the switchboard.

• Click Slide 2's thumbnail to display that slide in the slide pane.
• Cover the entire slide with an AutoShape.
• To do so, click the Rectangle icon on the Drawing toolbar.
• Your cursor changes to a "+" sign.
• Click and drag from the upper left corner of the slide to the lower right.
• By default, the resulting AutoShape will be a light blue or light green.

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• Right-click this Autoshape and hyperlink it to Slide 1, again using the Place in This Document button on the Insert Hyperlink dialog box.

The next step is to make this shape invisible, and there are two ways to do so—one recommended and one not.

• Double-click the shape to open the Format AutoShape dialog box.

Most people when attempting to make the Autoshape invisible click the arrow next to Color in the Fill category, to display the options below.

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They then select the No Fill option and click OK. This does indeed make the AutoShape invisible. By the way, make sure also to click in the Color area of the Line category (directly below the Fill area) and select No Line to make sure the shape is completely invisible using this method.

WE DO NOT RECOMMEND USING THIS APPROACH! The explanation for why appears at the end of this page.

Here is the preferred method, available in PowerPoint XP and beyond.

• Leave the Color setting as is and instead move the Transparency bar all the way to the right (100% transparency).
• As specified above, remove the shape's line by selecting No Line in the Line/Color area.

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Now that the hyperlinked shape is invisible, all content behind it is fully visible and the presenter can click anywhere on the slide to return to the switchboard.

Placing the Link on All Slides

The final step is to simply copy this invisible shape and paste it onto the remaining slides (Slides 3 through 22). There is a fast and systematic process for doing so if you have a wheel mouse.

• Click the invisible shape to select it.
• While holding down the Ctrl key, press C to copy.
• Roll your mouse wheel down one notch (doing so will advance from Slide 2 to Slide 3).
• While holding down the Ctrl key, press V to paste.
• Roll the wheel—Ctrl V.
• Roll the wheel—Ctrl V.
• And so forth, for the rest of the slides.

Congratulations! You have just created The Chicken. The only remaining steps are to test—and if necessary modify—the links.

About Making Shapes Invisible

WHY WE NO LONGER USE THE FIRST METHOD DESCRIBED ABOVE.

Back in the days of PowerPoint 97 and 2000, the first method was the only option. Then along came PowerPoint XP, with a seeming flaw that has never been addressed—in XP or 2003. In XP, if you remove the fill of a hyperlinked AutoShape, it will work fine on the slide where you created the shape. In other words, in Slide Show mode you will be able click anywhere inside the shape boundaries and the hyperlink will work. HOWEVER, if you copy the shape and paste it onto other slides (as per the procedure above), the link will still be there, BUT ONLY ON THE BORDER of the shape. Clicking anywhere inside the copied AutoShape boundaries will not trigger the link. Obviously this problem invalidates the usefulness of the first method. Removing the shape's fill never was ideal anyway because it made selection of the shape difficult. Bottom line—don't do it. Take the transparency up to 100% instead.

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