First Look: Google Presentations

More Features

Saving and Exporting: As you work on your document, Presentations automatically saves it periodically in your Google Apps storage space; you can also click on Save at any time to save immediately. Exporting presentations, however, is quite limited: if you choose File -> Save as Zip, Presentations downloads to your computer a .zip archive containing your presentation as a series of linked HTML files. Those files also require a Mozilla-compatible browser for display. Printing directly from Presentations is supported, albeit with limited control over print settings.

Revisions and Collaboration: Unlike PowerPoint and Keynote, Presentations lets you return to any previously saved version of your document; each version is listed on the Revisions tab. Currently, however, there's no way to compare revisions or see precisely what's changed.

Presentations also includes collaboration features; as in Docs and Spreadsheets, you can click on Share to invite others to view the presentation online or even make changes in real time. If you want to make your finished presentation available to anyone on the Internet, click on Publish and then on Publish Document; Presentations then gives you a URL that anyone with a supported browser can use to view the presentation.

Showing a Presentation: When you're ready to present your slide show, click on Start Presentation. A new window appears, zooming out almost to the full height and width of your display, though Presentations doesn't cover your Dock or menu bar. You step through slides by clicking on arrow buttons or using the arrow keys on your keyboard. A collapsible pane on the right side of the window shows any other people currently viewing your presentation online. You can participate in a live chat with your audience by typing in the field at the bottom of that pane; the chat transcript appears above it.

What's Missing

If you're used to PowerPoint or Keynote, you're bound to feel Presentations has a long list of missing features. It offers no animations of any kind, including transitions between slides and sequential display of text boxes within a slide. There's no outline mode; no charts, tables, borders, or drawing tools; no custom bullets; no area for presenters' notes; and no on-screen timer or other presentation aids. And you can't make your presentation fill the entire screen, meaning there will always be at least some potentially distracting on-screen elements.

Who It's For

Presentations is ideal for storing an emergency backup of your PowerPoint presentations -- even if your laptop is stolen on your way to a big meeting and no one else has PowerPoint, you'll still be able to give at least a rudimentary version of your presentation. It's also an easy way for multiple people to collaborate on a quick-and-dirty presentation. And it's a convenient, low-bandwidth method to share a presentation (or even present it interactively) over the Internet.

But make no mistake about it: in its initial version, Presentations is extremely light on features, and won't replace PowerPoint or Keynote for the serious presenter any time soon.

Joe Kissell is the senior editor of TidBits and the author of the e-book Take Control of Upgrading To Leopard (Take Control Books, 2007).