PowerPoint Video Trick

I just found out last week that PowerPoint doesn't like .avi files.

Just won't play 'em if you try to link them into your slide show.

If you're like me and have a digital still camera that shoots .avi files in movie mode, and you'd like to shoot one and link it into a PowerPoint presentation this could be a real show stopper.

But -

Then I found out that if you just change the file extension from .avi to .mpg it suddenly works as expected as if by magic - at least if you're in the Windows environment.

If you go back and forth between Mac and Windows machines as I do, you'll probably guess that this doesn't work on the Mac platform. Macs don't let you get away with kooky stuff like this. Personally, I prefer Windows, in part because there are wierd loopholes like this in the way the OS works.

I'll update later with a more detailed tutorial on how to do this from start to finish (I'll have to get my hands on a Windows machine - which are scarce here at work - to do this).