Simple PowerPoint Automation using C#

• Download source files - 13.02 KB
• Download demo project - 166.42 KB

Introduction

This is a simple way of creating a Microsoft PowerPoint document through the C# language.

Background

You need a minimum understanding of C# language buzz.

Using the Code

Create a new project, for simplicity, create a Windows application. Go ahead and right click on References in the Solution Explorer, and select Add Reference… When the Add Reference window comes up, select the COM tab. This will list all Component names which are available on your machine. Since we are going to use Microsoft PowerPoint , you will scroll down until you find: Microsoft Power point 11.0 Object Library. You can even do the same thing with PIAs. In the code, I have used PIA.

I have created a very simple wrapper class for the PowerPoint object model. The code will be given below. This project also has the error provider functionality to make sure that the user will enter values for all the fields.

Create button click event. Here, we check whether all fields are filled and then we call the CreateFile() function in the PowerPoint wrapper class.

private void btnCreate_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
    bool filled = true;
            
    if ( ( txtName.Text).Trim().Length.Equals(0) )
    {
        errorProvider.SetError(txtName,"cannot be empty" );
        filled = false;
    }
    if( ( txtAge.Text ).Trim().Length.Equals(0) )
    {
        errorProvider.SetError( txtAge,"cannot be empty" );
        filled = false;
    }
    if( ( txtDesignation.Text ).Trim().Length.Equals(0) )
    {
        errorProvider.SetError( txtDesignation,"cannot be empty" );
        filled = false;
    }
    if( ( txtPlace.Text ).Trim().Length.Equals(0) )
    {
        errorProvider.SetError( txtPlace,"cannot be empty" );
        filled = false;
    }
    if( ( txtEmail.Text ).Trim().Length.Equals(0) )
    {
        errorProvider.SetError( txtEmail,"cannot be empty" );
        filled = false;
    }
    if( ( txtCompany.Text ).Trim().Length.Equals(0) )
    {
        errorProvider.SetError( txtCompany,"cannot be empty" );
        filled = false;
    }
            
    if ( filled == true )
    {
        PPTAuto ppt = new  PPTAuto();
        StringCollection  array = new StringCollection ();

        array.Insert(0,txtName.Text);
        array.Insert(1,txtAge.Text);
        array.Insert(2,txtDesignation.Text);
        array.Insert(3,txtCompany.Text);
        array.Insert(4,txtPlace.Text);
        array.Insert(5,txtEmail.Text);
    
        ppt.CreateFile(array);                
    }
}

PowerPoint File Creation Code

public void CreateFile(StringCollection array)
{
    String strTemplate;
    // getting one Microsoft template
    strTemplate = "C:\\Program Files\\Microsoft Office\\Templates\\
            Presentation Designs\\Glass Layers.pot";

    //Create a new presentation based on a template.
    objApp = new PowerPoint.Application();
    objApp.Visible = MsoTriState.msoTrue;
    objPresSet = objApp.Presentations;
    objPres = objPresSet.Open(strTemplate, 
    MsoTriState.msoFalse, MsoTriState.msoTrue, MsoTriState.msoTrue);
                
    objSlides = objPres.Slides;
    
    // Adding a slide 
    objSlide = objSlides.Add(1,PowerPoint.PpSlideLayout.ppLayoutTitleOnly);
                 
    // adding different text boxes
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,100,500,80);
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,150,500,80);
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,200,500,80);
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,250,500,80);
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,300,500,80);
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,350,500,80);
    objSlide.Shapes.AddTextbox
        (MsoTextOrientation.msoTextOrientationHorizontal,100,400,500,80);
    
    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[1].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text = "These are my details";
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;
    
    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[2].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text =array[0] ;
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;
    
    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[3].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text =array[1] ;
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;
    
    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[4].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text =array[2] ;
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;
    
    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[5].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text =array[3] ;
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;
    
    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[6].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text =array[4] ;
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;

    objTextRng = objSlide.Shapes[7].TextFrame.TextRange;
    objTextRng.Text =array[5] ;
    objTextRng.Font.Name = "Arial";
    objTextRng.Font.Size = 20;
}

Conclusion

The interop assemblies provide a lot of options for working with PowerPoint data, both reading and writing. I hope this article gives you a head start in controlling PowerPoint from .NET and C#. Some experiment with the object model will help you to get that hands on.

History

• 02/01/2007: First draft