Working with Preset Placeholders
As a review, to enter Slide Master view, display the View tab and click Slide Master. One or more slide masters appear in the left pane, with its own subordinate layout masters. A slide master has five preset placeholders that you can individually remove or move around. Figure 22-18 points them out on a slide master with the Concourse theme applied, but they might be in different locations in other themes:
Title: The placeholder for the title on each slide
Text: The main content placeholder on each slide
Date: The box that displays the current date on each slide
Slide number: The box that displays the slide number on each slide
Footer: A box that displays repeated text at the bottom of each slide
Figure 22-18. Each slide master contains these placeholders (or can contain them)
These elements are all enabled by default, but the Footer is empty by default so it is not visible on individual slides unless you type some text into it in Slide Master view or add text to it using Insert Header and Footer. Each of these elements trickles down to the layout masters beneath it, so formatting, moving, or deleting one of these elements from the slide master also changes it on each of the layouts. See Figure 22-18 for an example of the various placeholders.
Formatting a preset placeholder
You can format the text in each of the placeholders on the slide master just like any regular text, and that formatting carries over to all slides and layouts based on it. For example, if you format the code in the Slide Number box with a certain font and size, it will appear that way on every slide that uses that slide master. You can also format the placeholder boxes just like any other text boxes. For example, you can add a border around the page number’s box, and/or fill its background with color.
Tip
If you want to make all the text in a heading all caps or small caps, use the Font dialog box. From the Home tab, click the dialog box launcher in the Font group and mark the Small Caps or All Caps checkbox there.
Moving, deleting, or restoring preset placeholders
You can move each of the placeholders on the slide master or an individual layout master. For example, you might decide you want the Footer box at the top of the slide rather than the bottom, or that you want to center the slide number at the bottom of the slide. To move a placeholder, click it to select it and then drag its border.
To delete one of the placeholders on the slide master, select its box and press the Delete key on the keyboard. Deleting it from the slide master deletes it from all of the associated layouts as well.
To restore deleted placeholders on the slide master, follow these steps:
1. | In Slide Master view, select the slide master (not a layout). |
2. | On the Slide Master tab, click Slide Layout. The Master Layout dialog box opens. Check boxes for already displayed elements are marked and unavailable. Checkboxes for previously deleted elements are available as shown in Figure 22-19. |
3. | Mark the checkboxes for the elements that you want to restore. |
4. | Click OK. |
Caution
Restored placeholders might not appear in the same spots as they did originally; you might need to move them. To put the placeholders back to their original locations, reapply the theme from the Themes button on the Slide Master tab.
Here are some more details you should remember about deleting and restoring:
On an individual layout master, you can quickly delete and restore the Title and Footer placeholders by marking or clearing the Title and Footers check boxes on the Slide Master tab. The “footer” that this checkbox refers to is actually all three of the bottom-of-the-slide elements: the actual footer, the date box, and the slide number box.
You can also individually delete the placeholders from a layout master, the same as on a slide master. Just select a placeholder box and press the Delete key.
You can restore all of the placeholders, except Text, by marking the aforementioned checkboxes on the Slide Master tab. Whenever any of the three footer boxes are missing, the Footers checkbox becomes cleared, and you can restore the missing box(es) by re-selecting the checkbox.
You cannot restore the Text placeholder, however, on an individual layout master. You must recreate it with the Insert Placeholder command.
Cross-Ref
For more on the Insert Placeholder command, see the section “Customizing and Creating Layouts.”
Displaying the date, number, and footer on slides
Even though the placeholders for Date, Number, and Footer might appear on the slide master, they do not appear on the actual slides in the presentation unless you enable them. This might seem counterintuitive at first, but it’s actually a benefit. PowerPoint enables you to turn the date, number, and footer on and off without having to delete, recreate, or reformat their placeholders. You can decide at the last minute whether you want them to display or not, and you can choose differently for different audiences and situations.
All three areas are controlled from the Header and Footer dialog box. To open it, from the Insert tab click Header and Footer. (Clicking Date and Time or clicking Number opens the same dialog box.) Then on the Slide tab, mark the checkboxes for each of the three elements you want to use. See Figure 22-20.
Figure 22-20. Choose which of the footer elements should appear on slides.
Date and Time
You can set Date and Time either to Update Automatically or to Fixed:
Update Automatically pulls the current date from the computer’s clock and formats it in whatever format you choose from the drop-down list. You can also select a language and a Calendar Type (although unless you are presenting in some other country than the one for which your version of PowerPoint was developed, this is probably not an issue).
Fixed prints whatever you enter in the Fixed text box. When Fixed is enabled, it defaults to today’s date in the m/dd/yyyy format.
Tip
In addition to (or instead of) placing the date on each slide, you can insert an individual instance of the current date or time on a slide, perhaps as part of a sentence. To do so, position the insertion point inside a text box or placeholder and then on the Insert tab, click Date and Time. Select the format you want from the dialog box that appears and click OK.
Slide Number
This option shows the slide number on each slide, wherever the Number placeholder is positioned. You can format the Number placeholder on the master slide with the desired font, size, and other text attributes.
By default, slide numbering starts with 1. You can start with some other number if you like by following these steps:
1. | Close Slide Master view if it is open. To do so, click the Close button on the Slide Master tab. |
2. | On the Design tab, click the dialog box launcher in the Page Setup group. The Page Setup dialog box opens. |
3. | In the Number Slides From box, increment the number to the desired starting number. |
4. | Click OK. |
Tip
You can insert the slide number on an individual slide, either instead of or in addition to the numbering on the Slide Master. Position the insertion point, and then on the Insert tab, click Slide Number. If you are in Slide master view, this places a code on the Slide Master for the slide number that looks like this: <#>. If you are on an individual slide, it inserts the same code but the code itself is hidden and the actual number appears.
Footer
The footer is blank by default. Mark the Footer check box, and then enter the desired text in the Footer box. You can then format the footer text from the slide master as you would any other text. You can also enter the footer text in the Header and Footer dialog box’s Footer text box.
Don’t Show on Title Slide
This checkbox in the Header and Footer dialog box suppresses the date/time, page number, and footer on slides that use the Title Slide layout. Many people like to hide those elements on title slides for a cleaner look and to avoid repeated information (for example, if the current date appears in the subtitle box on the title slide).