phuvf / oscpoint

OSCPoint is a PowerPoint add-in that allows Open Sound Control (OSC) control of PowerPoint on Windows

Nick Roberts: Award-winning event engineer

Lead developer at OctoCue & event software/hardware development gun for hire.

Contract software development work

• Touchscreen interfaces
• Game show engines and button systems
• Interactive exhibits, including button panels, RFID tags, card printers and proximity sensors
• Social media walls
• Flutter mobile app development

Live video engineering

• Official Barco Event Master Specialist (for Barco E2, Ex & S3)
• Disguise media servers
• Show system integration and operation
• Large-scale LED wall control systems, including Brompton processing
• Mapped and blended projector control
• Live event camera and PPU control systems
• vMix show programmer and operator

Show reel

A small sample of my work - check out my Instagram feed for the most recent events: @nickrobertsgb

Recent projects

About half my work is live video engineering for conferences, concerts and exhibitions, and the rest is custom-built hardware and software solutions.

If you're reading this you'll probably already know what's involved in conference work, so I'll skip that bit. Here's some examples of the custom-built stuff:

---

Alpine F1 garage (motorsport)

Video and lighting control systems for the Alpine F1 garage, including race engineer integrations, and the most famous curfew timer in F1.

---

Virgin Media Portl (TV advert)

Using the Portl (now called Proto) hologram system to allow fans to play FIFA with their idols over the internet.

---

Air Suburbia (EE TV advert)

Using an OpenReach FTTP connection to send multiple video, data and audio feeds between an airplane, an airport and a house in Harrow.

---

Coolman's Universe NFT activation

Crypto activation event in NYC where NFT owners could see and interact with their custom character using RFID scanning. Biggest win: custom-built space invaders!

---

Nike Air Max Day

The latest in a series of brand activations for Nike Dubai. Users can build a custom audio track with associated real-time visuals, then publish and share it via QR code and a custom microsite service.

Equipment

This list changes a lot and I'm not very good at keeping the logos up-to-date.

Fun (free and/or open source) stuff I've done

• OSCPoint - an OSC API for Microsoft PowerPoint, with associated Bitfocus Companion module
• https://vmixapi.com - the unofficial vMix API documentation
• https://github.com/phuvf/wireless_artnet_led_controller - a WiFi enabled LED controller using an ESP32 controller.
• https://github.com/phuvf/ismyportfolioscrewed - a quick & dirty calcuator to help UK landlords with tax changes (from 2016, now obsolete)

Contact details

Have a project you think I might be able to help with? Drop me an email: [email protected]

I'm based in Worcester, UK, but operate worldwide.

---

Zinc Event Production Ltd. registered in England & Wales, registration number 5340798.
Registered office: 48, Sansome Place, Worcester WR1 1UA. VAT registration number 854927780.

oscpoint's Issues

Trimmed Video Not showing correct length

When a video file has been trimmed in powerpoint, the remaining and position times are displayed relative to the untrimmed clip.

sectionName feedback not updated on first "Go to first slide in section"

Using Companion, I have a few buttons with feedback of "if sectionName=

" that also send a "Goto first slide in section" for that section. It takes two presses of that button for the feedback to update, as it seems (per the log) feedback is not sent when changing sections using this action. Slide number and section index both seem to update, but section name seems to lag until the next move.

Thanks for the great tool!

Handle unsaved changes when closing a file

Set Current Slide to Desktop Background

I know there's a feature in something else that, while in show mode (I believe) allows a slide to be set as the desktop wallpaper...great for when you dump out of a presentation to make an edit live. Is this possible to recreate?

THX!

Slide count for Sections

Is there a way to show in Companion the slide count for a section? In a slide deck I usually have multiple sections and it would be handy to see at a glance how many slides are left for the current section, rather than the slide count for the entire deck.

Thanks

Slide number feedbacks not updating

From FB group:

Having trouble getting any feedback to show up. Send OSC feedback is checked...all the ports match with companion. Start, Current, End...etc all work. However the feedback for slides and videos doesnt seem to be working all of a sudden for me. Had it all working last time I connected.

Ability to stop presenters click out of end of slideshow

Hi!

This is a request for one of my main problems with powerpoint. It's not really connected with OSC functionality which is great, but maybe it could be a part of that plugin.

The problem is presenters clicking out of the presentation, either to desktop or black slide depending on the setting. There is no option inside powerpoint to get to last slide and stay there until I manually close the presentation, which is the desired outcome.

Maybe you could somehow add a checkbox in the plugin config to not let powerpoint exit the presentation mode.
Maybe it could loop the last slide or something like that.

I and other event techs around the world would be very grateful to You for that functionality.

TIA

Start slide show from slide x

Would be nice to have the option to start the slideshow from a certain slide number.
/oscpoint/slideshow/start/from [integer: n]

Suggested addition to Further actions and ideas in the Examples considering slide notes for vMix

Not really an issue. Please consider the rewrite below as a hopefully useful addition to the current text.

There's currently no way (that I know of) to adjust text size via the vMix API. This means that if you have a lot of text in your notes, it may overflow the text box. You can get around this through different methods.

1. Use GT Title designer and create a Text box with Word wrapping turned on and the Shrink option selected. This will automatically reduce the font size, so that all the text is visible within the box dimensions.

2. Use GT Title designer and instead of a Text box create a Ticker, for example with the Direction "Top" selected. Additionally you may use the Shortcut SetTickerSpeed to control how fast the text will scroll. It might be a good idea to initialize the title Input with that shortcut and set its speed to 0. Then, have another shortcut in order to start the ticker if all the text is not visible.

3. By using a second title input with a smaller font size, and then switching between the two inputs as needed.

Methods 2 and 3 could be automated by looking at the length of the notes text, and switching to the smaller input or start the ticker, if it's over a certain length.

Save slide as wallpaper

Start from current slide not working when in individual window slideshow mode

Screen switching in/out of presenter view

Incorrect total slide count when multiple files are open but not being presented

When a deck is in focus via clicking or alt-tabbing, the total slide count is updated, even if not being presented.

However, if two decks are open, and the first is in presentation mode, escaped, and then closed with ctrl+w... resulting in the second deck now getting focus, the slide count reported for the second deck then becomes 0.

Unreliable playhead movement while video is playing.

I have set a rotary button on companion to forward/rewind a video by x ms. If the video is paused actions can be repeated very quickly, or while playing if actions are only sent once a second or so, all works fine.
If actions are sent in quick succession (continually rolling the dial for example) the playhead jumps back to the beginning of the video.

OSC Slideshow pause command

/oscpoint/slideshow/pause

Load presentation using filename/path

IP address error

Whenever I try to change the IP address to something different than 127.0.0.1 the following error occurs:

On 127.0.0.1 OSC is sent without problems.

Currently running on v1.0.1.1

Presenter view slide notes text size and scrolling

Show State Not Updating

Hello!

I downloaded the latest of both Companion and OSCPoint as of today (11/24/2023).

The Preset button for Show State: Slideshow (or Edit) doesn't seem to be updating, even after hitting "Refresh Data" button.

Media State, however, works as expected.

THX!

*FWIW, I was using the Web Buttons in the browser...not on the Stream Deck.

I can't activate buttons that have the ability to open files, like open file, please help. How do you make the 'supports variables' thing work when connecting a companion?

Hi I'm a fan of yours using your program so well in Korea

I'm really enjoying your program, thank you.

I have a few questions

How do you make the 'supports variables' thing work when connecting a companion?

I can't activate buttons that have the ability to open files, like open file, please help.

Minor sync issues due to non bundled playhead information

As the remaining time in a video and the elapsed time in a video are not reported in the same message, there is a slight difference in reported playhead position depending on which is relied upon.

Bundling these (with the "duration") in one message would alleviate this issue.

Open PowerPoint using OSCPoint

Hi Nick,

I can't get OSCPoint to open a file - I can select it, but open file only works if PP is already running.
Then I can scroll through te files and open the file I want.
Don't know if languagesettings could have anything to do with it (Dutch)
I am testing on Companion 3.4 Beta with OSCPoint 2.0.0.2
I did check the box for file-access

Is there an option to start PP directly from a button?

Originally posted by @helex1 in #41 (comment)

Companion preset for mins and one for secs

Larger presets for mins only and secs only

New features for v2.0.0, request for feedback

Hello OSCPoint users,

I've started work on v2 of OSCPoint. This should be backward compatible with v1.x but add new features as requested by the community. I thought I'd detail what I'm planning and get some feedback before the design is finalised.

There will probably be an updated Companion module to utilise these features, but that'll be after v2.x is finalised and published.

1 - Better presentation feedbacks

PowerPoint can have multiple shows open at the same time. By adding some additional feedbacks, it'll be possible to see which files are open and switch between them, using a standard JSON format which will include section info.

This should address issues #6 and #33.

See https://github.com/phuvf/oscpoint/blob/dev/FEEDBACKS.md for details of the proposed format of these messages.

2 - Open & close show files

OSCPoint can now access the local machine's file system (assuming permission has been granted by the user) and share a list of .ppt and .pptx files is a specific folder (called the active folder). The location of this folder can be set by via OSC, but it's always relative to the user folder.

Files in this folder can then be opened via OSCPoint.

This feature comes with some security complications, so it'll be off by default, but can be enabled using the tab in PowerPoint:

This should address issues #15.

For draft details of this feature, see https://github.com/phuvf/oscpoint/blob/dev/FILES.md

Also a new Set slide as wallpaper command to address issue #40.

3 - Event feedback

As OSCPoint reacts to PowerPoint events internally, it seemed sensible to forward these events as OSC messages. I don't have any use cases for these yet, but think they could be useful for others to build on top of.

Draft details in https://github.com/phuvf/oscpoint/blob/dev/FEEDBACKS.md

Donations and downloads

Finally - and not related to v2.x directly - I've changed the download process for the add-in, with a donation-suggestion request before add-in download.

I don't intent to make OSCPoint a paid-for-only tool as that would require a licensing system etc. etc. which is all very dull (and gets in the way of writing more interesting/useful code), but I'm also aware that OSCPoint is being used on lots of commercial shows that probably could afford a few quid without breaking the bank. One of the reasons it's taken so long to get round to v2.x it that it's hard to dedicate time to this project pro-bono when there's paid work to do too.

All donations come with an emailed receipt so you can claim this as a business expense. Hell, you could even bill it on to your client with a handling fee and make a profit - if that's your thing.

Anyway, thanks to everyone who's tried out OSCPoint and especially those who have provided feedback and suggestions.

Nick

Set current slide as wallpaper

Starting slideshow from anywhere other than slide 1 prevents slideshow returning to slide 1 (in v2+ only)

Goto first/last should be aware of hidden slides

Currently the /oscpoint/goto/slide/first and /oscpoint/goto/slide/last commands go to the first slide and last slide, irrespective of whether these are hidden.

Commands should go to first visible slide and last visible slide instead.

Close active presentation by default when no filename specified by close command

Is there "open" source code?

I see the MIT license. Is there source code? I checked all branched, tags and archives.

OSCPoint is a PowerPoint add-in that allows Open Sound Control (OSC) control of PowerPoint on Windows
Is this only documentation?

Position/remaing time refresh

When shifting the position of the playhead on a paused video, the position and remaining times do not update. While this can be got around in companion by adding a 'refresh data' action (<250ms delay seems to be necessary) it would be ideal if this happened automatically at any playhead adjustment.

Change status feedback from "slideshow" to "Live"

Please change the reported state of the presentation $(OSCPoint:state) values from "slideshow / edit" to "Live / Edit"

Reason: to fit the text on the buttons better.

Add UTF8 notes support

Chaos with multiple videos

As is to be expected. The reported positions of the playhead vary wildly when 2 videos are playing at the same time.

A suggestion would be to report an array of values when multiple videos are playing.

Slideshow window issue when starting slideshow from named section

Running on Windows 11, I start PowerPoint via Companion using Run Shell Path (local) and with the command line /c and the deck's file name. PowerPoint opens fine. When I then use OSCPoint Start Slideshow with a named section, PowerPoint drops into slideshow correctly, but does not display on the PC 2nd screen for streaming. If I close PowerPoint and manually reopen it, all works fine. Any suggestions?

Companion buttons showing remaining time of video

On the main page with the image of a Companion layout, it shows the time remaining split across 2 buttons - minutes on one button and seconds on the other.
I can only see in the list of variables within Companion to have either seconds or to have the time formatted as mm:ss Obviously, It's not a great hardship to have the time on one button, it does save a button after all, but for me it's easier to read! :D

Thanks

Osc-command to set osc-feedbacks

Idea for feature:

Osc-command that can be used to activate/deactivate sending of status messages. Maybe even to set destination ip+port.

Usecase: when having multiple ppt-computers, main+spare and maybe also other for house slides. Changing video mixer input should also change what state to monitor. All pcs sending to same ip + port, only one active at the time would do the thing.

Beta v2.0.2.0 : Using 'Start Slide Show>start from>current slide.

Beta v2.0.2.0 : Using 'Start Slide Show>start from>current slide causes ppt to start the slide show as if the current slide was slide number 1.
For example, currently using a deck with 84 slides.
Using OSCP as above, and starting at slide 77 starts the presentation at the correct point, but gives a presenter view showing that the presentation is on slide 1 of 8 (the number of remaining slides), and slide navigation back past slide '1' is not possible.

First seen running a main ppt on stable and backup ppt on beta. Confirmed issue by switching versions on both machines, and issue travelled with beta version.

ShowState not updating after Ending the PP

When I use the End-buttotn the Show-state remains red instead of returning to green.

2024-06-12_oscpoint.log

Companion icons for play

Having a play icon and stop icon on the presets.

Select and play a named slide show

Enumerate sections as a feedback

Regarding the sections and sectionNames, would it be possible to send them as variables to companion?

I'm thinking of having lots of PPTs files and changing between them you could pull the name of the section, to use as button label, and then action jumps to that section.

This might also help to eliminate spelling issues which would cause a section not to fire because of a single spelling mistake.

Reload to get slide number

Just testing and had to save and reload to get slide numbers correctly.

Feedback for when a slide transition is running

Time to next advance on click slide transition

Where a deck is advanced automatically by timing, provide a countdown to the display of the first advance on click slide in the deck.

Loss of current slide index on alt+tab

Entering the presentation, then alt tabbing to the editable deck (e.g. for live updates), will result in this plugin reporting the current slide as "0". Alt tabbing or clicking back to the presenter view does not resend the current index. Only "clicking" will update the reported index.