Hello to all, first ofall I really hope I am posting this in the right area. I am new to this website and am learning it as I go. Anyway, what I wanting to know is what software recommendations people have for lumanaria ceremony for the viewing of names. We have always read the long list of names and as we all know there are issues with that, so this year we are wanting to venture into the world of technology. So I am open to suggestions. Thank you in advance.
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November 13, 2007 - 12:41am
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Scrolling Names for Luminaria Ceremony
I have developed a flash presentation that pulls the names from excel, you can dump the names in the file from another spreadsheet, It has a seperate file where you can change the title and the background is a separate file too so you don't have to know flash at all. If you would like these files send me an email and I will send them to you. Thanks, Brian
Scrolling Luminaria Names
Hi Smiley,
We have tried Powerpoint in the past, but found that you couldn't scroll enough names to make it useful. But I have found that Impress, which is OpenOffice.org's version of presentation software works nicely. You can track your names in Excel and then just copy the column of names and paste into Impress.
OpenOffice is a free program found at www.OpenOffice.org
Here are some instructions:
Luminaria Scrolling Display
In Excel, once you've completed your Data Entry:
Filter for unique records
- Select the column or click a cell in the list you want to filter.
- On the Data menu, point to Filter, and then click Advanced Filter.
- Do one of the following.
- To filter the list in place, similar to using AutoFilter, click Filter the list, in-place.
- To copy the results of the filter to another location, click Copy to another location. Then, in the Copy To box, enter a cell reference.
- Select the Unique records only check box.
If using 2 columns (First Name and Last Name) Sort by Last Name
- On the Menubar, click Data - Sort...
- If you have a Header row, be sure to click the My list has Header row.
Merge First and Last Name Columns
- Use the formula:
=A2&" "&B2 (if A the first name column and B is the last name column and you are starting in the 2nd row) and then drag that formula down to each of the remaining rows so that they become: =A3" "&B3, =A4" "&B4, and on down.
Remove Extra Spaces:
Once you've merged columns, you may have extra spaces between First and Last Names. Use the following formula to trim extra spaces.
- In the column to the right, we want to use a new formula. Click in the first cell and then in the formula box, type:
=TRIM(C2) (where C is the column you want to work on and 2 is the row you want to change)
- Then grab that formula and drag all the way down the column
Copy Text from Excel to Impress
- Open Impress
- Open Relay Luminaria presentation
- From Excel, select column to copy,
- Copy,
- In Impress, create Text Box
- From toolbar on the bottom of the program, click on the T
- Paste copied text into Text Box in Impress
Format Text Box:
- Select Text Box
- From the MenuBar, click Format - Paragraph 1 ½ lines
- Alignment - Center (if you so choose)
- OK
Format Text
- Format - Text
- Text Animation tab
- Scroll Through
- Uncheck Pixels and set to .01
- OK
Now, for the caveats:
Even though you can see your show scrolling names while you are working on it, you will want to test your show to be sure it really works by clicking on the Slide Show button.
I have Vista and XP on 2 different computers and OpenOffice's Impress 2.2 works great until I hit Slide Show...and the names don't scroll. However, 2.1 works like a dream. 2.3 is now out and I have't had a chance to try it. I'll give that a shot tonight.
Good Luck!
Scrolling Names in Luminaria update
Whoohooo! Today I tried the new version of OpenOffice (2.3) on my XP Pro and on Vista Home. Both worked no problem. Just now I was able to create a scrolling Luminaria with 1500 names in 2 minutes. So I totally recommend the new version. I will emphasize that it is FREE.
AND, for those using laptops they do not own, there are external hard drives by AcomData called Hybrid Drives that have their own desktop and the ability to run certain programs right off the external drive. OpenOffice is one of those programs! So if you are using a laptop for Luminaria on which you are not the administrator, so you can't load OpenOffice, you may want to consider a hybrid drive to help out.
PS I don't work for either OpenOffice or AcomData. I just love stuff that works and that's free! 
I'm not sure how many names
I'm not sure how many names that you are talking about. We had over 9,100 luminaria for our 2007 Relay. We do not read our names because we have so many. However, we have tried for the last couple of years to have the names scroll on power point. This has yet to work. I'm not sure of the solution to your question, but when you find out please let me know. Thank you.
Joined: 2007-03-27