WiX Installer for VSTO with Visual Studio

I needed to create a silent installer for a VSTO Office Add-In I had created. The installer would be deployed silently via a group policy with an internal network. To do this an MSI (Microsoft Installer) would be ideal which would let you run something like this:

msiexec /i c:\path\to\installer.msi /quiet /log c:\path\to\info.log

The only MS info I could find regarding the install of a VSTO was really old (originally for Visual Studio 2013) and required InstallShield.

I then investigated creating a MS “Setup Project” – which may have worked eventually, if I persevered, but there seemed to be a lot of “working out” to do that should be straight forward.

So, then I turned my attention to WiX Toolset. I had seen this used previously, it is free and I have nothing to lose. Continue reading →

Change the Master Slide with Aspose

I’ve done quite a bit of work with Aspose and come up with solutions I haven’t found documented anywhere.

The challenge is to take an initial PowerPoint file to use as a template and append another PowerPoint file to it. Then output multiple Presentations, each with a version of the master slides applied. Continue reading →

PowerPoint VBA export slides to PPTX and JPG files

Normally I steer clear of VBA, but if I just need to do some quick processing then it makes sense!

Sub ExportSlidesToIndividual()
    Dim oPPT As Presentation, oSlide As Slide
    Set oPPT = ActivePresentation
    For Each oSlide In oPPT.Slides
        i = oSlide.SlideNumber
        t = "Slide"
         For Each oShp In oSlide.Shapes
          With oShp
            If .Type = msoPlaceholder Then
              Select Case .PlaceholderFormat.Type
                Case ppPlaceholderCenterTitle, ppPlaceholderTitle
                  t = oShp.TextFrame.TextRange.Text
                 
              End Select
            End If
          End With
        Next
        pad = Right(String(3, "0") & (i * 10), 3)
        oSlide.Export "c:\exported\" & pad & t & ".jpg", "JPG"
        oSlide.Export "c:\exported\" & pad &  t & ".pptx", "PPTX"            
    Next
    Set oPPT = Nothing
    MsgBox ("Processing complete")
End Sub

Continue reading →

Visual Studio Tools for Office with the Image Relay API

This project is just an example of what is possible with the Image Relay API. Image Relay is a DAM system. I have changed the client name and images for the purpose of this entry. It is also possible to do this using a demo account.

This add-in was created to allow users within an organisation to insert “on brand” imagery within a presentation.

Continue reading →

WordPress blog to website

My blog is free and created as part of “wordpress.com” – which is great. However, there are often adverts and a limit on the styles you can choose from. I also wanted my blog to be integrated in to the Digital Fishies website.

To do this I use C# to grab the RSS feed, and format this into the website. This all worked on my local development, but not when the website was published on my hosting provider. I was getting the following error:

"The client and server cannot communicate, because they do not possess a common algorithm
  at System.Net.SSPIWrapper.AcquireCredentialsHandle"

This all boiled down to different TLS versions on my website and wordpress.com. As I am using .NET 4.5.2, I was able to add the following line to the Global.asax Application_Start method.

ServicePointManager.SecurityProtocol = SecurityProtocolType.Tls12;

Now digitalfishies.com/blog works!