A. Features and Requirements Matters

• What is EasiSlides?
• What is the minimum Operating System required?
• Do I really need .NET on my PC?
• Are there any additional software required by EasiSlides to run?
• Any Installation issues I should be aware of?
• Where can I get more information on using EasiSlides?
• What software language is EasiSlides written in?
• Does EasiSlides support Windows Dual Monitor?
• Which Font and what Font Size should I use for Projection?

B. Database, Word & Text Files Matters

• Is it safe to modify the EasiSlides database if I have Microsoft Access on my PC?
• Why does the PraiseBook Generator generate quit a large file when compared to a normal Word document?
• Can I use background image for my slides?
• Can I change font settings for individual songs?
• What are Notations?
• When using word documents, will EasiSlides use the formatting setup and graphics, etc. in the Word Document?
• Can I play video files using EasiSlides?

C. PowerPoint Matters

• What version of Powerpoint does Powerpoint require?
• Does EasiSlides support Powerpoint custom animations?
• What is an EasiSlides-Aware Powerpoint file?
• Why is it in some setup, Powerpoint item does not appear but a white screen appears?

D. PraiseBook Generator Matters

• What Software do I need to view the generated PraiseBooks?
• Why can I only see one column instead of two?

E. HTML Generator Matters

• Why is it when I try to edit the HTML file using my HTML editor, the format doesn't right and there are gaps between each character?
• Why are filenames for CJK songs converted to letters and numbers?
• Why doesn't the Copy to Clipboard function in the generated files capture bold, italics, etc.?

F. Holy Bibles in EasiSlides

• What versions of Bibles are available in EasiSlides
• Why can't you supply the NIV?
• Can I just use other electronic Bibles from other sources for use in EasiSlides?
• Can I create my own electronic Bible for use in EasiSlides?

G. Costs and Licencing

• What is the End User Licencing Agreement (EULA)?
• What is the licencing cost of running EasiSlides?
• Are there any plans to charge for the software in the future?
• What's the purpose of registering EasiSlides?
• Are there any loss in EasiSlides functionality if I don’t register it with EasiSlides.com?
• Can I make a donation to EasiSlide?

A. Features and Requirements Matters

Q. What is EasiSlides?

EasiSlides is a Song Projection Software designed primarily for projecting lyrics, with a video projector, onto a large screen to assist Christian Worship. It has its own database of songs but you can also use Powerpoint files, Word documents (text only) and Text files. Also available is the PraiseBook Generator, which you can generate your own Praise Books or Praise Sheets, and an HTML Generator, for generating your worship lyrics in HTML format for your church website.

When compared to other Worship Projection software, EasiSlides is unique in that it has the facility to project two languages at the same time, thereby making it ideal for dual-language worship environments.

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Q. What is the minimum Operating System required?

EasiSlides is based on the Microsoft .NET Framework 2.0 and in theory, anything which can run .NET 2.0 can run EasiSlides. Microsoft has a website which provides details on the .NET framwork and you can access it here. Microsoft states that PCs running Windows 98, ME, 2000 and XP can run .NET. Our own tests and users' responses have helped us to come up with the following results:

EasiSlides will work on:

• Windows 98SE *
• Windows 2000
• Windows XP
• Windows ME

* In most cases, Windows 98SE will work but some users have found problems and have had to upgrade to Windows 2000 or later.

EasiSlides will NOT work on:

• Windows 98 First Edition

Minimum Spec: A Pentium 3 with at least 256 MB memory running Windows 2000/XP is recommended. However, EasiSlides should run on lower spec systems but it will be slow in starting and there is a slight time lag between songs/slides. If you do have a slower/older computer then you should switch off the reference alerts and do not use transitions so as to improve performance.

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Q. Do I really need .NET on my PC?

Yes you do, or else Easislides won't run!

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Q. Are there any additional software required by EasiSlides to run?

• In order to make use of the multi-language facility of EasiSlides, you will need to enable the appropriate language settings in the Regional Option of the Control Panel. Any non-Western fonts will show up as squares if the appropriate languages are not installed.
• Also, you have to make sure you have the necessary font installed on your PC and possibly an Input Method Editor (IME) for the language you require.
• If you want to use Powerpoint files or Word Documents, you will need Microsoft Powerpoint 2000 or Word 2000 (or later versions) on your PC.

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Q. Any Installation Issues I should be aware of?

Users with Windows98SE will find difficulty in displaying non-Western fonts. This is a Windows 98SE issue as per link to Microsoft here. The only way round the problem is to install the language-specific version of the OS, eg. Chinese Windows 98. Please note that in most cases, Windows 98SE will work but some users have found problems and have had to upgrade to Windows 2000 or later.

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Q. Where can I get more information on using EasiSlides?

Please visit the Help page of Guides on this website or the Help facility within the EasiSlides software.

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Q. What software language is EasiSlides written in?

EasiSlides V4.0 is written in C#. The language was self-taught. Most of the C# code are my own but I also made use of codes in the public domain. To the best of my knowledge, none of the code in EasiSlides infringe anybody's copyright.

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Q. Does EasiSlides support Windows Dual Monitor?

Yes, and more! If your PC has the necessary hardware and you have enabled a second monitor in your Displays Properties, EasiSlides will detect it and you can use it via the EasiSlides Options menu. If you have a third monitor, EasiSlides can also make use of it for displaying lyrics/chords to your choir or musicians. If you PC does not have a secondary monitor setup, EasiSlides will operate in single monitor mode and shall make use of keyboard keys for navigation. If using single monitor mode, you can press the F1 key during the LIVE Show to see list of available keyboard keys.

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Q. Which Font and what Font Size should I use for Projection?

EasiSlides comes with a songs database with 4 folders, ie. English, Cantonese, Mandarin and Cantonese/English bi-lingual. You can delete the songs from Song folder(s) you don't require. EasiSlides allows you to choose default Font and size for each Song Folder. The following Font and size have found to work quite well:

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B. Database, Word and text Files Matters

Q. Is it safe to modify the EasiSlides database if I have Microsoft Access on my PC?

You are advised NOT to modify the EasiSlides Database (which is based on Microsoft Access) directly. The reason being that, for speed and Unicode purposes, EasiSlides builds additional information to the songs when it stores them. EasiSlides may not function correctly if you amend the items manually and EasiSlides does not have the additional information.

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Q. Why does the PraiseBook Generator generate quite a large file when compared to a normal Word document?

The PraiseBook Generator creates a Rich Text Format (RTF) file. Generally, it is much large in size than those generated by Word because it is an inter-changeable format and has to have as much information as possible in the file. As soon as your RTF file is generated, you should save it into the Word Processor of your choice for further manual refinement.

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Q. Can I use background image for my slides?

Yes. Each song can have its own image background.

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Q. Can I change font and other settings for individual songs?

Yes. Fonts, alignments, margins, size, colour, headings, notations can all be set for individual songs.

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Q. What are Notations?

Notations are things such as Guitar Chords or Ruby Text which appears on top of words. If Notations are used as Guitar chords, you can use EasiSlides to transpose them to different keys if so desired.

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Q. When using word documents, will EasiSlides use the formatting setup and graphics, etc. in the Word Document?

No. If you place a Word document on the Worship List, EasiSlides will only extract the text contents. The displayed font will be based on the Folder setting you have allocated to the Word document on the worship List. By default, the folder setting is set to the first folder in the database. Any blank lines will be treated as a screen break.

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Q. Can I play video files using EasiSlides?

Yes You can. You can also use a camcorder to feed a live video into EasiSlides. However, be aware that some graphics card do not support all EasiSlides video functions and you will therefore need to test video functionalities for your own particular PC.

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C. PowerPoint Matters

Q. What version of Powerpoint does Powerpoint require?

You don't need Powerpoint software if you are only running EasiSlides in Database Mode. If you wish to run Powerpoint presentations, Powerpoint 2000 is the minimum version required.

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Q. Does EasiSlides support Powerpoint custom animations?

Yes, for each screen. However, animated Gifs can't run indefinitely or else EasiSlides won't be able to control the slide movements. Also, because of the way Powerpoint operates, EasiSlides can't handle Powerpoint custom shows.

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Q. What is an EasiSlides-Aware Powerpoint file?

Basically, indicators have been inserted into the Powerpoint file which tells EasiSlides where each of the verse starts and which slide holds the chorus. This means the EasiSlides operator can jump directly to a particular verse or to the chorus if desired. Please see the Help facility in the EasiSlides software for more details.

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Q. Why is it in some setup, Powerpoint item does not appear but a white screen appears?

Two possible causes. One is that you are running a custom show, with automatic transitions, etc, which EasiSlides does not support. Or, your display settings is set to 32-bit colour and if this is so, you will need to change it to 16-bit colour.

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D. PraiseBook Generator Matters

What Software do I need to view the generated PraiseBooks?

At a minimum, Wordpad which comes with all version of Windows. To see page breaks, etc. you will need MS-Word or any other Rich Text Format (RTF) editor.

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Why can I only see one column instead of two?

Some RTF editor such as Wordpad are limited in functionality and therefore can only display one column, even though EasiSlides has correctly set the format for two columns. An important thing you need to remember is that if you open the generated document in Wordpad and then saves it, Wordpad will remove the double column setting since it doesn't understand them. The two column formatting will be lost even if you open the document using MS Word later.

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E. HTML Generator Matters

Why is it when I try to edit the HTML file using my HTML editor, the format doesn't look right and there are gaps between each character?

This is because the files are in double-byte Unicode format. This kind of file format is required to hold non-Western CJK characters. Some (western) HTML editors can't cope with Unicode files but I have tried using MS Word and it worked quite well (though it adds lots of XML information to the file). Therefore, if you want to edit the HTML files and your HTML editor can't cope with the unicode file, try using MS Word instead.

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Why are filenames for CJK Songs converted to letters and numbers instead of the original CJK title?

The reasons are that some FTP software and some WebServers can't handle unicode filenames. It would mean, first of all, that you will have difficulty in uploading your CJK files, and secondly, problems in getting your WebServer to store the CJK filenames. By converting them to a Hexadecimal format, FTP software and web servers should have no problem in handling them.

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Why doesn't the Copy to Clipboard function in the generated files capture bold, italics, etc.?

This is because the function is an Internet Explorer (IE) command (not Windows) and therefore, is very basic. As far as I know, the button only works in IE and no other browser.

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F. Holy Bibles in EasiSlides

What versions of Bibles are available in EasiSlides

EasiSlides provides five optional public domain Holy Bibles:

• King james Version
• American Standard Version
• Revised Standard version
• Chinese Union (Simplified text)
• Chinese Union (Traditional text)

Other public domain versions and languages will become available when EasiSlides users send them to me for publication

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Why can't you supply the NIV?

Zondervan requires a one-off payment of $10,000 for using the New International Version (NIV) in the software. Everytime a copy is distributed, either for free or for a cost, Zondervan requires a further payment of $10 per copy.

25th Oct 2004: Contacted International Bible Society about use of NIV. They replied that they are not granting any further licences for projection software at this time.

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Can I just use other electronic Bibles from other sources for use in EasiSlides?

Not directly but with the necessary software, you can try coverting it. Please see the question below for more information.

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Can I create my own electronic Bible for use in EasiSlides?

If you have a Holy Bible in an Access database format, or can convert it to an Access format, you can restructure the table and field structure of it to replicate the EasiSlides Bible format structure. You will also need to add in addtional rows of data. Please open up a current version of EasiSlides-formatted Holy Bible to see the structure required.

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G. Costs and Licencing

What is the End User Licencing Agreement (EULA)?

It describes the basis on which you use EasiSlides software. The Agreement is shipped with all versions of EasiSlides and can be found under the Main Menu in the EasiSlides software. If having read the EULA and you do not wish to abide by it, you should stop using EasiSlides immediately and remove it from your machine.

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What is the licencing cost of running EasiSlides?

EasiSlides is free to download and use for individual or collective Christian worship gatherings, subject to the terms and conditions of use. You will be responsible for your own Microsoft Operating System and Powerpoint (if you run Powerpoint files) software licences. Also, for churches and fellowships, you will need to look into CCLI licences requirements. Please visit the http://www.ccli.com website for CCLI licencing details.

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Are there any plans to charge for the software in the future?

The software was written by me to support the work of the BCCC and I would like to share it freely with all other Christians in the worship of our true God. (Please see the BCCC Doctrinal Basis which also summarises my statement of belief.) My hope is that donations received would be enough to keep EasiSlides free of charge.

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What's the purpose of registering EasiSlides?

If you wish to use EasiSlides on an-going basis, please register your use with us at the Register Page. The main purpose of registration is for me to keep track on the spread of EasiSlides.

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Are there any loss in EasiSlides functionality if I don’t register it with EasiSlides.com?

No. You can continue to work with a fully functional EasiSlides if you choose not to register your use with EasiSlides.com.

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Can I make a donation to EasiSlides?

EasiSlides is free to download and use, subject to the terms and conditions of use. There is no licencing cost. However, if you would like to make a financial donation towards the continuing support and enhancement of EasiSlides, please visit the Donate Page for more details.

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