How to Link PowerPoint to MySQL Data for Real-Time Information

MySQL is a free and frequently used database system and is often used for websites or other internet driven databases and applications. The system will show how the user can use DataPoint to connect a PowerPoint presentation to a MySQL database in order to display database information in a PowerPoint presentation.

Why does the user wants to use MySQL data in the PowerPoint?

• For fresh and up-to-date content in the presentation. Always the right pricing and stock information when the users are presenting in a meeting.  Open the presentation and the user will get the latest content on the slides without copy/paste.
• Real-time information on a slide show e.g. for displaying game results at a sports event, voting results, tweets or RSS feeds.

A common used system with MySQL is WordPress. WordPress is a website content management system that stores information in MySQL database. In this demo the system will show the user on how the user can use our software to display information directly from a WordPress website and database in a data driven presentation. Imagine that the user can display posts and comments live from the website. Website visitors can comment on the posts and articles and the user can display the information in real time on a television or computer screen for real time monitoring and animation.

OK, let’s set up the data driven MySQL presentation now. First install DataPoint and after that the user can start Microsoft PowerPoint. The user will find a new menu item called DataPoint in the normal PowerPoint main menu.

Now click the List button of the Connections group.

Navigate to the MySQL node and click the Add connection button. Now enter the server name, username, password and database name of the MySQL database that the user wants to connect to.

Click OK to close.

Click the Add query button to indicate where to get the data from.

Select the data table of the MySQL database that the user wants to display on the screen, or the user enter the custom SQL statement.  Click OK to close.

The preview of the data is ready for now. The user have to set up a first data connection towards the MySQL database.  The system is ready to start using this data at various PowerPoint shapes.

Insert a new text box (or select an existing one) and click Text box in the Shapes group of the DataPoint menu.

Choose the data connection.  Choose the column that the user wants to display and set to row number to 1.

Click OK to close and the whatever value of the first row of the chosen data column of the MySQL database is displayed on the screen. When the user added a post to the MySQL WordPress database, then this new information is displayed on screen.  In case the user do not want to display the first row (the last post in our data selection) then the user can activate data scrolling to display each record for a number of seconds in the slide show.

So finally:

• When the user opens the presentation, the user will see  the last data row of the MySQL database automatically.
• When the user runs the slide show, it will continuously look for new data at the database and update the slide show accordingly.