Post by john_mPattern fill for shapes is another feature of the Office 2003 drawing tools
that is now gone!
The other one I used all the time was snap to grid with drawing tools! With
the new version I can't make many of the technical presentation type drawings
I used to! For example, I can no longer make a "square wave" shape because of
the lack of snap-to on a grid!
You don't say, but I'm assuming you've installed 2007?
Snap-to and the grid are still there. Right-click in an area of the slide that
contains no shapes, or just off the slide to be certain and choose "Grid and
Guides". Back in comfortable territory now?
But pattern fills are indeed gone.
If you still have PPT 2003 or access to it, you can set a slide up at, say,
1"x1" page size, fill it with one of the pattern fills, then export as WMF or
EMF. You can then use those as picture fills in 2007.
I've written a little macro that'll automatically generate a little WMF file of
each available patterned fill. See below. If you're not comfy with using VBA,
wait a bit and visit:
No more Pattern Fills in PowerPoint 2007
http://www.pptfaq.com/FAQ00925.htm
I'll post a link to a zip file with all of the pattern fills sample WMF files.
Sub MakeFillPatterns()
' Start by opening a new blank presentation
' Then run this
Dim oSh As Shape
Dim x As Long
Dim sOutputFolder As String
On Error GoTo ErrorHandler
' edit this to the slash-terminated path to the folder where you want the
files created
' the folder MUST exist or you'll get an error and the macro won't work
sOutputFolder = "c:\temp\"
With ActivePresentation
.PageSetup.SlideHeight = 72
.PageSetup.SlideWidth = 72
Set oSh = .Slides(1).Shapes.AddShape(msoShapeRectangle, 0, 0, 72, 72)
With oSh
' we don't want the outline visible ... it'll spoil the pattern
.Line.Visible = msoFalse
.Fill.Transparency = 0#
.Fill.Visible = msoTrue
' This is set to use foreground and background scheme colors.
' Change the scheme to get different color fills:
.Fill.ForeColor.SchemeColor = ppForeground
.Fill.BackColor.SchemeColor = ppBackground
For x = 1 To 64
.Fill.Patterned x
ActivePresentation.Slides(1).Export sOutputFolder &
"PatternedFill" & CStr(x) & ".WMF", "WMF"
'ActivePresentation.SaveAs sOutputFolder & "PatternedFill" &
CStr(x) & ".WMF", ppSaveAsMetaFile
Next
End With
End With
NormalExit:
Exit Sub
ErrorHandler:
' if we got here, either the path was wrong or we've asked for a fill number
greater than
' PPT knows about; either way, quit
Resume NormalExit
End Sub
-----------------------------------------
Steve Rindsberg, PPT MVP
PPT FAQ: www.pptfaq.com
PPTools: www.pptools.com
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