I use online apps and services extensively – I value not having to worry about installing software, not worrying about software versions, and getting my work done via web apps. I take pride in rarely launching the Outlook desktop client (or other MS Office apps) even though I use Outlook, Word, Excel, etc. extensively each day!
A new icon recently appeared in my Office 365 app menu (Sway) and I decided to explore it and blog about the experience as I did.
What is Sway? To over simplify, I’d describe it as web-based PowerPoint but that’s probably not fair to either Sway or PowerPoint (O365 already exposes an online version of PowerPoint). These links provide a much better description of what Sway is than I can do in this blog!
https://sway.com/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcg6DGO9hpI&list=PLXPr7gfUMmKyE22-YpbgcDfr2SXEO7-qX&index=1
Like any good developer I thought I'd start “Swaying” with a ‘Hello World’ project. I clicked on the Sway link and Sway / O365 led me through the rest! I added my ‘Hello World’ Text, found an image on Bing to use as my background and voila. First Sway complete!
Next I decided I wanted to share my first Sway but not necessarily with everyone. Sway and O365 gave me a couple options:
I decided I’d let anyone see this but only via this link: https://sway.com/FQGZ1nXN9iYUttM3
While creating my ‘Hello World’ Sway I noticed I had the option of importing a PowerPoint presentation to use in a new Sway. I recently created a PowerPoint for use in a webinar on a SQL Server Maintenance Solution we love at Innovia. Makes sense that for Sway number 2 I’d give that a try!
After I clicked ‘Import’, I browsed to the OneDrive for Business location I had previously saved the PowerPoint, selected the presentation, and it took Sway less than a minute to create this:
https://sway.com/jlcOzfADP5Jdp0G9 (Once again I chose to share my new Sway via the “anyone with this link…” option)
Wow! I am impressed!
Notice you also have the option of importing a Word document (I am using Word initially to draft this blog). I’ll give you 14 chances to guess what my 3rd Sway is going to be but I am hopeful you’ll only need 1! https://sway.com/sbzn5DlWWbIBAtZx
I hope you’ve found this as interesting as I have – consider me sold on Sway!
