Moving at the Speed of Creativity by Wesley Fryer

No iPad Keynote Importing for Keynote ’08

This is a bummer. I haven’t seen a compelling reason to upgrade to Keynote ’09. Looks like Apple wants to make one for iPad users.

iPad will not import Keynote '08

I tried presenting from my iPad with Keynote and the iPad VGA adapter last Wednesday in Iowa. I was underwhelmed. Keynote for iPad does not support hyperlinks, which I use often in presentations. I also was disappointed there wasn’t a way to import a video clip on my iPad in videos into Keynote. I was hoping to see if I could get videos to play within Keynote on the iPad by importing an existing presentation I had made on my Mac previously, which has embedded videos. I was able to copy the presentation file to my iPad using iTunes, but when I tried to open it on the iPad in Keynote I got the above error.

Does anyone know if Keynote on the iPad presently will support / play embedded videos?

I was able to import my Keynote ’08 presos onto my iPad by first uploading them to Google Docs, and then viewing the preso on the iPad in Safari. When I chose to download the Google preso in PPT format, Safari displayed it and gave an option to open it in Keynote. That was a button in the upper right corner of the browser window. It would also be possible to work around this by exporting from Keynote ’08 into PPT and then using iTunes to import the file onto the iPad.

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12 responses to “No iPad Keynote Importing for Keynote ’08”

  1. Jeri Hurd Avatar

    Hey, Wes: Wow, this is huge, actually. I am lusting after the iPad, and thought it would be a great presentation tool, but obviously not. How in the world can it not support hyperlinks or embedded video. What do they think presentations are?? I assume Apple will deal with this in future iterations of the software. In the meantime, that’s a definite strike one. Thanks for letting us know!

    btw–did you find some good bbq? : )

  2. Russ Goerend Avatar

    Hi, Wes,
    Just curious: why bother with Keynote in the first place? I’ve been doing all my slidesets (and creating all my documents for that matter) with Google Docs this entire school year and I haven’t run into a single problem.

  3. Tim Avatar

    I plan to do a Keynote presentation from my iPad next week so thanks for the heads up about some of the potential problems. I don’t have videos in mine but will need to improvise something for the web links.

    I also am disappointed that my speakers notes don’t display on the iPad. Maybe fixes for that and other deficiencies will be coming in an update.

  4. Ryan Collins Avatar

    I load a keynote presentation with embedded videos and the videos played fine. A lot of my transitions were hit and miss, iPad keynote gave me a big list of things that didn’t import correctly.

    The videos did lose their frame that they had under Keynote 09.

    I’m pretty underwhelmed with Keynote iPad. I’m hoping it gets better. I am using it and my ipad to each the life cycle of frogs to some kindergarteners on Monday. Making a simple book in keynote wasn’t bad.

  5. Brian Crosby Avatar

    Hi Wes _ these are all things I want to know about before thinking about getting an iPad. I was informed that if you are projecting you can’t show anything on the desktop … like a web page or document. One reason for me to get one would be to get around school district filters when the 3G version comes out, but if I can’t project the web page or YouTube video, then it defeats the purpose. I could use my “Lumen” I guess – set the iPad on the Lumen and zoom in on the screen, but seems like a weak workaround.

  6. Wesley Fryer Avatar

    @Jeri: I hope embedded hyperlink support comes…. with the iPhone/iPad 4.0 software, multi-tasking / backgrounding is expected, and perhaps that will make the iPad less of a “one app at a time” device. I certainly wouldn’t say the iPad is without value as a presentation platform, it’s good Keynote WILL output to an external VGA device. It’s limited, but that’s often the case with 1.0 versions. I was glad to read in Ryan’s comments here that embedded videos ARE supported, as long as you create with iWork ’09 / Keynote ’09.

    To your BBQ question, no, I settled for a good Mediterranean restaurant in Tulsa Friday. Maybe next time!

  7. Wesley Fryer Avatar

    Russ: I have transitioned to Google Docs for most of my presentations this year as well. I wanted to experiment with the functionality and value of being able to both edit in Keynote on the iPad as well as present. Since I’m traveling more these days, it would be great if I could leave my comparatively heavy MacBook Pro laptop at home and just travel with the iPad. That day is not here yet, based on my limited experiments so far. I’d love to see an iPad app that would offer Google Gears functionality for Google Presentations, for offline presentation editing. This would be great when Wifi or 3G is not available.

    I did play with iWork on the iPad Friday at the Apple Store in Tulsa, and was pretty impressed. The app just looks so amazing, as you add and resize/edit images… Haven’t decided if it would be worth springing for that yet, however.

  8. Wesley Fryer Avatar

    Brian: I agree with your assessment– since the iPad won’t do video-out (yet) for Safari or YouTube, that really limits its utility as a presentation tool in the classroom.

    That might change radically this week with the announcement of the iPhone/iPad 4.0 software, however. If multi-tasking / backgrounding IS included, that could mean the app ScreenSplitr could become an approved application in the Apple App store. Sherman Nicodemus wrote a guest blog post about Screensplitr and Demogod on my blog over our Spring Break, and from what he said the lack of multi-tasking in the old/current iPhone/iPad OS has been the big reason it’s had to require a jailbreak. Even if Screensplitr becomes available in its current form in the App Store, I think Sherman said it’s limited to 15 fps, which would make video playback jerky. Still, it would be a lot better than what we have now for screensharing from either device…

    If you’re searching for a way to display web content in your classroom and directly use the cell phone network, I would recommend getting a mobile broadband router– Sprint has some, and I think other companies do as well. (Not AT&T, however, as far as I know.) I’d recommend being careful with this connection at school, however, and only using it yourself– not letting students use computers/devices connected to it. From an E-Rate standpoint I could see someone raising a legal issue with that… Of course you could configure the device to use a basic, free content filter like OpenDNS, and that could help cover you… but the best plan would be just using that device yourself and having students always access the web via the district-provided network.

  9. William Avatar

    Quite a Pity, Kind of makes it seem like a lite version of Keynote. Although, There is always in-app purchases

    William, theamazingipad.com

  10. Ryan Collins Avatar

    I played with the AV composite cable for the iPod with my iPad last night on my tv (I don’t have the VGA cable) and here’s what I found out:

    * Keynote works as expected, sending the presentation to the tv. An added bonus is that by holding your finger on the iPad gives you a laser pointer dot on your presentation that you can use to point out things on the slide.

    * The Youtube app send videos out.

    * Netflix does not 🙁

    * Although it doesn’t send Safari out, when you come to a video on a web page and start playing it, it does send the video out.

  11. Ryan Collins Avatar

    @Brian, you should be able to do that now with an iPhone and the av cable. I know I can use the av cable with my Touch and the YouTube app to send video to a tv.

  12. Matt Dunlap Avatar

    FYI… you can add videos directly to your Keynote presentation on the iPad if the videos are in your photo gallery.