Microsoft is having a competition for the best PowerPoint slide shows. Submissions begin this week!

Even if you don’t have anything to submit, check out their list of DOs and DON’Ts and some tips and templates. It’s on Microsoft’s web site at www.microsoft.com/office/powerpoint-slidefest.

Back in June, I posted that if you’re running the 64-bit version of Microsoft Office, you couldn’t insert Flash movies, since the Flash player is only a 32-bit plug-in. Users of 64-bit Windows have also experienced a lot of problems when watching Flash videos, which is the format of most videos on the Web, like on YouTube, Vimeo and elsewhere.

So it was an excellent gift today when I downloaded the beta of Adobe Square, the x64 Flash player. There are actually two downloads: an ActiveX control for Internet Explorer and Microsoft Office, and a plug-in for Firefox and every other browser. You’ll probably want to install both.

As soon as I did — wham! — I was able to place Flash objects into PowerPoint and Excel. On the Insert tab, select Video/Video from File.

Someone had sent me an Excel workbook that contains videos (a teaching aide that I’ll review in the near future) and originally, all I saw were blank boxes. Once I installed Square, the videos played just great. I also noticed that YouTube videos play a lot more smoothly, without jumping, jittering, starting-and-stopping. Flash player 10.1 fixed a lot of that already, but Square seems even better.

A couple of caveats: since Square is still in beta, there’s no guarantee of anything, so if you experience crashes and whatnot, don’t say you weren’t warned. Also, the beta won’t update itself automatically and you won’t get reminders to do so. It’s up to you to visit the download page every so often to update it manually. Download it here.

Inserting a Flash movie in PowerPoint 2003 and 2007 wasn’t very straightforward, but you could certainly do it. In 2007, go to the Developer tab on the ribbon (enable the tab in the Options, if necessary) and click the More Tools icon . From the pop-up that appears, choose the Shockwave Flash Object.
Draw a box on the slide, then use the Properties panel to set the file name of the movie.

PowerPoint 2010 either makes this easier or makes it impossible, depending on whether you’re using the 32 or 64-bit version of Office.

The problem is that even though 64-bit Windows has been around for several years, the Adobe Flash player is only a 32-bit plug-in. Office 2007 and older are also 32-bit, so for those applications, the plug-in isn’t a problem.

But Office 2010 is the first suite from Microsoft that comes in x32 and x64 versions. With the x32 version, you can simply go to PowerPoint’s Insert tab and click the Video button to insert a Flash object.

The problem is if you have the x64 version of PowerPoint, the video button won’t let you insert a Flash object, and neither will the Controls window in the Developer tab. You just can’t do it.

Keep in mind that if you have the 64-bit version of Windows 7 or Vista, you can still have the 32-bit version of Office, in which case you can still insert Flash movies. You’ll miss the plug-in only if you’re using the 64-bit version of Office, and that requires 64-bit Windows.