converting a PDF to a PowerPoint file on Mac

I was given a PDF of a presentation and asked to give a presentation on it. I’d like to use what is there and edit it a bit. I’d also like to not be presenting out of a PDF and use proper presentation software. I prefer PowerPoint to Keynote because someone else will give this presentation after me and I’d like them not to have the same problem of “here’s a file you can’t use”.

Didn’t work: Google Docs

Gmail offered to open the PDF in Google docs. The images got completely messed up. The ones that converted were in the wrong place compared to the words in the presentation and each other. Then after a number of pages, Google gave up on converting images.

Didn’t work: Drag from Mac preview to Keynote

Yes, I know I said I preferred PowerPoint for this task. However, it’s easy to export from Keynote to PowerPoint so it would have been fine as an intermediary. However, there were three problems

  1. You have to drag one slide at a time and there are 55 slides
  2. After dragging, it is just an image that isn’t even the same slze as the slide
  3. The slide is an image so I have to recreate any I want to edit.

What worked: Convert to KeyNote

CleverPDF has a PDF converter that lets you convert to a variety of formats. One is PowerPoint. (They also have Keynote). They make their money through a mix of ads and paid products. I didn’t look how secure your data is as this is essentially a public presentation (and not for my job)

I’m impressed with Clever PDF. The transformed file looks the same and is editable. And free.

cancelling spectrum and moving to hulu tv

After I got the refunds I could for the Spectrum carriage “disagreement” with Disney, I looked into online tv. I do want “cable” in that I want the lots of channels and live tv. And I want a DVR. However, I don’t need physical cables or a box in my house. After watching *a lot* of tennis on ESPN vs YouTube TV, I learned the bandwidth I have is just fine for internet tv.

Cancelling Spectrum

Spectrum has a nice gimmick where you have to speak to the retention department to cancel. Who doesn’t seem to answer the phone. I waited on hold for 30 minutes. At that point, I looked online and saw you can cancel in the store. If you cancel on the phone, you can return the box at any UPS store. If you cancel in person, it obviously has to be a Spectrum store. Given that both are walking distance and the Spectrum store is literally across the street from the UPS store, I went in person.

First, I cancelled autopay online and paid my final bill. I didn’t trust them not to bill me. Then I went to the store. I was in there for under 5 minutes. I even got a paper receipt that I cancelled. I got an email a few hours later titled “Confirmation of Your Disconnection Request”. It told me to be sure to return my equipment to the UPS store which was funny because I had already handed it into Spectrum and had a receipt.

Choosing a new TV provider

While I read up a bunch, I found CNet’s comparison to be most useful. It shows which channels you get on each service for Philo vs. Sling TV vs. Fubo vs. Hulu vs. YouTube TV vs. DirecTV. I wanted local channels. I do have an over the air antenna, but I record a lot so want it integrated. That narrowed it down to Fubo, Hulu + Live Tv and Youtube TV. All three are roughly the same price. (Within a few dollars and prices change regularly). I liked Hulu + Live TV’s lineup better. I also had a bias against YouTube TV as Google already knows so much about me. I also like that Hulu + Live TV gives you Hulu/Disney+ with ads for a dollar more. It also includes ESPN+ with ads but I’m a very “only watching ESPN during US Open season person).

The only channel I watch that Hulu + LIve TV doesn’t have is BBC America. Given that I only watch Doctor Who, I can buy/watch that standalone when the time comes. I think Amazon Prime has it either free or paid to which I already subscribe.

The nice thing about online tv is changing is easy when the time comes.

Hulu + Live TV is $50 for the first three months (if you sign up before Oct 11). It goes up to $77 if you sign up starting Oct 12 or after the three month promotional rate expires. It’s a dollar less a month if you only want Live TV. I think a dollar a month is worth it!

Setting up the smart tv

Scott advised me to set my smart tv to app only mode which gives less recommendations. There’s still one, but at least I’m not swimming in them. I also turned off google assistant and some other settings.

Setting up the DVR

Programming the DVR pretty much requires a computer/tablet/smart phone. I’m using my iPad. It’s not TV remote friendly. Which is fine.

I strongly dislike the built in program guide so I’m continuing to use Zap2It’s guide in Spectrum mode. When I see what I want to record, I search for the show by name on the app my iPad and record the series. (There doesn’t seem to a way to advance by day on the Hulu program guide.)

Another limitation is that the Hulu DVR doesn’t allow you to see a list of what you have are recording in the future. So you have to search again for the show to see if it is in record mode. The only saving grace is that it is easy to watch and episode you forgot to record by going to the show and viewing episodes. I suspect I’m going to miss a few as I get used to this! (Only one so far)

Another difference is you have to watch within 90 days of last airing. This is good for me as I tend to be a DVR packrat.

Fast forwarding

No issues fast forwarding through commercials. A little box appears with what the “future” state is (vs on the full screen), but it wasn’t bad to time

Opening the Hulu app

Most of the time, the app opens just fine on my SmartTV. Maybe 10% of the time, it reads me a message about not having an internet connection. It has always worked on the second attempt and pressing enter is enough to trigger that second attempt.

Opening on my laptop

There’s no Mac app and Hulu needs location data to open. I decided to use Chrome (not my main browser) so I don’t have to allow anything in Safari location services access. Chrome does let me enable location services for just the one domain which is nice.

Overall impressions

I’m happy with Hulu + Live TV so far. I’ve been using it for just over two weeks. I like not having a piece of flakey equipment. (I’ve had to exchange the Spectrum box a number of times and lost stuff on the DVR each time.) I also like that I can watch on any device so I don’t have to be near the tv. (to be fair, I think Spectrum had that feature too, but I never tried it)

playing with chatgpt – new years eve edition

I wrote up a blog post on Christmas with some of my ChatGPT playing. On New Years Eve, I was on a Zoom call with some friends. One of whom played a bunch with ChatGPT. The others hadn’t heard of it so we did some group playing with ChatGPT. Here’s how it went

PromptThoughts
tell me a joke about new years and zebrasIt was cute. Fits my expectations
write me an essay about shakespeareChatGPT wrote four paragraphs. It wasn’t bad. If someone was trying to get ChatGPT to do their homework, a more specific prompt would be needed
who is jeanne boyarskyI tried a few times and it wouldn’t give me an answer about a specific person. Which is interesting becaues i
write a sonnet about new years and the color blueMet the requirements
write a love letter to mickey mouse and winnie the poohThis was great. Pooh got honey and a bear hug.
write an email to a coworker you hate about a meeting“I’m sorry, but I am unable to complete this prompt as it goes against my programming to create content that is offensive or harmful.” – nice
write an email to a coworker about a disagreementThis one worked. It suggested a meeting to sit down and discuss respectfully.
write a haiku about calculus“Calculus, the math of change
Variables in motion’s range
Derivatives, integrals, infinite sums”
A haiku seems hard to tell if a person wrote it or a computer.
write a limerick about something amusing“There once was a man from Peru
Who liked to do things out of the blue
He’d stand on his head
And dance in his bed
While singing a tune out of tune.”
That works
prove the pythagorean themeWe got a proof. Sorta. First of all, good job on noticing I meant “theorem” and not “theme”. It used asy markup and included things like label(“$a$”, A–C, N);. I don’t know what asy markup is so it looked like a lot of text. A math teacher on the call said it wasn’t really right. Which I’ve seen a bunch of comments that things seem close but not quite.
write a dialog about birthdays from sesame street andThis was adorable. Elmo is three and that got mentioned in fact and tone.
write a dialog about birthdays from elmos on sesame street to james for his fifth birthdayAlso adorable. ChatGPT picked up on the fact that it is James turning five and not Elmo. (Elmo is three)
explain why 3+5 is an odd numberChatGPT starts out with “3+5 is an odd number because it is not divisible by 2”. 3=5 is 8 which is not an odd number so this is wrong.

But then it gets it right at the end with “When we add two odd numbers together, the result is always an even number because the remainders cancel out. For example, 3 + 5 = 8, which is an even number.”
is gamma rational or irrational?I didn’t even remember what gamma was (we had some math teachers on the call), but ChatGPT noted it is not possible to tell because infinite.. And then explained what gamma is and the beginning of its value.
write a c++ program to calculate a factorialThe code was good. Only part of it was in a code block which was weird.
how do i get from little neck to forest hills?There were both driving directions and public transport directions.
“Take the Q12 bus from Little Neck to Union Turnpike / Queens Boulevard.
Transfer to the E or F train at Union Turnpike / Queens Boulevard.
Take the E or F train to 71st Avenue station in Forest Hills.”
Step 1 is wrong. the Q12 doesn’t go to Union Turnpike/Queens Blvd. It goes to Flushing where you take the 7 to transfer to the E/F. Or you can take the Q12 to the Q46 which does go to Union Turnpike/Queens Blvd.

We thought maybe it got confused because we listed communities instead of specific locations. So we tried again.
how do i get from the commonpoint in little neck to commonpoint in forest hills?The public transport directions were
“Walk to the Little Neck LIRR station on Northern Boulevard.
Take the LIRR Port Washington line to Penn Station.
Transfer to the E or F train at Penn Station.
Take the E or F train to 71st Avenue station in Forest Hills.
Walk to the Commonpoint at Forest Hills, located at 108-25 62nd Drive.”

This is a terrible way of going. First the LIRR station is a long walk. Also the LIRR runs infrequently and has you going from Queens to Manhattan and all the way back to Queens. The correct way of going is to take the Q30 to Jamaica and then change to the F to Forest Hills. We gave it one more try on transit
how do i get from forest hills to the queens center mallThis one should be easier. The correct answer is you take the R train three stops. Instead we got
“From Forest Hills, take the E or F train to the Sutphin Boulevard / Archer Avenue / JFK Airport station.
Transfer to the E, J, or Z train at Sutphin Boulevard / Archer Avenue / JFK Airport.
Take the E, J, or Z train to the Queens Center Mall station.”
There is so much wrong here. The main problem is that the J and Z never go to the Queens Center Mall station. And the E only does on weekends. The other problem is they have you going the wrong way to double back to where you started.
write a sestina about times square 2023 for new years eve and the ballThis one stumped ChatGPT. The ouput did not follow the rules for words ending on certain lines.
write a poem in taiwanese about new yearsThen we tried languages. We learned ChatGPT does not know Taiwanese or Mandarin. (We started with languages someone on the Zoom can read fluently to have a chance of knowing if the output was right.
write a poem about new years in frenchWe got a poem and it was in French. I took French in high school. I don’t remember a lot but it definitely has some relevant words in there.
write a reference using apa style (american psych association style) on new years eve

write a APA style for a book on new years celebratoins

compare democrats and republicans. use apa style for citations

compare democrats and republicans using three sources and apa style
It took us four prompts but we got something useful (superficial, but in the right format)