Impressive is a simple open source presentation program that displays slideshows of image files (JPEG, PNG, TIFF and BMP) or PDF documents. Rendering is done via OpenGL, which allows for some “eye candy” effects.
Smooth alpha-blended slide transitions are provided for the sake of eye candy, but in addition to this, Impressive offers some unique tools that are really useful for presentations.
Impressive is written in Python, a feature-rich interpreted scripting language.
Features include:
- Page transitions.
- Overview screen.
- Automatic view – a mode that hides PDF pages from Impressive’s overview page based on whether they have a title or not.
- Highlight boxes.
- Spotlight effect.
- Zooming.
- Powerful way to customize individual presentations using so-called info scripts. Info scripts are actually Python scripts with full access to Impressive’s global data structures and functions.
- Support for PDF and URL hyperlinks like web links and e-mail addresses.
- PageProps.
- Keyboard shortcuts.
- Uses Xpdf’s pdftoppm as the default PDF rendering backend.
- Background rendering.
- Transitions can now be turned off completely, either globally or on a per-page basis.
- Persistent cache which is useful for large and frequently used presentations.
Website: impressive.sourceforge.net
Support: Documentation
Developer: Martin J. Fiedler
License: GNU General Public License v2.0
Impressive is written in Python. Learn Python with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
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