Deck Editing — One-Time Setup Walkthrough

First-time setup for the PowerPoint-native deck-editing tooling (RunDeckOps.bas + run-deck-ops.sh; see rules/deck-editing-rules.md). macOS + Microsoft PowerPoint only.

Steps 1–4 are manual GUI actions only the user can perform; the agent presents each and the user acts, then the agent proceeds. The Step 5 smoke test verifies the whole setup end-to-end before any real edit — so the agent does not pause to confirm each manual step, it confirms once via the smoke test. Run this once per machine; afterwards the agent invokes run-deck-ops.sh directly.

Step 1 — Enable VBA macros

Ask the user to open PowerPoint → Settings → Security & Privacy and enable macros ("Enable all macros", or enable + trust). Proceed to Step 2.

Step 2 — Create the macro container DeckOps.pptm

The macro must live in a macro-enabled file, never in a real deck. Ask the user to:

1. File → New Presentation (a blank deck — this becomes the macro home).
2. File → Save As → set File Format: PowerPoint Macro-Enabled Presentation (.pptm) → name it DeckOps.pptm, save it somewhere stable (e.g. alongside the tooling).

Gotcha to warn about up front: if PowerPoint ever shows "Visual Basic macros will be removed if you save the file in this format", the user is saving a .pptx — tell them to click Cancel and save as .pptm instead. A real deck must never carry the macro.

Step 3 — Import the macro

Ask the user to open the VBA editor (Tools → Macro → Visual Basic Editor, or ⌥F11), select DeckOps.pptm's project in the left pane, then File → Import File… and choose skills/presentation-creator/scripts/RunDeckOps.bas. Save DeckOps.pptm (⌘S).

To UPDATE the macro later: right-click the DeckOps module → Remove (No to export) → Import File… the new .bas → save.

Step 4 — Grant Automation consent (first run only)

The first time a script drives PowerPoint, macOS shows an Automation consent prompt. Tell the user it is GUI-only — it cannot be approved headless — so they should run the first invocation themselves (or be at the machine to click OK): System Settings → Privacy & Security → Automation → allow the terminal to control PowerPoint. After consent is granted once, the agent may run run-deck-ops.sh itself.

Step 5 — Smoke-test before any real edit

With DeckOps.pptm open, run a 3-slide throwaway against a UNIQUELY-NAMED copy of a deck and confirm it opens clean in PowerPoint and Keynote (no "Repair" prompt). Only then run the real edit. Given the history of lost work with other tools, always test first.

Google Drive caveat (important)

If decks live in a Google Drive "My Drive" folder (the macOS Google Drive File-Provider mount), sandboxed PowerPoint can OPEN/read them but cannot create a new file there via VBA — SaveCopyAs fails with E_FAIL (-2147467259). run-deck-ops.sh works around this by saving to a local staging folder (~/.deckops-staging/) and then moving the result into the Drive destination with the shell (which writes to Drive normally). Keep using uniquely-named copies for the base/import/output so PowerPoint's filename-keyed open-deck cache never hands back the wrong deck.