Where can I learn more about VBA programming in PowerPoint?

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First, the bad news
There aren't many books specifically about PowerPoint programming. In fact, until early 2004, there weren't any at all.

Now the good news
David Marcovitz has written Powerful PowerPoint for Educators: Using Visual Basic for Application to Make PowerPoint Interactive and created a companion web site, Powerful PowerPoint for Educators. Recommended reading.

And more good news
VBA is very similar to regular Visual Basic. If you're just beginning to learn VBA, find yourself a good book on VB5 or VB6. That'll get you off to a good start. Everything you learn about VB will apply to VBA as well, with very few exceptions.

If you just need a quick tutorial on how to pop some VBA code into PowerPoint so you can try it out, we have the Visual Basic Basics here

If you already know VB and need to get up to speed on the specifics of VBA in Microsoft Office apps, get a copy of the Microsoft Office 97 or Office 2000 Visual Basic Programmer's Guide from Microsoft Press. Of the two, I'd recommend the Office 2000 version. It's more complete and accurate. It does a pretty good job of calling out features that are available only in Office 2000 and not in Office 97.

Better yet, it seems to be on line here

There's also a programmer's guide for Office 97. Here's a link to the PowerPoint section

Check out http://msdn.microsoft.com for examples.
There's also an online version of the earlier Office 97 VBA programmer's guide. The object model for Office 2000 has changed a bit and there are some additions to VBA, but for the most part, anything that works in PowerPoint 97 shoud work in later versions.

There's a wealth of PowerPoint-specific example code at PowerPoint MVP Shyam Pillai's site

Chirag Dalal has some highly useful add-ins and examples on his site.

Haunt the newsgroups and VB/VBA web sites. There's a ton of good code out there, already written.

See How do I join the PowerPoint newsgroup The same info applies to getting hooked up to any of the other Microsoft newsgroups at msnews.microsoft.com. Check out the various VB-related groups and the groups that cover the other Office apps. In many cases, you can easily adapt existing Excel or Word code to work in PowerPoint.

Chris Ray's site hasn't been updated in a while, but has some potentially useful routines.

Don't limit your search to PowerPoint
Other than the application-specific stuff, VBA is VBA. Those Excel and Word folks have been doing this stuff a lot longer than we have in PPT and have a LOT to offer.

Start at MVPs.org where you'll find links to dozens of sites maintained by MS MVPs who support the various VB/Office products. These people are your friends.

Excel MVP Stephen Bullen's site has lots of useful goodies, as does John Walkenbach's site

Howard Kaikow has a useful list (with thoughtful reviews) of books about Word and Office VBA and general VB.

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