This is a small framework for creating and viewing web-based presentations. It is aimed at authors who have or are prepared to gain some knowledge of web technologies, and who want something more flexible or customizable than a conventional presentation tool. It consists of a viewer, plus an optional custom web server for development and/or self-contained delivery:
There are perhaps three major advantages of web-based presentations. One is that they are cross-platform. A second is that a wide range of different types of resource can be embedded in a presentation, with no need to change programs while presenting. A third is that the approach is completely open ended, using free and open source software, with no proprietary lock-in, and virtually no limit to what can be achieved. On the other hand, there are quite a lot of niggly details to sort out, and the aim of this framework and its documentation is to handle some of those details.
This framework provides only a fairly small range of basic features. The bulk of the power of web presentations comes from the capabilities of browsers and the embedded integrated technologies guaranteed by the HTML5 standard, all of which are controllable through scripting.
Examples of resources that can be combined seamlessly into a presentation are images, video and audio clips, mathematical notation, program fragments with syntax highlighting, vector-based drawings, and custom scripted animations. With some extra work, mobile-friendly materials, audience interaction, and live sketching or programming demos, are possible. Demos are provided for some of these possibilities in the documentation, and suggestions are provided for others.