Entering agenda items

Created: 2026-08-02 12:00 · Updated: 2026-08-09

The Agenda items tab is the main work area of the Agenda Master. Here you enter the agenda — one item per line. PPPTools calculates numbers and time slots automatically from your input.

Empty start

In a fresh presentation the Agenda Master starts with a single empty line — no example content. To try things out with a ready-made sample agenda, load the "Sample agenda" preset on the Preset tab whenever you need it.

Items and sub-items

Every line is an agenda item. The indent of a line sets its level:

Not indented → main item (e.g. "2 Market overview").
Indented → sub-item of the main item above (e.g. "2.1 Competition").

Numbering follows the structure automatically; you never type numbers by hand.

New line appears in the right place

When you are on a row (cursor in one of its fields, or you last clicked there), ＋ Sub-item inserts the new sub-item directly below that item, and ＋ Item places the new main item after its whole block (item plus its sub-items). With no active row the new line is appended at the end, as before.

Quick entry with separators

You can separate title, owner and duration in one line with semicolons: Market overview ; A. Sample ; 15 produces the title "Market overview", owner "A. Sample" and a duration of 15 minutes.

The visible row

Each row shows, compactly: No · Title · Owner · Min, and on the right the ⋯ button for the detail area.

Field	Meaning
No	Automatically calculated number (follows the indent).
Title	Name of the item.
Owner	Person or role (optional; only shown when the column is enabled in Layout).
Min	Duration in minutes. Basis for the time-slot calculation.

Detail area (⋯)

Clicking ⋯ expands a detail area for the row:

Field	Meaning
Timeslot	The calculated time slot (e.g. 09:15–09:30). Derived from the start time and durations — not typed manually.
Custom	A free extra value for the optional custom column (you set the column name in Layout, e.g. "Goal").
Notes	Internal note for the item.
hide	Hides the item in the table of contents without deleting it.

The structure buttons in the detail area let you indent or outdent an item and move it in the order.

Duration and time slots

How durations add up to time slots is controlled on the Configuration tab. The groups there are collapsible — Duration calculation and Structure are open, the rarer ones (Section management, Hyperlinks, Title management) collapsed by default.

Duration calculation — three modes:
Flat — each item counts its own duration; time slots run continuously across all items.
Sub-items → main item — the duration of sub-items rolls up to the main item; time slots on main items only.
Bottom-up — each node aggregates everything below it; time slots on main items.

Also on the Configuration tab are Section management (see below), Hyperlinks & navigation and Title management.

Numbering now belongs to the scope

The number the main items begin with (start number) and whether the count is continued from the previous scope are no longer set here, but per agenda scope on the Presentation tab. That way each scope has its own numbering. Details under Scopes.

Start time for time slots

Time slots are calculated from the start time on the Presentation tab. Without a start time the slots stay empty, but durations are still calculated.

Empty time slot at 0 minutes

A time slot of zero length (start = end) is not printed as "09:15–09:15" — it stays empty. This only affects items that genuinely last 0 minutes. In the Sub-items → main item and Bottom-up modes it cannot happen as long as a main item has sub-items with a duration — the children's durations roll up to it. There, an empty slot appears only when a single leaf item with no children is itself set to 0 minutes. In Flat mode, any item with 0 minutes can be affected.

Section management

PPPTools can create real PowerPoint sections to match your agenda items — the grouping that appears as collapsible bands in the slide sorter on the left. This lets you jump quickly between agenda items in large decks.

The Section management group on the Configuration tab has a master switch — just like Title management:

Switch	Effect
Section management active	Off (default): PPPTools does not touch PowerPoint sections at all. On: on Generate and Update, sections are created per selected item type, renamed (No + Title) and orphaned sections of this agenda are merged.
Section per main item	Creates a section before the divider slide of every main item (on by default).
Section per sub-item	Additionally creates a section before every sub-item divider slide (off by default).

Each section is anchored to the item's divider slide — so divider slides must be generated. If you hide an item ("hide") or deselect its item type, its section is merged back into the previous one on the next Update (the slides are kept).

Foreign sections stay untouched

PPPTools uses the invisible markers to know which sections belong to this agenda. Sections you created by hand, or that belong to other scopes, are never renamed or removed.