presenter-mode / demo

How to give a
scripted tech talk

Press S for presenter view · T to switch theme · ← → to turn pages

@lewissharing talk · 30 min

Hi everyone, and welcome to today's tech talk. I'm Lewis, and today I want to talk about a topic many people overlook but which has a huge effect on how a talk lands: how to make a tech talk both deep and smooth, with no getting stuck.

Before we start, a quick word about this deck itself: it's an HTML slide template with presenter mode built in. What you're seeing is the audience view, but my own screen shows something completely different: the current slide, the next slide, the full script and a timer, all on one screen.

Why build this? Because the biggest pain point in my own tech talks was never slides that weren't pretty enough. It was reaching a slide and suddenly not knowing what to say, or forgetting how to make the transition. Today's talk is both the content and a demo: I'll keep presenter mode on the whole time, so you can see how smoothly it goes.

The talk runs about 30 minutes in 5 parts. Feel free to interrupt with questions anytime.Let's go.

agenda

5 things we'll cover today

01Why great slides alone are not enough~5min

02What presenter mode should show~6min

03Writing a script that doesn't sound read out~8min

04Live demo · html-ppt skill how to use it~8min

05Takeaways + Q&A~3min

Let's run through today's agenda.

In part one I want to convince you that "a beautiful deck does not mean a good talk". I've seen so many polished decks where the speaker steps up and starts with "um... so... yeah...".

Part two is about the presenter view. Products differ quite a bit here: Keynote, PowerPoint and reveal.js all have their own approach, but I'll give you my answer on what makes the design actually useful.

Part three is the core of today: the script. Many people think a script means writing out every word you'll say. Wrong. The point of a script is to let you "glance and pick up straight away". It's written in a completely different way.

Part four is a live demo of the html-ppt skill I use myself, showing how to produce a deck with a script in 30 minutes.

Finally, wrap-up and Q&A.

OK, on to part one.

// part 01 · problem

Making slides and giving a talk
are two different things.

✅ Great slides

Consistent theme, clean layout, clear charts, restrained motion. That's the quality of a "static work".

❌ Great delivery

Coherent logic, steady pace, no "ums", handles questions, adjusts the rhythm on the spot.

💡 The difference

The first is craft on paper; the second needs you to "glance at a slide and know what to say next".

Let me start with a possibly controversial view: making slides and giving a talk are two completely different things.

Look at the left card. What does "great slides" mean? Consistent theme, clean layout, clear charts, restrained motion. These are all quality standards for a static work, and they can be judged offline.

The middle card is different: "great delivery" means coherent logic, steady pace, no getting stuck, handling questions and adjusting to the room. These are live skills, and have almost nothing to do with how good the slides look.

The key is the right-hand card: a good speaker is, at heart, someone who can "glance at a slide and know what to say next". What does that depend on? Not memorising, and not winging it, but a well-designed teleprompter system.

For the next 25 minutes, everything I say revolves around this one question.

// part 02 · presenter view

Presenter view needs four panels

①

Current slide, large

Over half the view, so one glance tells you what the audience sees.

②

Next slide preview

Lets you prepare the transition and avoid "what was on the next slide?"

③

Script area

Large type, high contrast, scrollable. This is what the speaker really reads.

④

Timer + page count

Know how long you've spoken and how many slides remain. Pacing depends on it.

Presenter mode should give you four panels. I'll rank them by importance.

First, the current slide, large. It must take up over half the view because it's your "sync anchor" with the audience: whatever they see, you need to have in mind too.

Second, the next slide preview. Many people don't see why it's there, so let me explain: the moment a talk stalls isn't during a slide, it's the 2 seconds when you flip to the next one. If you can see the next slide in advance, the transition line comes naturally.

Third, the script area. This is today's focus and I'll cover it in the next part. For now, one hard requirement: large type, high contrast, scrollable. While you speak, you only catch it out of the corner of your eye; small type is impossible to read in time.

Fourth, the timer and page count. Knowing how long you've spoken and how many slides are left drives your sense of pace. Keynote does this best; reveal.js is not clear enough by default.

You need all four. This deck has all of them, so press S and try it.

// part 03 · script

The 3 iron rules of a script

Not a word-for-word speech but "cue signals"

Bold the core points, put transitions in their own paragraph, list data and names clearly. So one glance gets you back on track.

Each slide 150-300 words, no more, no less

Under 150 words is too few cues; over 300 you won't have time to read. Pace it at 2-3 minutes per slide.

Write in spoken language, not formal prose

"therefore" → "so"; "the said solution" → "this solution". Read it aloud as you write; it should sound like speech.

Now the core part: how to write the script. I've boiled it down to 3 iron rules.

Rule one: a script is not a speech. Many people hear "script" and think they must write every sentence word for word. Wrong. If you read from the page, the audience spots it immediately and trust collapses.

The real job of a script is "cue signals". Bold the key points, put transitions in their own paragraph, list data and proper nouns clearly. Then as you speak you can glance and pick up straight away; what comes out is still your own words.

Rule two: keep each slide to 150-300 words. That's a rule of thumb from a dozen or so talks. Under 150 words and the cues run out halfway through; over 300 and you can't scan it all in time. At 2-3 minutes per slide, this count fits.

Rule three: write in spoken language. This one trips up the most people. You write "therefore" but say "so"; you write "the said solution" but say "this solution". Read it aloud as you write; it shouldn't be a mouthful.

Put these three together and you'll find that giving a talk suddenly becomes comfortable.

// part 04-05 · demo + close

Now you can do it too

# Install the html-ppt skill
npx skills add https://github.com/lewislulu/html-ppt-skill

# Copy the presenter mode template
cp -r templates/full-decks/presenter-mode-reveal examples/my-talk
open examples/my-talk/index.html

# Keyboard controls
S  → Open presenter view
T  → Switch theme (5 presets)
← → → Turn pages
R  → Reset timer
    

The key: write a 150-300 word script in each slide's <aside class="notes">.

Last, let me demo how to use this skill, to save you time figuring it out yourselves.

Step one: install the html-ppt skill with a single command. Step two: copy my presenter-mode-reveal template into your own examples directory. Step three: open the HTML and press S.

The keyboard controls are listed here. S opens presenter view, T switches theme, left/right arrows turn pages, R resets the timer. Five themes come built in (tokyo-night, dracula, catppuccin-mocha, nord and corporate-clean), which covers the two common cases: dark tech talks and light business reports.

The most important step: at the bottom of every slide, in the <aside class="notes">, honestly write a 150-300 word script. That's the deliverable of the whole method. AI can help with a first draft, but you must go through it yourself and read it aloud to check it's something you'd actually say.

OK, that's it from me today. If you remember this "presenter view + script" combination at your next talk and find it goes more smoothly than before, that's my biggest win. Thank you all, and questions are open now.

How to give ascripted tech talk