237 lines
13 KiB
Markdown
237 lines
13 KiB
Markdown
# Preset: slides
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**Last updated:** 2026-05-17 | **Verified:** research/03-prompt-patterns-intent-presets.md
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**Evidence grade:** Anthropic-documented + community-validated
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**Captured-on date:** 2026-05-16
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The `slides` intent preset generates presentation decks — internal stakeholder updates, executive roadmaps, customer briefings, partner proposals, all-hands meetings. Output is HTML deck with per-slide layouts, optionally exportable to PPTX (with caveats — see Section e).
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---
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## (a) What this preset is
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Anthropic launch post (`https://anthropic.com/news/claude-design-anthropic-labs`) names `slides` as a destination-shaped preset: the artifact assumes the slide-deck format, not the dashboard / one-pager / prototype format. Output renders in the Claude Design canvas as a slide-by-slide thumbnail strip plus the active slide in full view.
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Two Anthropic primary sources ground this preset:
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- The dedicated tutorial `https://claude.com/resources/tutorials/using-claude-design-for-presentations-and-slide-decks` publishes five verbatim canonical prompts (Section c) and the slide-deck composition framework.
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- The PowerPoint-mode article `https://support.claude.com/en/articles/13521390-use-claude-for-powerpoint` publishes the PPTX export conventions and the template-respecting guidance: Claude reads the slide master, layouts, fonts, and color scheme of an uploaded PPTX template and produces output that respects them.
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The two sources compose: the tutorial covers the prompt patterns, the PowerPoint-mode article covers the export discipline.
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---
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## (b) When to use it
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Pick `slides` when the destination is a presentation surface. The decision matrix:
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| Operator goal | Preset |
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|---------------|--------|
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| Internal team update / project review | **slides** |
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| Customer-prep briefing for a sales call | **slides** |
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| Executive roadmap or quarterly business review (Q1/Q2/Q3/Q4 results) | **slides** |
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| Partner proposal / co-development pitch | **slides** |
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| All-hands or company-wide announcement | **slides** |
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| External investor pitch deck | **pitch-decks** (separate preset — see preset file for the PPTX trap) |
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| Single-page memo / one-pager | one-pagers |
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The distinguishing question vs `pitch-decks`: **is the audience internal or external?** Internal → `slides`. External investor → `pitch-decks` (with explicit caveat about PPTX export, see `pitch-decks.md`).
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---
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## (c) Anthropic-published prompt patterns
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The Anthropic tutorial `https://claude.com/resources/tutorials/using-claude-design-for-presentations-and-slide-decks` publishes five verbatim canonical prompts:
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### Pattern 1 — Q1 results deck
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For quarterly business review decks (Q1 / Q2 / Q3 / Q4 results). Pattern names the metrics in priority order, the audience seniority level, the narrative arc (where we started, what changed, where we are, what's next), and the supporting visualisations (charts, tables, callout numbers).
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### Pattern 2 — Executive roadmap
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For multi-quarter roadmap decks. Pattern names the roadmap horizon (quarters or half-years), the workstreams (3-7 named tracks), the major milestones per workstream, the dependencies between workstreams, and the assumptions / risks per quarter.
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### Pattern 3 — Customer-prep briefing
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For sales-call preparation decks. Pattern names the customer (company + named contacts), the meeting goal, the customer's known priorities, the value-prop alignment, the proof points (case studies, metrics), and the asks / next steps.
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### Pattern 4 — Partner proposal
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For co-development or partnership proposals. Pattern names the proposed scope, the resourcing model, the timeline, the success metrics, the IP / licensing model, and the open questions.
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### Pattern 5 — All-hands announcement
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For company-wide updates. Pattern names the announcement (one sentence), the why-now context, the impact on employees, the timeline, and the resources / Q&A links.
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Refer to the tutorial URL for the verbatim prompt text. This plugin cites by URL rather than reproducing Anthropic's exact wording (per the brief's source-quality rule and the Apache-2.0/MIT compatibility note in `../04-handoff-and-scope.md`).
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### Template-respecting guidance (verbatim from PowerPoint-mode article)
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`https://support.claude.com/en/articles/13521390-use-claude-for-powerpoint` publishes the verbatim guidance about uploading an existing PPTX template:
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> Claude reads the slide master, layouts, fonts, and color scheme of an uploaded PowerPoint template and produces output that respects them.
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Practical implication: if the operator has an existing brand-compliant PPTX template, upload it as a Claude Design project asset before prompting. The generated deck will respect the template's typography, color palette, and layout conventions. Without an uploaded template, the model defaults to its convergent middle-ground deck aesthetic.
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---
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## (d) Community uplift
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Three community-converged patterns extend Anthropic's material for `slides`.
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### Outline-first narrative scaffolding
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Community pattern (`research/03`): brief the deck as an outline first (turn 1: produce the slide-by-slide outline as a markdown bullet list), then expand to full slides (turn 2: generate the deck from the approved outline). This forks the conversation but produces tighter narrative arcs than briefing the full deck in one turn.
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The outline-first pattern composes with Anthropic's GLCA framework (`../01-prompt-fundamentals.md` Layer 1) — Goal becomes the deck's takeaway, Layout becomes the outline, Content becomes the per-slide bullets, Audience becomes the seniority + context match.
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### Single-job-per-slide constraint
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Community pattern (research/03): each slide should communicate exactly one idea. Slides with two or more ideas leak comprehension. Brief the constraint explicitly:
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```
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Each slide does one job. If a slide is trying to communicate two ideas,
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split it into two slides. The takeaway from each slide should be
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nameable in one sentence.
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```
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### Audience translation matrix
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Community pattern (research/03): brief the audience translation explicitly when the deck spans seniority levels. For example, a roadmap deck shared with both engineering leads and executive sponsors needs to translate technical decisions into business outcomes for the exec audience without losing fidelity for the engineering audience. The pattern:
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```
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For each slide, write two versions of the takeaway:
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- The technical-detail version (for the engineering audience)
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- The business-outcome version (for the executive audience)
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Use the business-outcome version on the slide and the technical-detail
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version in the speaker notes.
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```
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---
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## (e) Critical caveats
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Three caveats specific to `slides`.
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### HTML → PPTX export is lossy for richly-styled text
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Community-documented at `https://moda.app/blog/claude-design-for-pitch-decks` (cited in research/03) and `https://claudedesign.substack.com`: when the operator exports an HTML-rendered slide deck to PPTX, richly-styled text (custom typography, mixed weights, inline color variations) can flatten to images. PowerPoint loses the editability — the text becomes a rasterised picture.
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The mitigation:
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- If the destination is final PPTX delivery, validate the rendered PPTX text-as-text count before assuming editability survived
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- If text-as-text is critical (legal review, copy-edit-after-the-fact), keep the typographic styling simple in the brief — single typeface, two weights, no inline color variation, no inline highlighting
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- For the `pitch-decks` preset specifically, this caveat is severe enough that the recommendation is "do not use Claude Design for external pitch decks where PPTX is required" — see `pitch-decks.md`
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### Don't trust the canvas as ground truth if destination is PPTX
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The Claude Design canvas renders the deck in HTML. The PPTX export converts to PowerPoint format. Some aesthetic decisions that look correct in the canvas do not survive the export:
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- Custom backgrounds with gradients can rasterize
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- Inline icons positioned via CSS can shift
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- Multi-column slide layouts can collapse
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- Speaker-notes-equivalent annotations may not round-trip
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Validate by opening the exported PPTX in PowerPoint before stakeholder delivery, especially for high-stakes decks.
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### Quota burn on long decks
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Multi-slide decks (10+ slides) compound context faster than single-page artifacts. The 4-screen inflection in `../03-iteration-and-session.md` applies — long decks reach the inflection within 2-3 chat turns. Plan to break the deck into outline → first 5 slides → next 5 slides if the deck is large, using the context-reset prompt between sessions.
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---
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## (f) One end-to-end worked prompt — layers 1 + 2a + 3 composed
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Goal: a 12-slide internal-team Q1 results deck, audience is engineering leadership + cross-functional partners.
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```
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Goal: A 12-slide Q1 2026 results deck covering platform-team delivery,
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reliability metrics, headcount and hiring, top 3 themes for Q2,
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and one slide on a major incident retrospective
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Layout (outline):
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1. Title — "Platform team Q1 2026 results"
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2. TL;DR — three bullet takeaways
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3. Delivery — features shipped, % of roadmap completed
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4. Reliability — uptime, MTTR, incident count
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5. Latency — p95/p99 trend
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6. Hiring — headcount delta, key hires, open roles
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7. Top theme 1 for Q2 — name + one-sentence framing
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8. Top theme 2 for Q2 — name + one-sentence framing
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9. Top theme 3 for Q2 — name + one-sentence framing
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10. Incident retrospective — what happened, what we learned
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11. Asks — explicit asks of leadership and partners
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12. Q&A / Discussion prompt
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Content: Real numbers throughout — actual % completion, real MTTR
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minutes, real headcount, real names for hires (or named
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placeholders); each slide's takeaway nameable in one sentence
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Audience: VP of Engineering, peer Eng-leadership, partner-team PMs,
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partner-team Eng-leads — mixed seniority, mixed technical
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depth, ages 30-55
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Aesthetic family: editorial-confident — like The New York Times opinion
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section meets Linear's design language. Clean,
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authoritative, no flourish. Each slide reads like a
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well-edited paragraph.
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Color palette (CSS hex):
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--color-bg: #FAFAF8
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--color-surface: #FFFFFF
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--color-muted: #6B6B6B
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--color-fg: #2A2A2A
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--color-ink: #0A0A0A
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--color-accent: #3D5C8A
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--color-success: #2D6356
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--color-warning: #C89B3F
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--color-error: #B23A48
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Typography: Söhne or Inter Variable; modular scale 1.333 (perfect
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fourth — slides scale up); weight palette 400 body / 600
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emphasized / 700 slide titles
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Corner radius: 4px on any card-like containers; slides themselves
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have no corner radius (full-bleed)
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Motion: none on static slides; ease-out 240ms on slide transitions
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Density: comfortable — generous spacing, one job per slide
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Surface: flat — full-bleed slides, no shadows, single subtle accent
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line under slide title
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Slide composition rules:
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- Each slide does one job
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- Slide titles are claims, not topics ("We shipped 87% of roadmap"
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not "Roadmap delivery")
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- Body text is 2-3 lines max per slide
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- One number, chart, or visual element per slide max
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- Speaker notes carry the depth; slides carry the takeaway
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Negative constraints — do not produce any of:
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- Inter, Roboto, Arial, Space Grotesk as primary typeface
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- Purple gradients on white backgrounds
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- Three-bullet-and-image generic slide template
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- Pulse animations or fly-in transitions
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- Generic "corporate deck" template defaults (centered title-and-
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subtitle on every slide)
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- Multi-column slides with more than two ideas per slide
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If the destination is PPTX, ensure text-heavy slides keep text as text
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(not rasterized). Keep typography simple to maximise text-as-text
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survival in export.
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```
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Expected follow-up turns:
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1. Turn 2: outline-first review — confirm the 12-slide structure, adjust ordering, swap titles if needed
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2. Turn 3: add audience translation per slide (speaker notes vs slide takeaway)
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3. Turn 4: render full deck against the approved outline
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4. Turn 5+: Tweak panel for typography scale and spacing; comments for slide-by-slide refinements
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5. Export validation: open PPTX in PowerPoint and audit text-as-text vs rasterized
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---
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## Sources
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- `https://anthropic.com/news/claude-design-anthropic-labs` — preset enumeration
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- `https://claude.com/resources/tutorials/using-claude-design-for-presentations-and-slide-decks` — verbatim canonical prompts (5 patterns), slide-deck composition framework
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- `https://support.claude.com/en/articles/13521390-use-claude-for-powerpoint` — PowerPoint-mode conventions, template-respecting guidance
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- `https://support.claude.com/en/articles/14604416-get-started-with-claude-design` — GLCA framework
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- `https://moda.app/blog/claude-design-for-pitch-decks` — community-documented PPTX export caveat (cited)
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- `https://anthropic.com/engineering/harness-design-long-running-apps` — design grading criteria
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Re-research trigger: Anthropic updating the slides tutorial; new canonical pattern added; PowerPoint-mode conventions revised; PPTX export behaviour changing materially.
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