Wednesday, September 16, 2015

University students, faculty and staff now have access to a new online presentation tool through their UGAMail accounts, which is powered by Microsoft’s Office 365.

Sway, a free web-based presentation tool from Microsoft, offers users another way to create online-only presentations, newsletters, tutorials, lessons and digital stories.

In Sway, users can pull content from web sources, such as Twitter, YouTube, Flickr and OneDrive, as well as upload their own files to create interactive presentations and reports, called “Sways.”

You can also collaborate with other users on Sways in real time. All of your Sways are auto-saved as you create them and are stored in the Sway cloud.

Once created, a Sway can be shared through email and social media, and viewed in any web browser. Sways automatically adjust to different screen sizes and can also be viewed easily on mobile devices and tablets.

Sway is not a replacement for PowerPoint, but another presentation and communication tool, particularly useful for creating web-based presentations as well as presentations that may be viewed on a mobile device or tablet. You cannot download Sways or access them without an Internet connection.

Sway is free to all UGA students, faculty and staff through the University’s licensing agreement with Microsoft. To access Sway, log in to your web-based UGAMail and click on the Office 365 App Launcher in the upper left-hand corner of the screen. You will see an icon for Sway.

You can also access Sway by logging in with your UGAMail address and password on sway.com, or by downloading the free Sway App available for iPhone, iPad and PCs running Windows 10. You must have an Internet connection for the Sway app to work.

You can find examples of a Sway presentation and a Sway newsletter, as well as basic instructions for how to use Sway, on the EITS Help Desk site.