Themes & masters

This group of instructions controls the overall look of a presentation: the theme colors and fonts, the slide master background, and the slide layouts (their names and the position of their placeholders). It also lets you import a complete theme from another presentation.

Prerequisite: before using any of these instructions, the workflow must already have a PPTX presentation created or opened (with Create presentation), which these instructions will act upon.

These concepts recur across several instructions in this group; they are explained here once.

• Document: indicates which document in the workflow the instruction applies to. If left empty, the current document is used.

• Master and layout numbers start at 1: a presentation can have one or more slide masters, and each master contains several layouts. Both are referred to by position, and the first is 1, the second 2, and so on.

• Out-of-range numbers do nothing: if a master or layout number does not exist, the instruction simply does nothing (no error, no change). This is the same as the Slides instructions, where an invalid slide number also does nothing.

• Colors are hex codes: color fields take a 6-digit hex code such as 4F81BD. A leading # is optional — #4F81BD and 4F81BD both work.

• Measurements are in centimeters.

• Dynamic values (@name): in any text field you can type @ followed by the name of a value saved earlier in the workflow, and it will be replaced by that value. For example, if you saved a font name in titleFont, you can type @titleFont in the Heading font field.

• “From variable” fields: the @name trick only works in text fields. So that a numeric field (like Master number or Left (cm)) can also take its value from a saved value, each one has a companion “from variable” field:

  • If you leave it empty, the value typed in the normal field is used.
  • If you fill it in with the name of a saved value, the engine ignores the normal field and uses that variable’s value.

  This is mainly for chaining instructions. If you only work with fixed values, you can ignore these fields.

• Apply Theme From Presentation .pptx
• Set Layout Placeholder Geometry .pptx
• Set Slide Layout Name .pptx
• Set Slide Master Background .pptx
• Set Theme Color Scheme .pptx
• Set Theme Fonts .pptx

Apply Theme From Presentation .pptx

Imports the complete theme (colors, fonts, master, and layouts) from another presentation file and applies it to the current presentation.

When to use it: to make a presentation match the look of an existing .pptx without recreating its colors, fonts, and layouts by hand.

Parameter	Meaning	Default	Required
Document	Document the theme is applied to	(current document)	No
Source presentation path	Full path to the .pptx to take the theme from. Supports @name	(empty)	Yes

Important behavior: if Source presentation path is empty, nothing happens. The current master and theme are replaced by the ones from the source file, and every slide is re-pointed to the source’s first layout. If the source file has no slide master, nothing happens.

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Set Layout Placeholder Geometry .pptx

Moves and resizes a placeholder (title, body, picture, etc.) within a layout.

When to use it: to adjust where a placeholder sits and how big it is on a layout, so every slide using that layout follows the new arrangement.

Parameter	Meaning	Default	Required
Document	Document the instruction applies to	(current document)	No
Master number	Which slide master the layout belongs to (starts at 1)	1	No
Layout number	Which layout to change (starts at 1)	1	No
Placeholder type	Which placeholder to move/resize, chosen from a list: title, body, picture, date, footer, slide number	title	No
Left (cm)	Distance from the left edge	1	No
Top (cm)	Distance from the top edge	1	No
Width (cm)	Width of the placeholder	20	No
Height (cm)	Height of the placeholder	3	No
Master number (from variable)	Reads the master number from a saved value	(empty)	No
Layout number (from variable)	Reads the layout number from a saved value	(empty)	No
Left (from variable)	Reads the left position from a saved value	(empty)	No
Top (from variable)	Reads the top position from a saved value	(empty)	No
Width (from variable)	Reads the width from a saved value	(empty)	No
Height (from variable)	Reads the height from a saved value	(empty)	No

Important behavior: if the master or layout number is out of range, or the layout has no placeholder of the chosen type, nothing happens. Placeholder type is picked from a fixed list (so it does not accept @name); a presentation saved with an older, unlisted value still opens and is treated as the title placeholder.

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Set Slide Layout Name .pptx

Renames a layout inside a slide master — or, if the layout number is beyond the existing layouts, creates a new blank layout with that name.

When to use it: to give a layout a meaningful name (so other instructions can find it by name), or to add a new named blank layout.

Parameter	Meaning	Default	Required
Document	Document the instruction applies to	(current document)	No
Master number	Which slide master the layout belongs to (starts at 1)	1	No
Layout number	Which layout to rename (starts at 1); a number beyond the last layout creates a new one	1	No
Layout name	The name to give the layout. Supports @name	Custom Layout	No
Master number (from variable)	Reads the master number from a saved value	(empty)	No
Layout number (from variable)	Reads the layout number from a saved value	(empty)	No

Important behavior: if the master number is out of range, or the layout number is negative, nothing happens. If the layout number matches an existing layout, it is renamed; if it is beyond the last layout, a new blank layout with that name is added to the master.

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Set Slide Master Background .pptx

Sets a solid background color on a slide master, which every slide based on that master inherits.

When to use it: to give all slides the same background color by changing it once on the master, instead of per slide.

Parameter	Meaning	Default	Required
Document	Document the instruction applies to	(current document)	No
Master number	Which slide master to change (starts at 1)	1	No
Background color	Background color as a hex code. Supports @name	FFFFFF (white)	No
Master number (from variable)	Reads the master number from a saved value	(empty)	No

Important behavior: if the master number is out of range, nothing happens. Any existing background on that master is replaced.

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Set Theme Color Scheme .pptx

Changes the presentation’s color scheme — the set of theme colors (dark, light, six accents, and the two hyperlink colors) that slides draw from.

When to use it: to recolor the whole presentation at once by defining a new palette, instead of coloring each element individually. You can also change a single theme color: clear every other color field and only the ones you fill in are written.

Parameter	Meaning	Default	Required
Document	Document the instruction applies to	(current document)	No
Scheme name	A name for the color scheme. Supports @name	Custom	No
Dark 1	Main dark color (usually text). Supports @name	000000	No
Light 1	Main light color (usually background). Supports @name	FFFFFF	No
Dark 2	Secondary dark color. Supports @name	1F497D	No
Light 2	Secondary light color. Supports @name	EEECE1	No
Accent 1	First accent color. Supports @name	4F81BD	No
Accent 2	Second accent color. Supports @name	C0504D	No
Accent 3	Third accent color. Supports @name	9BBB59	No
Accent 4	Fourth accent color. Supports @name	8064A2	No
Accent 5	Fifth accent color. Supports @name	4BACC6	No
Accent 6	Sixth accent color. Supports @name	F79646	No
Hyperlink	Color of hyperlinks. Supports @name	0000FF	No
Followed hyperlink	Color of visited hyperlinks. Supports @name	800080	No

Important behavior: if the presentation has no theme, nothing happens. An empty color field means “leave that theme color as it is”, so the instruction only touches the colors you actually fill in — the rest of the palette survives. The same goes for the scheme name: empty keeps the current name. Every field comes prefilled with the standard Office value shown above, so if you don’t clear them the whole palette is rewritten.

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Set Theme Fonts .pptx

Sets the presentation’s heading font and body font at the theme level.

When to use it: to change the typography of the whole presentation in one step, rather than restyling each text box.

Parameter	Meaning	Default	Required
Document	Document the instruction applies to	(current document)	No
Heading font	Font used for titles and headings. Supports @name	Calibri Light	No
Body font	Font used for body text. Supports @name	Calibri	No

Important behavior: if the presentation has no theme, nothing happens. An empty font field means “leave that font as it is”, so you can change only the heading font or only the body font; if both are empty the instruction does nothing.

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