I got the following question several times after my presentation at the St. Louis Heroes Happen Here launch event yesterday:

"What utility were you using to zoom in on your code? That was freakin' cool!"

That utility is ZoomIt, and it is a free tool available on Microsoft's TechNet site. You can download it here.

To install ZoomIt, open the Zip file you downloaded and simply extract the file content to a directory somewhere on your computer. You can then add a shortcut for the executable file in your Startup folder so it fires up every time you start Windows, or, if you're like me and trying to limit how much background processes are running on your machine, just add the shortcut to your Quick Launch bar. That way, you can start it up any 'ol time you need it.

ZoomIt has a couple of other features as well, including the ability to draw and type text directly on your screen while zoomed. When you fire up the application for the first time, you'll be presented with a dialog box where you can set the keystroke preferences for activating these ZoomIt features and, of course, to turn ZoomIt off. Full directions for setting-up ZoomIt are on its main product page.

I discovered this tool for the first time at the launch event in Minneapolis back on April 1st. I delivered the "next web" demo during the keynote and ZoomIt really helped me show some of the code and especially the toolbar details in a hall that sat 3,000 people.

If you do a lot of presenting, you should definitely go grab ZoomIt and use it in your presentations. It really works and the price is right!