Software
Review of: |
 There
is a theory of left brain/right brain personality wherein if you are left
brain oriented, you are very logical in your approach to things. If you
are right brained, you are creative and visually oriented. I must be right
brained as I learn things much more easily when shown visually how to do
something as opposed to plodding through an instruction book.
LearnKey sent me its Adobe PageMaker 6.5 training CD’s and after a rocky start, I’ve enjoyed using the three CD’s that come with the package: Beginning, Intermediate and Advanced PageMaker 6.5. The rocky start was when I first installed the CD’s (you install each training CD as you would a new software program, complete with password). After viewing each CD, I set the program aside for a month or so before coming back to it to begin writing the review. I discovered I couldn’t remember the password! I tried 4-5 passwords that I’ve used at various times, combinations of them, case sensitive versions — and nothing worked. Finally I uninstalled each CD and then reinstalled each program, entered a new password when requested and now I’m back in business with LearnKey’s Adobe PageMaker 6.5. I bought LearnKey video training tapes (3 tapes) for WordPerfect 6.1 about four years ago. I have two problems with video training tapes. My VCR player is located in my den, not near my PC. Secondly, I would find myself getting very sleepy when watching the WordPerfect training tapes because all you do is sit and try to pay attention — although truthfully, the tapes were well done. Not so with CD training. You can stop the lesson at any point by clicking on a button that looks like the pause button on your VCR, minimize the LearnKey screen, maximize the PageMaker 6.5 screen and practice what you just learned. Then reverse the steps and go on to the next PageMaker procedure on the CD. Steve Broback, who goes way back to PageMaker when it was an Aldus product,
is the instructor on the CD set and he has an easy, friendly method of
presenting PageMaker user techniques. In fact, he frequently says, "Lets
walk through this again" and repeats demonstrating a procedure. If there
is something you still don’t understand, simply click on the subject being
covered to repeat it. Broback not only shows you a procedure but explains
why you ought to do it this way. He also shows more than one way to do
several procedures.
Each CD takes about 15 minutes to play if you just sit and watch Broback’s demonstration. But there’s more! Each CD has three buttons marked Directory, Challenge and Search. Clicking on Directory brings up a window showing numerous bulleted terms. Clicking on a term opens yet another window with another Broback dialog explaining what the term means and demonstrates the procedure. In other words, by exploring all the bulleted items, Disk 1 has 100 minutes of instruction, Disk 2 has 60 minutes of instruction and Disk 3 has 80 minutes of instruction. The Challenge button allows you to practice certain procedure. The Search button displays a long bullet list of terms. Clicking on a term opens a window showing an explanation of the term. There are four more buttons on each CD: Interact, Test, Help and Exit and are self-explanatory. PC requirements are very modest: 486 CPU/100 MHZ, double spin CD-ROM, 8MB RAM. 3MB hard disk space, Windows 95 or NT, 100% Sound Blaster compatible sound card. The set of three LearnKey CDS for PageMaker 6.5 is listed in the catalog for $179.95 which translates to about $45/hour for training — not a bad deal since you can repeat any lesson over and over and over until you get it. LearnKey’s catalog lists over 100 training titles on CD ROM and even more titles on Video tape. Many of these CDS can be bundled for a discounted price. A LearnKey catalog has been placed at the Alamo PC Resource Center for use by APCO members..
1845 West Sunset Blvd. St. George, Utah 84770 Orders: /800/865-0165 |