Microsoft Web Publishing Step by Step Learning Kit

Reviewed by: Stuart K. Fairclough, AMIMI (stuart@mpcc.org.uk )

Author: Publisher: ISBN: Our Reference: Our Price:

Catapult Inc. Microsoft 0735606986 376835 £35.99 (inc. VAT)  RRP: £39.99 Discount: 10%

THE MICROSOFT WEB PUBLISHING STEP BY STEP LEARNING KIT provides both multimedia-based and print-based hands-on instruction, so you can choose the teaching method that best meets your needs. That way you' ll learn the information better, use the information more effectively, and have fun doing it. You'll learn how to use the full-featured Web-specific programs in the Microsoft Office 2000 Premium edition: FrontPage 2000 and PhotoDraw 2000. You'll also learn the Web publishing features in other Office 2000 Premium applications.

The interactive CD starts you off with a pre-assessment test to help you determine what you already know about Web publishing, and then it guides you through the content that will help you improve your Web publishing skills. You learn by doing in a realistic software-simulation environment, as well as by using the actual Office 2000 Premium programs and features. When you've finished the training, quizzes test what you've learned.

The book, based on the popular Microsoft Press STEP BY STEP series, presents lessons that work best in print. Each lesson breaks tasks into easily learned steps, using clear, succinct instructions. Copious illustrations show you exactly what to do, and pre-built practice files help you learn by doing.

You get two great learning tools in one convenient kit!

Metcom says.. 
This is the bang up-to-date reference guide from the Bill Gates personal stable and when I say up-to-date, I mean it assumes that you are now using Office 2000 together with Front Page 2000 (included in the Office 2000 Premium Edition). This just one of a whole series of . step by step. reference guides that come from Microsoft. Instead of just a book, you also get an interactive CD Rom which takes you through the intricacies of creating web pages with easy to follow interactive practice lessons. Again, no colour pages but rather, black and white yet clear diagrams and screen grabs. The otherwise drabness of a mono colour is broken up by the inclusion of a sort of pastel blue mixture of pages. Step by Step is a complete interactive training kit, as the title suggests, and really is a complete self contained training course, almost like doing a evening class course but from the comfort of your own home environment.

Step by Step takes the pupil much deeper into the realms of web production and as such this is definitely not a book that you could follow or work through in a weekend! Although there is a section at the back of the book that discusses Windows conventions for the new user, there is an assumption that this package is more aimed at the intermediate user or for someone who wants a little bit more of an in depth tutorial. The book is broken up into 3 main parts and these are in turn broken into individual lessons. Lessons 1-2 of Part-1 start at with the basics of Planning and Creating your web site. By Lesson-3 you should be linking web pages and hyperlinks. Lessons 4-8 give instruction Adding style; Formatting; Adding multimedia to your creation; Creating feedback forms and Using frames. Lessons 9-10 actually advising you on getting your web pages onto the net and managing and enhancing your site.

Part-2, Lessons 11-14 deal with the finer elements of creating pictures using Microsoft. s PhotoDraw; Creating and manipulating photos; working with picture objects and Using templates to create web graphics. \the final part of this book covers all the other bits such as: Using Office 2000 to publish documents on the web; Upgrading from FrontPage 98; Special features that require FrontPage server extensions and in Appendix C that all important new user guide to Windows.

Overall, a very comprehensive in depth study guide on its own sometimes a little bit deep for the average beginner but with the addition of the interactive practice CD, this really is an excellent all round learning experience for anyone who wants to publish web pages on the internet. A polished product that of course you would only expect from Microsoft.