Looking for Word & DTP help/survey

[Floramaria Deter <fmc -at- NETCOM -dot- COM>]

Hello!

I have a difficult situation that I'm hoping to receive guidance on.  I am
a student technical writer for a government agency in California.  I have
been working there for about a year.  During this time I have been using MS
Word 95 on Windows 95 to write documents ranging from 10 page checksheets
and lesson plans to 25 page lessons to 150+ page user guides (w/ screen
shots).  In a nutshell, MS Word is driving me insane.  It isn't designed to
handle the kinds of documentation I am doing.  I have tried the master
document/sub-document solution, but that tends to corrupt my files.  I have
finally gotten my supervisor's attention for the need to improve our
software, particularly after my last project.  I wrote a trainer's guide
that was about 180 pages long and contained .bmp screen shots.  The master
document was 800K and the subdocuments were 12 to 23 megs each.  At one
point, the master document became so corrupted that it grew to 75 megs (and
yes, fast save was off).  It was a mess that took me hours to rebuild.

I have taken it upon myself to research the various DTP applications.  What
I'm looking for is the an application that handles large documents smoothly
and is relatively easy to learn to use.  There are three technical writers
(including myself) and all of us are students.  Due to funding, it is next
to impossible for students to receive formal training so we need an
application that we can pick up and teach ourselves.  I have the most
computer knowledge of the three because I have learned much from my husband
who is a software engineer, but all of us are students in the English
department (two of us are graduate students).  I have heard that FrameMaker
is the probably the best DTP tool available (I searched through the
archives and read the survey taken last December on STP).  I have a copy of
FrameMaker, but I have found it very difficult to use.  I doubt that my
co-workers will find it easier to learn.

I would like the input of the members of this list.  Please take the time
to fill out the survey below and send it to me at fmc -at- netcom -dot- com -dot-   DO NOT
POST YOUR SURVEY ON THIS LIST.  I don't want to be the cause of an
excessive amount of traffic due to my survey.  I will post the results to
the group at a later date.

Thanks!

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DTP SURVEY


1.  What desktop publishing software do you use at work?  List all the DTP
applications you use and the percentage of the time you use them.  The
total should add to 100%.






2.  What are the reasons your company chose the DTP that you use?






3.  What are the benefits of the software you use?  The drawbacks?







4.  Do you like the DTP your company uses?  (I'm not a rep from any DTP
company so feel free to answer this question honestly!)






5.  What DTP doe you use on your own time?  List all the DTP applications
you use and the percentage of the time you use them.  The total should add
to 100%.





6.  Is it different than the software you use at work and if so, why?






7.  From the following applications, which one is your favorite to use when
writing long documents?  Select only one and please indicate which version
you use.


        a. Microsoft Word
        b. Microsoft Publisher
        c. WordPerfect
        d. Ventura
        e. FrameMaker
        f. PageMaker
        g. QuarkXpress
        h. Interleaf
        i. Other:________________________


8.  Other Comments:












Thanks!

Flora Deter










----------------------------------------------------------
  Floramaria Deter   Email address: fmc -at- netcom -dot- com
  VISIT FLORA'S HIDEOUT ----  http://www.deter.com/flora

  An artist does not fake reality -- he stylizes it.

        - From Ayn Rand's "The Romantic Manifesto"
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