(no subject)

[Claire Pateman]

Hi all,

Firstly, thanks to everyone who replied to my question about Tech courses - 
greatly appreciated. Secondly - good luck to England in the World Cup!!! 
Please don't ban me for that Lisa!

Ok - now on to my real question. As a tech writer I find that there are more 
and more software programs that clients/employers require. I am wondering if 
anyone knows of freeware/cheap shareware progs that I can use to familiarise 
up-and-coming tech writers with before they commit to buy the big boys. The 
three areas that I am looking at are: DTP (eg. Quark), Help(eg. Robohelp or 
Flare), Diagrams (eg. Visio). I have found a few on Tucows and Download.com, 
but any that other that fellow tech writers would say were worth a look then 
please let me know. I want my students to be able to evaluate software that 
gives them a good idea of what the more costly programs will involve so that 
they can assess where they want to specialize before forking out lots of 
cash.

Have a great weekend,

Claire