captivating or.... what?

Sidebar: This blog has apparently become my personal reminder of how fast life is passing by my own existence on earth. Extremely unsettling. Not. It's simply just another day, but very similar to yesterday and tomorrow. Yet here I am, an annum past, and I haven't achieved the few short personal goals I'd set for myself. Ugh. [Note that professionally, I've excelled; what message does that convey?]

Back to the topic: I've been putting together presentations for several decades and have once again discovered myself craving more flair, pizzazz, oomph... There have been the occasional random experiments with presentation software and various plugins. I've purchased, installed, then uninstalled (and sometimes reinstalled) hundreds of dollars worth of software. Could my money have been better spent? Perhaps, but I look at *most* of my nose-crinkling research as education in its purest form. Take into account that I am considered to be knowledgeable on all subjects "techie," my experimentation into other realms offers additional fodder to pull from when dishing out advice. Best part? I have an excuse to PLAY!! :)

Crystal Graphics. Great stuff, but more eye candy than most business situations can handle. Indezine. Great freebies, and they've offered tutorials that have saved precious moments for me. ("Hey, have you ever looked at Indezine.com?") Someone asked me to take a look at DryFork - but upon my first ponderance (of the web site,) I'm leary.... The software to view DryFork presentations is a whopping 177 megs! There's no way I can expect a customer to throw something of that magnitude on their home or office machine, let alone download such a huge file for themselves. Good grief. But, I'm downloading it as I type... just so I can say I really did look at it and give the software serious consideration. And I get paid for this. Cool.

I'm straying from my original intent. I do training on a fairly regular basis, but use personal interaction to drive home points and make my training sessions casual and fun. I can challenge those who learn quickly and reinforce the basics for those who stagger. BUT. Now I'm pushed to develop an interactive ON LINE (intranet and/or internet) class so travel expenses can be curtailed. I like the idea of it, particularly because I've grown to enjoy coffee on the patio....

So what's best? Several years ago, I tried Macromedia Authorware. At the time, it was detailed but hard to nagivate. Has it improved? Is it worth the investment for an upgrade? Is there enough difference between versions to spend the money on the upgrade? What about Adobe Breeze? Or Adobe Captivate? I own and have used several Adobe products, but have no experience with their training line. Good? Bad? Indifferent?

Well, that's just bizarre. I forgot that Adobe and Macromedia have joined hands. I went to investigate the version changes on Authorware and discovered the information now resides on Adobe's web site. So I can effectively revise my earlier comment. "I have had experience with Adobe training products." Ha. So the query becomes more complex. Why does Adobe sell so many different types of training software? Which is best for my application/audience? Where is my magic eight ball for the quick and accurate answer? '-)

Have fun. It's show time.