Microsoft Office 2000 Step by Step Learning Kit

This package covers each edition of Office 2000, with elements on Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Outlook, and Publisher. The book contains key information on each Office program, mainly in the form of stepped procedures. It's handy as a basic reference, but other books (Woody Leonhard Teaches Microsoft Office 2000, to cite one example) have superior information and instruction. The CD-ROM is this package's real gold mine for novice Office users.

The CD-ROM excels at identifying the user's weaknesses and making it easy to access the tutorial emphasizing the skills needed. Each section--such as "Applying Basic Formatting to Your Document" and "Modifying an Existing Database"--begins with a pretest. When you finish the pretest, the program points out links to multimedia presentations that cover your weak areas.

The presentations use voice narration and somewhat interactive animation (click here, click there) to convey key concepts and procedures. (There are also text-only versions of the tutorials for workstations without sound hardware.) Users will get a quiz at the end of each section as well. The software keeps track of a user's progress through the lessons, what they've scored on quizzes, and what lessons need completion. --David Wall