Authorware was originally developed in the Twin Cities, but was bought by Macromedia in the early nineties. As a result, there are many experts in town, which may influence your choice of authoring tool.

Authorware offers an object-oriented environment and a powerful set of functions for developing high-level interactive programs. While diverse enough for any multimedia application, Authorware combines strong features for tracking students' progress with superb support for student testing, making it the most natural and complete product for training.

Authorware uses a flowchart structure, and you build your application by choosing from eleven icons. Each icon is used to manipulate data or to deal with your application's functionality. Several icons control such functions as importing text, video or sound. Others, like the interaction and decision icon, allow authors to create complex branching structures and quizzes. You can select a group of icons and export them as a model for future use, which is a great labor-saving device. There is also a library function for re-using elements such as graphics - this ensures consistency in the design, and also saves space since these elements are stored only once and used many times.

Authorware does a fine job of providing most functionality through icons and dialog boxes, and of allowing authors to build applications without resorting to the scripting language. This is a great advantage for those of us who are non-programmers.

One of the more powerful features of Authorware is that you can jump to other applications, perform functions there, then return to Authorware, for example to print a document or access a database.

Another great selling point is that Authorware is cross-platform. Once you develop an application, it takes little effort to develop a version for either Windows or Mac users. Recently, Macromedia added Shockwave functionality, which enables authors to prepare small Authorware files for use on the Internet. For more information and current pricing, visit the Authorware Web site.