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Cheryl Lockett Zubak Honored with Two Help Author's Choice Awards

PHILADELPHIA, PA, February 23, 1999 - Cheryl Lockett Zubak, president of Work Write, Inc., has been awarded two Help Author's Choice Awards: "Best Speaker or Instructor" and "All Time, All Around Help Guru." Cheryl received her awards at a special dinner, sponsored by Microsoft, during the 1999 WinWriters Online Help Conference in Seattle, Washington.

Nominations for the awards were placed by secret ballot from more than 60 experts in the international online help industry. Help authors and developers from around the world then voted for the most influential tools, books, and experts in the online help industry through an online form posted at the WinWriters website. Voting took place between September 1998 and January 1999.

"I remember when I first started developing help systems in the early 1980s," says Cheryl. "There was no help community - at least not one that you could easily find. Finding another help author was like walking down a dark alley and finding a wonderful mansion at the other end. That's why I believe that giving back to the help authoring community is so important. I'm honored that my peers have recognized and appreciated my commitment to this profession and my expertise in developing and teaching about user assistance."

Cheryl has been developing online help systems since 1983, and Windows help since 1988 (beginning with Windows 2.0). She is coauthor of Designing Windows 95 Help: A Guide to Creating Online Documents, considered a "bible" of help design, and is currently working on a book on HTML-based help design.

As one of the mostly highly rated speakers at the WinWriters and Society for Technical Communication conferences, Cheryl speaks internationally at conferences and corporations on the design and development of online help. She is one of the industry's most popular instructors, and frequently teaches onsite courses on RoboHelp, RoboHelp HTML, ForeHelp, HTML Help, Homesite, online help design, embedded help design, and performance support strategy.

Cheryl has been frequently credited with raising the visibility of "help as software" to the mainstream help authoring community. Particularly for the last several years, Cheryl has evangelized the development of embedded help systems at conferences in the United States and abroad. With her partner, Ralph Walden, Cheryl has been working on design strategies and tools that will assist help authors with developing embedded help systems.

Cheryl's commitment to the help authoring community is also marked by her volunteer service on such online forums as the WINHLP -L listserv, the RoboLIST listserv, countless private emails, and her free webzine, Help Matters, located at http://www.helpmatters.com/hm/index.htm. Because of her volunteer efforts and her expertise in HTML-based help design and development, Microsoft named Cheryl one of the four charter members of the HTML Help MVP (Most Valuable Professional) program. Cheryl was again renominated as an HTML Help MVP this year. HTML Help is the new Microsoft development environment for online help systems and intranet-based online documentation.

The Help Author's Choice Awards, sponsored by Microsoft Corporation and WinWriters, were held in honor of Ralph Walden, the visionary behind the Microsoft development of WinHelp and HTML Help. In honor of Ralph, the Help Author's Choice Awards have been dubbed the "Walden" awards. Ralph is now the business partner of Cheryl Lockett Zubak.

Winners of the awards were honored at a "black tie" event (sponsored by Microsoft Corporation) at the 1999 WinWriters's Help Conference in Seattle, Washington in February 1999. At the event, Ralph spoke on the evolution and future of online help.

For further details, contact Cheryl at Work Write, Inc., 128 South Eastview Avenue, Feasterville, PA 19053. Phone: +1 215.357.3453 Fax: +1 215.357.0695 Email: cheri@workwrite.com Website: http://www.workwrite.com

Last updated, September 2002

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