Letters - News Briefs

Home Office Computing, April, 2001

COBRA Uncoiled

As director of a small not-for-profit organization for the past nine years, and currently completing a book on managing not-for-profits and small businesses, I would like to point out some incomplete information in your January 2001 article, "How to Tame a COBRA" (page 94). I thought the article was excellent; however, the author failed to mention that employers with 15 or fewer employees are not required to offer COBRA benefits to employees who leave the company. Most states have their own laws for small-business employers regarding continued medical insurance coverage for former employees. Employers not required to comply with COBRA are required to comply with their state's insurance laws. Most states require that employers offer medical insurance coverage at the ex-employee's expense during a shorter period of time than the eighteen months required under COBRA regulations.

Vernon Carre Via the Internet

Funny Posture?

While I loved the concept and the humor of your January cover I couldn't help but think, poor guy. The man is a major candidate for back problems, neck and shoulder problems, eye strain, repetitive stress injuries, and on and on.

Hilma Volk Via the Internet

No Respect for Corel Ventura

No doubt about it--Corel Ventura Publisher 8 has become the Rodney Dangerfield of desktop publishing programs, judging by the three applications HOC honored in this category in its December HOC 100.

Ask any professional who has used Corel Ventura 8 and any of the three desktop publishing programs to which HOC gave awards, and you'll find that they almost unanimously would have named Corel Ventura 8 top banana.

If you publish books, ads, and catalogs like I do, you quickly discover that none of the other desktop publishing programs offer the array of tools Ventura offers. In fact, it's been estimated that you would have to buy thousands of dollars in add-ons to bring Silver Award Winner AdobePageMaker 6.5 up to the Ventura feature set. And there aren't enough add-ons available for the Gold Winner, Microsoft Publisher 2000 Deluxe, or the Bronze ducat, Adobe InDesign 1.5, to match Ventura's features. Beyond features, Ventura is a much more productive application to use thanks to its ease-of-use command set and, particularly, its built-in database publisher.

It's a shame that Corel barely markets or advertises this gem. And it's a bigger shame that HOC failed to recognize Ventura's feature and ease-of-use leadership and placed it at the top of the category. It just doesn't get any respect!

Daniel Lauber River Forest, IL

Associate Editor Eileen Bien Calabro responds: We, too, think Corel Ventura Publisher 8 is a fine desktop publishing package, and said as much when we reviewed it for our September 2000 issue. This gem is full of value, power, and simplicity. However, we couldn't get past the program's PostScript output, which worked fine for us, but has the potential to lock up commercial image setters and force home users into a workaround. We also know that many users don't want or need all of the extras found inside Ventura's $695 box of goodies. These issues didn't stop us from recommending it (we gave it an 8 out of 10), but did put it in fourth place among the DTP programs we saw last year. Ventura ran exceptionally well, but didn't medal in this event.

More #*%! for the Editor

The article in the December issue ("Business Card Chaos," page 124) blamed the printer for what is actually the "hip-and-happening" graphic designer's responsibility--providing the commercial printer with properly prepared files. When colors touch each other in a design, a trap needs to be applied for the colors to print properly in case the printing press gets off register. A trap is an overlapping area of color that abuts the area of color intersection. If the press is out of register, the trap will compensate and the white areas of the paper will not show between the colors.

The graphic designer most likely used the wrong type of fonts for commercial printing. The article was a disservice to commercial printers who are unfairly targeted. Do-it-yourselfers should let professionals handle commercial print jobs to avoid wasting time, money, and a lot of frustration. Anyone with a computer can design a business card, but that does not mean the design will be printable on a commercial printing press.

Sue Reichmann Via the Internet

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