About the Authors

Laura Acklen first encountered WordPerfect 4.2 in early 1988 when she developed custom courseware and trained law offices that were converting from Wang systems to Novell LANs. In 1990, she began teaching classes for the international training company, Productivity Point International (PPI), and progressed into courseware development for its corporate headquarters. Her student and instructor manuals were distributed internationally and used in all PPI training centers.

In 1993, Laura wrote her first book for Que, called Oops! What to Do When Things Go Wrong with WordPerfect. Since that time, she has authored or co-authored thirteen other books for Que, including six editions of the Special Edition Using WordPerfect books (for versions 6, 6.1, 7, 9, 10, and 12) and four editions of the Absolute Beginner’s Guide to WordPerfect (for versions 10, 11, 12, and X3).

Laura was a contributing editor for the WordPerfect for Windows Magazine for four years. She wrote the monthly “Basics” column for the first year before switching over to the “Troubleshooting” column, which also appeared in every issue. Laura is currently writing articles and tutorials for Corel’s monthly e-newsletter, “The WordPerfect Expert.”

Laura enjoys cooking, swimming, biking, and scuba diving. She lives in Austin, Texas with her husband Jeff and their three children. The WPWriter.com Web site was created after the release of Special Edition Using WordPerfect 9 and now boasts the largest collection of WordPerfect tips on the Web. There are also articles, links to other WP resources, and a page with links to updates and patches.

Read Gilgen completed his B.A. at Brigham Young University and his M.A. and Ph.D. in Latin American literature and linguistics at the University of California, Irvine. He taught Spanish at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill and at the University of Wisconsin before becoming director of UW’s L&S Learning Support Services (the language labs) in 1981.

His professional interests include instructional technology in higher education, especially in foreign language education. He is a past president of the International Association for Language Learning Technology.

He has taught and written extensively on DOS, Windows, and WordPerfect since the early 1980s, having first used version 2.3 of WordPerfect. He is author of Que’s WordPerfect for Windows Hot Tips, contributing author to several Que books including the Special Editions of Using WordPerfect (both DOS and Windows since version 5.1), co-author of Using Corel WordPerfect Suite 8, and co-author of Special Edition Using WordPerfect (versions 9–12). He also wrote Absolute Beginner’s Guide to Microsoft PowerPoint 2003 for Que.

Most of his spare time is spent with his best friend and wife, Sue. Together they are also heavily involved in church leadership. When he can find the time, he also enjoys singing and acting.