MadCap Software, headquartered in La Jolla, offers MadCap Flare, a help authoring and technical writing tool featuring onboarding and support from MadCap, and a set of modules for designing advanced guides, aids, and web or application help aids.
$167
per month
Microsoft Publisher
Score 7.5 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft Publisher is a desktop publishing application available with an Office 365 subscription, or as a standalone download.
$139
one time purchase
Pricing
MadCap Flare
Microsoft Publisher
Editions & Modules
MadCap Central
$1,500
per year
MadCap Flare
$1,999
per year
MadCap AMS
$2,999
per year
Microsoft Publisher
$139
one time purchase
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
MadCap Flare
Microsoft Publisher
Free Trial
Yes
No
Free/Freemium Version
No
No
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
Yes
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
No setup fee
Additional Details
Includes a 12-month Platinum-level Maintenance Plan.
MadCap Flare has its problems, but it serves our team well as an authoring software. This would not be the case if we needed to regularly collaborate on articles, as Flare is prone to conflict issues when another person dares to breathe near an open topic. When working individually, though, it's fine. I'd love to see improvements to design, performance, and stability, but Flare remains one of the best softwares on the market for our needs as an authoring team. MadCap Central is well-suited to internal reviewing when every member is comfortable with Flare (the errors it tends to introduce set aside). SMEs, though, tend to find it hard to use. It's cluttered, some styles don't render, and it just seems like a failed attempt to reproduce Google Docs. I'd love to see improvements there, to help get our SMEs to want to use Central.
Microsoft Publisher is well suited for almost any situation. It is something that I'm sure has far more advanced tools than I use or am aware of, but it is also very simple for entry-level users to create professional documents quickly. I have used it for very involved brochures in real estate scenarios and I have also used it for very simple "Construction Zone" signs at a job site under construction. There are so many uses for this program!
Formatting in general. It's a pain to refine a layout in Publisher in my opinion.
Microsoft is so invested in their approach to software and making it look and feel like an Office 365 application that they inadvertantly cripple applications like Publisher.
Earlier versions of Publisher gave you a lot more latitude and creative freedom. They were also much easier to work with. Not everything has to look like it's part of Office 365. They did the same ... thing to Access.
MadCap Flare is in desperate need of an overall redesign. It relies heavily on dozens and dozens of tiny buttons that contain dozens of nested features. Clicking the wrong button can cause your software to freeze and crash. Building targets can be an absolute mystery, as far as all the files involved. It also has a tendency to freeze and crash. There's typically a huge learning curve for new hires who've never used it--nothing is intuitive.
I would like to give it for the functionality and working as it can do almost all the jobs, but you is much needed to improve as we have multiple design designing tools available on website with very much modern UI and layout also template and stock images. Library should be updated and it lacks multiple materials to use.
While I have not directly used support for Microsoft Publisher, I have used their help files and found them to be useful. I have also found that most answers that I need can be found through simple web searches and chat platforms. In all though, there are very few times when the preloaded help files have not given me the answers that I need.
MadCap software does offer quite a few more technical features than Google Drive, but the user experience is far inferior. Google Drive is much less buggy to work with, and it's much more accessible. MadCap only being available on Windows operating systems makes it difficult to work with teammates who may not have such a device available.
Microsoft Publisher is more for beginners, or for basic needs, anyone with some familiarity with the Microsoft suite should be able to use it easily. If you’re looking to create something more graphic and advanced, you’d probably want to look into something like InDesign, which is not as user friendly if you’re not familiar with it at all. For basic needs the average employee should be able to use Microsoft Publisher with ease.
I have been able to create flyers and brochures that in the past we sent out to a marketing company and spent a ton of money on something I was able to do myself in minutes.
The quick and simple user experience has allowed us to create signs that are designed to keep people safe on our job sites. This is important because we take safety very seriously and sometimes need to be able to produce these signs in a matter of minutes so that the superintendent can safely mark off areas to avoid.
The program has taken the place of Word and Excel in many cases to make documents like proposals look more balanced and professional.
