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Many Colour Genie users' first encounter with a keyboard was when they unpacked their computer, plugged it in and got it running. Perhaps they find that it takes such a long time to enter programs and they make so many errors that the whole thing could seem pointless. Don't despair! NCGUG to the rescue! Typing Tutor by Dave Sullivan will not only get them used to the keyboard but also increase their typing speed, using all fingers.

After loading and running the program you are presented with a menu with seven main choices, ranging from single rows to the whole keyboard. Each choice has a further five sublevels of difficulty from simple sequences of keys to words based on the range of keys used with some shifting involved.

Start at level one and progress through the main menu as your proficiency increases. (A word of warning - the Tutor will not allow you to move on until you are word perfect). While practising, each time you get it right a bleep sounds, and if you get it wrong the bleep changes tone.

The final level (7) is an overall test to help you see how well you are doing and how fast you can type. In order to keep in line with a typewriter, Typing Tutor throughout reverses the keys of your Colour Genie so that you have to press shift to get capital letters.

Being a two-finger typist myself, I found that using the Typing Tutor certainly speeded me up and I am gradually using *all* my fingers with an increasing degree of accuracy.

Although the program cannot cope with fast touch-typing speeds (being written in Basic) it will certainly be a boon to the majority of Colour Genie users. The instructions are helpful and user-friendly. Typing Tutor has much to be recommended. It works on any Colour Genie.

Roger Crossley